Dark Adeptus

by Ben Counter

  'Of course. All this time in the warp, bargaining with the Fell Powers. This devotion to Chaos. This form that is not flesh and not machine. What else am I? What else could I be?'

  The Castigator's body took on the appearance of flesh, pale and covered in bulging veins. Its eyes sank into deep, scorched sockets and claws were growing from its fingers. It was still humanoid, but it was becoming the half-flesh, half-magic stuff of dae­mons.

  Alaric felt it against his soul, massive and crushing, the sign of a daemonic presence the like of which he had not felt since he had confronted Ghargatuloth on Volcanis Ultor. The Castigator was an awesome presence, almost deafening. Alaric's shield of faith bowed under the enormity of it - the Castigator was battering at Alaric's mental defences without even having to will it. It was a daemon at last - and dae­mons were something Alaric understood.

  Savage joy flared in the Castigator's eyes. It raised its hands and green flames flowed from its fingers.

  'Yes! A daemon am I! Thank you, justicar! At last, I am complete!'

  'You're welcome,' said Alaric. 'And now you die.'

  Chapter Twenty

  'Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of the daemon, I shall fear nothing. For I am what the daemon fears!

  - Grand Master Mandulis of the Grey Knights

  THE TITAN WORKS spread out below the belly of the Hellforger. The ship's enormous shadow turned Chaeroneia's permanent twilight into the black of night as the grand cruiser descended through the last few layers of pollutant cloud and into the relatively clear lower atmosphere. The navigation daemon kept the cruiser's battery of thrusters firing constantly keeping the Hellforger hanging impossibly over the titan works. Few newer ships could have managed it - most were not even designed for the possibility of atmospheric flight. But the Hellforger was old indeed and it knew a few tricks the Imperial Navy had long forgotten.

  On the bridge, Urkrathos was studying the images of the titan works intently. Such was the massive power usage of the facility that the ship's sensors had trouble cutting through all the interference - the ocu­lar glands on the ship's underside had barely been able to focus on the place and send clear images to the bridge. The Titans were clear enough, hundreds of them standing silently to attention like an honour guard for Urkrathos's arrival. But details were diffi­cult. And details were important, because it was one particular Titan that had grabbed Abaddon's atten­tion. So Urkrathos had to confirm that the signal was genuine, by scanning the banks of pict-screens that had been extruded from the body of one of the bridge sensor-daemons.

  Urkrathos could just make out the shapes of Reavers and Warlords, even a few Warhound Scout Titans. One Titan had fallen and Urkrathos's trained eye spotted the signs of a short, vicious battle among the wreckage. There were bodies and bullet scars everywhere. But Urkrathos wasn't interested in that.

  His eye caught the cherry-red of molten metal and he homed in on one pict-screen showing a massive charred crater, molten wreckage smouldering in its centre. 'There.' He said to the sensor-daemon. 'Enlarge.'

  The sensor-daemon moaned and its bulbous, fleshy body quivered as most of the pict-screens sank back into its skin and the one showing the crater grew larger. The image shuddered as the ocular strained to refocus before the image was sharp again.

  Urkrathos studied it more closely - a Titan had been destroyed, recently and catastrophically He couldn't tell what type of Titan it had been, but that wasn't what interested him - what he really noticed was the massive footprints crushed deep into the rockcrete.

  He willed the ship's sensors to scan along the path of the footprints. They were massive, larger even than those of an Imperator Titan. Then the scanners ranged across an expanse of shimmering white armour, bright even through the static on the pict-screen.

  Urkrathos saw the flicker of green flame, the mas­sive multi-barelled gun and the graceful lines of something that could never have been built by tech-priests, Dark Mechanicus or otherwise.

  He had found it. The tribute promised by Chaeroneia to Abaddon the Despoiler, the tribute Urkrathos had been sent by the Despoiler to collect. The Father of Titans, the ultimate god-machine, which contained within it the information needed to build a thousand more of its kind. The weapon that would end the Thirteenth Black Crusade and begin Abaddon's inexorable conquest of the galaxy.

  'Hold position,' ordered Urkrathos. 'And prepare the landing parties.'

