Heroes of the Space Marines

by Nick Kyme

‘Limited,’ said Altando, ‘and so it will remain, inquisitor, without the resources we need. Ah, but it appears you have solved that problem. Correct?’

  The inquisitor muttered something and the blank-eyed servitor trudged forward. It stopped just in front of Altando and wordlessly passed him the black metal case.

  Altando accepted it without thanks, his own heavily augmented body having no trouble with the weight. ‘Let us go next door, inquisitor,’ he said, ‘to the primary laboratory.’

  The hooded figure followed the magos into a chamber on the left, leaving the servitor where it stood, staring lifelessly into empty space.

  The laboratory was large, but so packed with devices of every conceivable scientific purpose that there was little room to move. Servo-skulls hovered in the air overhead, awaiting commands, their metallic components gleaming in the lamplight. Altando placed the black case on a table in the middle of the room, and unfurled a long mechanical arm from his back. It was tipped with a las-cutter.

  ‘May I?’ asked the magos.

  ‘Proceed.’

  The cutter sent bright red sparks out as it traced the circumference of the case. When it was done, the mechanical arm folded again behind the magos’s back, and another unfurled over the opposite shoulder. This was tipped with a powerful metal manipulator, like an angular crab’s claw but with three tapering digits instead of two. With it, the magos clutched the top of the case, lifted it, and set it aside. Then he dipped the manipulator into the box and lifted out the head of Balthazog Bludwrekk.

  ‘Yes,’ he grated through his vocaliser. ‘This will be perfect.’

  ‘It had better be,’ said the inquisitor. ‘These new orkoid machines represent a significant threat, and the Inquisition must have answers.’

  The magos craned forward to examine the severed head. It was frozen solid, glittering with frost. The cut at its neck was incredibly clean, even at the highest magnification his eye-lenses would allow.

  It must have been a fine weapon indeed that did this, Altando thought. No typical blade.

  ‘Look at the distortion of the skull,’ he said. ‘Look at the features. Fascinating. A mutation, perhaps? Or a side effect of the channelling process? Give me time, inquisitor, and the august Ordo Xenos will have the answers it seeks.’

  ‘Do not take too long, magos,’ said the inquisitor as he turned to leave. ‘And do not disappoint me. It took my best assets to acquire that abomination.’

  The magos barely registered these words. Nor did he look up to watch the inquisitor and his servitor depart.

  He was already far too engrossed in his study of the monstrous head.

  Now, at long last, he could begin to unravel the secrets of the strange ork machine.

  AND THEY SHALL KNOW NO FEAR…

  Darren Cox

  009.009.832.M41

  04.52

  ‘THREE MINUTES UNTIL blackout.’

  The vox crackle from the Land Raider’s driver pulled Castellan Marius Reinhart from his silent liturgies. Bathed in the interior’s red light, he released himself from his assault harness and stood. His armour’s gyro-stabilisers steadied him against the buck of the transport’s passage as he peered over the driver’s shoulder.

  Through the forward viewport he watched as flashes of lightning fractured the night and revealed a landscape of icy rock and jagged peaks. Above, strange auroras moved across a sea of churning storm clouds. Even over the rumble of the Land Raider’s tracks he could hear the slow roll of thunder.

  ‘How far are we from our target?’

  The Land Raider’s co-driver adjusted a series of brass dials on the forward console. ‘At our current speed, auspex readings mark us thirty minutes out.’

  ‘Do we have any readings from the keep, any residual power spikes?’

  ‘Negative, Castellan, the storm is jamming the majority of our forward sensors. There is no way to say for certain.’

  Reinhart growled a curse under his breath. They were going in blind. Atmosphereologists aboard the Black Templar flagship, the Revenant, had warned him and his Sword Brethren about the dangers of the electromagnetic storm raging over Stygia XII’s upper polar region – and over their waiting target. The forge-world’s storms could affect the machine-spirit of even the most basic device – a fact necessitating their insertion by Thunderhawk transports just beyond the storm’s perimeter. Though a direct flight through the storm would have saved the most time, there was no way to tell if the Thunderhawk’s systems could withstand the fury of the electromagnetic pulses. The risk was too great and their cargo too precious. The Land Raiders would have to get them as close as possible.