  IN THE TIME it took Alaric to raise his gun, the Castigator flitted to the far side of the chamber, its burning eyes narrowed with anger. In the time it took to pull the trigger, the green fire had flowed from its eyes, down its mouthless face and arms and surrounded its clawed hands.

  Storm bolter fire spattered across the chamber as Alaric sprayed on full-auto. The Castigator moved almost too fast for Alaric to see - two shots thunked into its chest but the rest flew just wide, blasting spider-web cracks into the data-blocks which flared glossy black where they were hit.

  'Betrayal!' screamed the daemon. 'It understands and yet it defies! Treachery!' The Castigator, wreathed in flame, dived at Alaric. Alaric turned one hand away but the other grabbed his gun arm, forcing it away as he fired another volley of shots.

  The daemon wrenched Alaric up off the data-block. For a moment Alaric was looking into those hate-filled green eyes, the flame rippling over his armour and the skin of his face. Then the Castigator threw Alaric with all its might, straight into the data-block wall behind him.

  Alaric's armoured bulk was considerable and the Castigator was strong. Alaric smashed through the glassy data medium, thousands of shards slicing at him as he flew. He crashed through several layers of the cogitator core and then was bathed in ice-cold green fire, boiling around him with enough force to throw him further.

  Alaric realised where he was. He had flown right through the burning eye of the Castigator's Titan, into the open air. He thought quickly enough to grab the lip of the armour below the Titan's immense face, his legs dangling over the sheer drop down to the ground. He pulled himself onto the carapace, his Marine's training enabling him to casually count off his injuries without the pain overwhelming him - his face was burned, the back of his ribcage was frac­tured and the shoulder of his gun arm was badly wrenched.

  He saw a huge, dark shape above him, a massive wedge of corrupted metal so vast it was like a rotting steel sky. A spacecraft, come to Chaeroneia to answer the Castigator's signal and take the Father of Titans back to the court of Abaddon. That meant Alaric was almost too late.

  A sound snapped Alaric's attention away from the sight. Something was bounding across the carapace towards Alaric - bestial, canine, half-way between lizard and insect, with a snapping lopsided maw full of lashing tentacles. A daemon.

  Alaric fumbled to get his Nemesis halberd off his back, but he was too slow and the thing was on him. The edge of the carapace was near and the surface was slippery and curved - Alaric fought to keep his footing as he tried to draw his weapon and he knew he wouldn't have time before the creature slammed into him and pitched him over the edge to his death.

  A sound like a thunderclap ripped out of nowhere and the daemon came apart in a shower of black-green gore. Alaric looked up to see Brother Dvorn lunge out from behind the curve of the Titan's high armoured collar, smacking his Nemesis hammer into the hissing remains of the daemon.

  'Justicar!' said Dvorn in surprise. 'You're alive! He glanced down at the puddle of acidic mess that had once been the daemon. 'Damn things came at us in a mass. We fought them off but there are still some left. Haulvarn reckons we're an infection and these things are the immune system.'

  'He's right.' said Alaric, bracing himself against the Titan's collar armour and moving away from the edge. 'But there's worse. I found the greater daemon controlling this machine and it's angry. And by the look of it we'll have company very soon.' Alaric pointed up at the ship hanging above them - lander ports were already opening on its underside and Alaric knew that it would only be a few minutes befo
re landing craft or drop pods rained down, full of Chaos troops eager to claim their tribute.

  'Justicar!' called Brother Haulvarn, hurrying across the carapace. Like Dvorn he had obviously fought long and hard against the Castigator's lesser dae­mons - perhaps that was why Alaric had made it to the cogitator core unmolested by them. 'I felt it wake. What is it?'

  'I don't know for sure and it doesn't matter. Broth­ers, this machine must be destroyed. The reactor core is open, you can get in through the Titan's eye. Do whatever you can to destabilize it.'

  'Yes, justicar.' said Haulvarn. 'And the daemon?'

  The Castigator's burning form burst out through the top of the daemon's head, screaming its rage, the muscles of its new daemonic body writhing as it turned its anger into raw strength to tear Alaric apart.

  'I'll deal with it.' said Alaric. 'The Chaos fleet wants the Titan. Don't leave them anything to find. Go!'