  Reinhart keyed his vox, triggering the command channel connecting him to the rest of his battle-brothers in the convoy. ‘Escalade Two, Escalade Three; we’re approaching the storm’s blackout perimeter. Be prepared for vox interference.’

  Two of the twelve amber runes displayed on his visor flashed briefly. Chaplain Mathias, commanding the second Land Raider, and Brother-Sergeant Janus, commanding the third, had received and understood.

  Through the viewport Reinhart could see the track ahead narrowing into a rocky defile.

  ‘Understood, Escalade Three.’ The driver turned in his seat, addressing Reinhart. ‘We’re moving into a single ingress line. Escalade Three will take point.’

  Reinhart nodded and turned back to the Land Raider’s hold, grasping an overhead stabiliser. In preparation, the interior of the hold had been stripped bare, leaving room only for its cargo and three occupants.

  ‘Brother Cerebus, Brother Fernus, prepare the Ark’s shield.’

  On either side of the hold, two Techmarines, their helmets heavy with neural cables, turned towards him and nodded. They bowed over a great armoured casket – what they called the Ark. Its surface was incised with the baroque runes of the Adeptus Mechanicus, and grav-engines kept it suspended just above the floor.

  Chanting the rites of activation, the Techmarines coupled their grafted servo-arms with the Ark’s forward actuators. Moments later a heavy thrum vibrated through the hold. A pale shimmer began to enshroud the Ark. Reinhart could not help but watch in awe as the machine-spirit was drawn from its slumber by the warrior-priests.

  He found himself joining them in a prayer of his own.

  ‘Emperor, protect us in this hour of need, may you see the truth of our actions. Allow us to be the instruments of your will and steer our hands on this blessed duty.’

  With the Techmarines’ rite complete Reinhart could barely see the Ark through the coalescing motes of energy that surrounded it. Lexmechanics aboard the Revenant had built the shield to specifically retard the effects of Stygia XII’s storms and protect the Ark’s internal functions. If it failed, millions would pay the price.

  ‘Castellan, we have contact. Escalade Three is taking fire.’

  Reinhart whirled back to the viewport just as the heavy staccato thump of rounds stitched across the exterior of their own Land Raider. ‘Where? Where is it coming from?’ He braced himself as a violent shudder ripped through the hull of the transport. Alarms sounded in time with the strobing of combat lamps.

  ‘They’ve taken out our starboard sponson!’ The co-driver shouted over the hail of gunfire. ‘It’s an ambush, right and left, above us, from the cliffs—’

  In front of them. Escalade Three blossomed into a searing ball of flame. Shrapnel from its shredded hide clanged against their forward armour. At once five runes disappeared from Reinhart’s visor.

  ‘Holy Throne!’ The driver, panic evident in his eyes, glanced over his shoulder at Reinhart. ‘They must have ruptured a fuel cell. Whoever they are, they have some heavy ordinance.’

  Reinhart ignored him. Unwilling to admit their fate, he keyed his vox and tried to reach Escalade Three. Only static answered. Brother-Sergeant Ianus plus Brothers Gorgon, Sangrill, Charsild and Eklain were five of the Templar’s most experienced and bravest Sword Brethren, each of them champions and legends in their own right. Together
, they had all survived countless battles on countless worlds, and now they were gone. The loss was staggering.

  ‘Castellan, your orders? Do we search for survivors?’

  Reinhart blinked. ‘They’re all dead. Drive – get us out of here.’

  With the heavy growl of turbine engines, the driver punched the throttle forward. Reinhart looked back to Cerebus and Fernus, both of whom stood protectively to either side of the Ark. Their Mechanicus power axes were held ready, shoulder-mounted bolters on-line. ‘Be ready! This is going to get rough!’ he yelled over the cacophony.

  Another violent lurch nearly sent him sprawling to the hold’s decking. A second series of alarms began to wail.

  ‘We can’t take much more, Castellan! We have armour breaches in three locations! If we continue to sustain this—’ A terrific blast of flame and smoke engulfed the cabin in front of Reinhart. Hot shrapnel flew in all directions, pinging off the ablative plates of his artificer-forged power armour. Beneath him, the Land Raider shuddered to a stop.