  Haulvarn and Dvorn ran round towards the front of the Titan's head. As Alaric had hoped, the Castigator ignored them. It was Alaric it wanted to kill. Alaric was the betrayer - the one who had under­stood, but not submitted.

  The Castigator screeched and sent bolts of green flame rippling down towards Alaric like comets. But Alaric, for all his size and the weight of his armour, was a Space Marine, his body enhanced to be quick as well as strong. He rolled away from the first strike and ducked past the next, spraying fire up at the Cas­tigator. The rear edge of the carapace was dangerously close and the yawning drop swung by as Alaric scrabbled away from the daemon's fire. The Castigator was fast, too and zipped around above the Titan.

  More fire fell in fat shimmering bursts that blew hissing craters in the Titan's shoulder armour. The Castigator was frustrated. It had probably never failed to get its way before. It didn't care any more about subtle manipulations or a plan that had taken a thousand years to play out. It just wanted to kill. It was the only advantage Alaric had and he was going to use it.

  The Castigator dived, determined to finish Alaric with his bare claws. Alaric swept the Nemesis halberd at it and cut a deep gouge across the Castigator's chest, stepping to the side as the daemon slammed a fist into the carapace.

  The daemon lashed out and caught Alaric on the chest. Alaric stumbled backwards and the daemon was upon him, slashing at him, cutting through the ceramite of his chest armour as if it was nothing, bat­tering him backwards towards the edge.

  The daemon was strong. As strong as anything Alaric had ever faced in close combat. And it was winning.

  Alaric felt an arm break in the Castigator's grip. It was his gun arm. He could do without it for now. He wrenched the arm around, feeling it fold uselessly and slip out of the Castigator's grip. It gave him the freedom to force the Castigator off him and headbutt the creature square in its featureless face. The dae­mon reeled and Alaric spun his halberd, cracking the butt end into the Castigator's throat and following up with a slash that carved a furrow down its face.

  Teeth slid from the edges of the wound, giving the Castigator a revolting vertical mouth that drooled blood as the Castigator howled. It kicked out and prehensile claws on its foot gripped Alaric's leg. The Castigator soared upwards, flying up above the Titan with Alaric dangling from its grip. The collar armour shot by and suddenly Alaric was high in the air, the drop dizzying as it spun beneath him as the Castigator flew high up above the titan works, towards the steel sky of the Chaos ship.

  It was going to drop him. It was so simple. Alaric could fight as well as almost any other soldier the Imperium had, but one thing he couldn't do was fly.

  The Castigator let go. Alaric pivoted in the air, shifting his weight to turn himself the right way up. He stabbed up with the halberd, forcing his broken arm to move in a two-handed strike that thrust the halberd blade up over his head.

  The blade punched into the Castigator's abdomen and passed right through. Alaric twisted the blade and it caught, leaving him hanging by the halberd. The Castigator twisted and screamed, trying to dis­lodge the blade and send Alaric tumbling to his death. But it was losing height, too, its concentra­tion broken and its powers of flight compromised by rage and pain. The Castigator swooped low, not much slower than a dead fall, the surface of the titan works streaking by beneath it. Alaric hung on grimly as the daemon flew between the legs of the Warlord Titan and banked to avoid the solid mass of a bunker.

  They hit the ground badly, the blade coming free as Alaric and the daemon cartwheeled across the rockcrete. For a moment everything was blackness and pain. Alaric's head cracked against the rockcrete and broken teeth rattled around in his head, a gunshot of pain flar­ing from his broken arm. For a moment he wasn't sure if he was alive or whether he was now tumbling towards one of the hells to which sinners were sent, to be punished for his failure.

  Alaric skidded to a halt. His vision swam back and he shook the pain from his head. He was alive. He rolled onto his front and grabbed the halberd that had landed next to him. Looking up, he saw the Castigator was already on its feet.

  The wound in its abdomen was a pulsing black mass. Bladed limbs reached out of the wound, grasping hands, writhing tentacles, the manifold form of the daemon taking hold. Alaric pulled himself up into a crouch and the pain was gone, replaced by the iron-hard discipline of a Space Marine. The two were twenty metres apart, close enough for Alaric to see every muscle in the Casti­gator's mutating body bunch up ready to pounce. Alaric was the same, winding up for the strike, knowing that this was his one chance to take on the Castigator in the only way he could - up close, hand-to-hand, face-to-face, where his Space Marine's strength and Grey Knight's ferocity would count the most.

  For a moment they watched one another, man and daemon, each mind filled with nothing but the death of the other. Then, as one, they charged.

  Alaric sprinted. The Castigator thrust itself for­wards on dozens of insectoid limbs, its drooling maw and limb-filled wound gaping to crush and kill. The two slammed into one another and the final murderous struggle exploded in a mass of stabbing limbs and slashing blades.

  Clawed hands reached out. Alaric cut them off with his first slash. His second bit deep through the Castigator's corrupted mass even as it grew and flowed around him. The Castigator tried to drag him in and Alaric welcomed it, pushing into the lethal mass of bony blades and lashing tentacles.

  Alaric ripped one foot out of the mass and crunched it down through bone and gristle, forcing himself upwards towards the Castigator's head. The Grey Knight yelled a wordless prayer of rage and pulled his halberd clear, switching the grip and dri­ving it deep into the Castigator's throat. The corrupted mass sucked the halberd out of his hand but he didn't care, raising his fist again and punching the Castigator's corrupted face.

  A Grey Knight was trained to act with deliberation and level-headedness and leave behind the heedless bloodlust that characterized some Chapters of the Adeptus Astartes. But they also knew that every enemy demanded a different type of fight. Some would be defeated with cunning and guile, others with strength of will, both things at which the Grey Knights excelled. But there were some enemies, some among the ranks of the daemon, that could only be defeated with good old-fashioned rage.

  It was rage that drove Alaric then. Again and again he slammed his fist into the Castigator's face, into the lipless mouth-wound and the burning eyes. He felt the deaths of his battle-brothers, of Archis and Lykkos and of Archmagos Saphentis and the tech-guard. He felt Hawkespur's savage wound and the breaking of Thalassa's spirit. The suffering of Chaeroneia a thousand years ago, ripped into the warp where those who resisted were consumed by the dark gods, all for the satisfaction of an intelli­gence that should never have existed. He felt them all and welded them into a diamond-hard spike of hatred that he drove into the Castigator's corrupted soul just as he drove his fist into its face.

  The daemon stumbled backwards on its many new limbs, reeling. Its face was a gory mess, green flames licking from dozens of cuts. Alaric reached into the gaping wound in its throat and
pulled his halberd out, bringing a fountain of gore with it.

  'You should have picked an enemy,' said Alaric, 'with less imagination.' He swung the halberd in a great arc and sliced off the Castigator's head.

  The death-scream was the loudest sound Alaric had ever heard. The Castigator howled in binary as it died, its information bleeding out of it in zeroes and ones like machine gun fire. Pure information shot from the Castigator's ruined body like fireworks and among them Alaric glimpsed its thoughts. He saw endless legions of Castigator Titans marching on the Imperial palace on Terra, standing in ranks of thou­sands on the surface of Mars. He saw destruction, so absolute the very stars were burned out by its feroc­ity, leaving behind a black and dead universe where the Castigator's purpose had finally been realized. But then they were gone and without the Castigator's will to hold it together the mass of information became a shower of meaningless fragments, spi­ralling scraps of light that died as the Castigator's own life flooded out of it in a pool of corrupted gore.

  The daemon's head thudded wetly onto the ground. Alaric took a couple of steps away from its hissing oozing corpse and sunk to his knees, exhausted. The Castigator's body slumped to one side - it was the size of a tank, swollen with corrupted growths, dry and tat­tered now the information that fuelled it was gone. Its skin began sloughing off and the body started to melt.

  Alaric looked round to the Castigator's Titan, domi­nating the forest of Titans. One of its eyes exploded, the green flame exploding out to be replaced with a plume of wild plasma.

  The reactor was critical. The plasma was boiling over as it approached catastrophic mass. Haulvarn and Dvorn had succeeded.

  Alaric picked up the battered head of the Castigator. The green flame was just a faint flickering now, barely reaching past what remained of its eye sockets. Its ver­tical, gaping mouth was dumb. Alaric held up the head so it could see the Titan.