  Oily smoke began to fill the hold. Cerebus inserted a diagnostic cable from his chest plate into the Land Raider’s secondary codifier. The machine’s screenplate flickered as lines of scripture scrolled across its surface. The Techmarine’s augmented voice came over Reinhart’s vox reflecting nothing of the anarchy that boiled around them. ‘The Land Raider is crippled, Castellan. Evacuation is the only option before the engine’s plasma coils go critical.’

  Reinhart nodded. ‘Escalade Two, this is Escalade One; acknowledge.’

  Amid the crackle of static, Mathias’s vox keyed up. Reinhart heard the thunderous boom of bolter fire in the background. ‘I acknowledge, Castellan. Your Land Raider is blocking the track. We can’t get around. We are dismounting and moving to your position to secure the Ark.’

  Good, Reinhart thought. The Ark comes first; all of them would willingly sacrifice their lives to protect it. He drew his filigreed bolt pistol, its balanced weight a perfect extension of his armoured gauntlet. Whispering his Litany of Devotion, he clasped the bolter’s binding chain around his wrist, each link graven with the litany’s sacred words.

  ‘Brother Cerebus, Brother Fernus, exit forward.’ He gestured towards the hatch beneath the smoking crew cabin where the remains of the driver and co-driver crisped in the dying flames. ‘Chaplain Mathias and our battle-brothers in Escalade Two are moving to cover you. Get through to the target as quickly as possible. May the Emperor be with you.’

  Without waiting for their response, Reinhart turned, flipped open an access panel, and punched the quick release of the port side hatch. Explosive bolts blew the armoured door outwards. With a roar, Reinhart leapt into the frozen night of Stygia XII.

  Through swirling snow he was met by streaks of tracer fire lancing down from darkened figures in the crags. Las-pulses and solid shot tore up the ground around him in explosions of rock and ice.

  Within moments the crunch of footfalls and the bellow of war chants alerted him to Brother Apollos’s approach from the direction of Escalade Two. The giant Sword Brother marched through the gunfire as if striding through a heavy gale. Shells whined and spat off his ornate Terminator armour. He bore his giant thunder hammer chained to his wrist; in his other, a heavy bolt pistol tracked and fired. The newest of Castellan’s squad – and the youngest – Apollos had been awarded his tabard just a year prior. In that time, Reinhart had met few who could match his fervour in battle.

  Next to the hulking Terminator, a giant himself but dwarfed in Apollos’s shadow, was Brother Ackolon. The prime helix of the Apothecarius was emblazoned on his shoulder pad, his narthecium strapped securely to his back. Together, the Space Marines laid down a withering fusillade of fire, their blazing muzzle flashes lending a daemonic cast to their already terrifying countenances. Apollos reached the shadow of the burning Land Raider and crashed against its buckled armour, shielded against the fire from the opposite cliffside. He pulverised the rock face looming over them in a shower of bolter shells, sending shadowy foes diving for cover. Ackolon followed close behind and crouched next to Reinhart, slamming a fresh magazine into his bolter. ‘Castellan, Chaplain Mathias with Brothers Dorner, Gerard, and Julius are moving up the right; your orders?’

  ‘Keep moving,’ Reinhart voxed over the hammer of his bolter, even as a smoking slug blew a chunk from his ceramite leg guard. ‘They’ll cut us to pieces if we remain exposed in this Throne-forsaken defile much longer!’

  Ackolon nodded. ‘The Emperor protects!’ He motioned to Apollos and the two Space Marines burst from the cover of the crippled Land Raider, charging through the smoke and haze of gunfire. Reinhart fired a final volley, blowing two of the enemy from the cliff, then followed.

  Ahead, he could see the towering forms of Cerebus and Fernus fighting their way through the defile – the Ark between them – its shield sparking each time a round found its surface. Paralleling him across the narrow track, Chaplain Mathias, his golden skull helm gleaming, led the three remaining Sword Brethren at a full run, their bolters streaking angry gouts of automatic fire. Reaching the two Techmarines, Reinhart and his squad flowed seamlessly into a wide formation around the Ark. From their left, a rocket, spitting a fiery contrail, hissed through the air and detonated at Brother Julius’s feet.

  The blast vaporised his legs, blowing away his helmet and a good portion of his breastplate. The Templar fell, screaming hate around mouthfuls of bloody froth. Still, Julius’s bolter roared. Ackolon dashed to him, and began dragging him along, firing from the hip. Brother Gerard moved to help. Before he could reach them, a stray round blew through the knee joint of his armour. Blood sprayed, steaming on the frozen ground.

  Reinhart knew the situation was slipping from his grasp. Enemies they had yet to identify held the high ground, the rough terrain rendering them next to impossible to acquire. Worse yet, the storm of gunfire lacing the air around them only seemed to be intensifying.

  With two battle-brothers down, the squad moved into a tight circle, doing their best to cover all angles of fire. A sudden, earthshaking detonation washed the defile in blinding firelight – the crippled Land Raider had finally succumbed to its wounds. Then, as abruptly as it had started, the gunfire ceased.

  From somewhere forward of their position, where the defile opened into a deep valley, came the echoing booms of multiple engines. Reinhart risked a glance upwards.

  Dorner heard the booms as well, mistaking them for enemy fire. ‘Incoming!’ he yelled.

  Reinhart held up a fist. ‘Hold your fire; those are jump packs.’ With the words barely uttered, the sound of thumping bolters filled the night once more. Tracer rounds streaked down from the sky into the enemy positions high in the rocks.

  ‘Stay alert! Everyone hold their position.’

  In the momentary respite, Reinhart removed his helmet, its vox and visor readings going dead from the interference of the storm. The others followed suit. None of them could risk being blind and unable to communicate if the fighting broke out again. Reinhart moved to Brother Gerard. The injured Space Marine, blood colouring the lower leg of his power armour, stood over Ackolon and the stricken Brother Julius. The Castellan laid a hand on his shoulder. ‘How is your knee, brother?’

  Gerard continued to scan the defile, his bolter sweeping left and right. ‘A minor wound. I can still fight,’ he said. Reinhart looked down at Ackolon. ‘Brother Julius?’

  Ackolon shook his head. ‘Massive trauma. I’ve already removed his gene-seed.’

  Reinhart scanned the rocks. He felt the stares of his men. He looked back at Ackolon. ‘Then he will serve the Chapter in death,’ he said loud enough for all of them to hear. ‘So will we all, if that is what the Emperor’s will demands of us.’

  Overhead, the sound of bolter fire ceased, but Reinhart’s heightened senses could pick out the faint echo of a more intense exchange from somewhere deeper in the valley. Subtle flashes flickered in the darkness. An ochre cast stained the sky, a great conflagration raging just out o
f sight. He knew it could only be coming from one place. What he did not know was what waited for them there.

  Chaplain Mathias, the black cross of their Chapter tattooed on his forehead, moved to Reinhart’s side. ‘Castellan, our… rescuers… approach.’

  Reinhart turned. He glanced at Mathias, the disgust of their situation evident on the Chaplain’s grim face. From the direction of the valley a squad of women – armoured in crimson and sable – advanced. Catechisms of the Ecclesiarchy adorned their tabards, stitched in High Gothic around the blood red petals of a single rose. Each carried a finely worked, Godwyn Deaz-pattern bolter of gold and silver. It was the signature weapon of those female orphans raised in the schola progenium and inducted as Adepta Sororitas – battle-sisters of the Ordos Militant.

  The lead sister broke from her flanking guard. Reinhart moved to meet her, Mathias a step behind.

  Beneath short-cropped midnight-black hair, old scars lined what would have been an attractive face. Her marred beauty was accentuated by an augmetic targeting reticule that replaced her left eye; the jewelled lens glowed a baleful red. ‘Brother Astartes,’ she said, her voice as cold as the biting wind. ‘I am Sister Superior Helena Britaine of the Third Celestian Squad of the Order of the Bloody Rose.’

  ‘Castellan Marius Reinhart of the Sword Brethren of the Black Templars,’ Reinhart gestured to Mathias. The Chaplain stepped forward, his skull helm held in the crook of his arm, his crozius arcanum – topped with a glittering Imperial eagle – cradled in the other. ‘This is Chaplain Mathias Vlain.’

  The Sister Superior nodded. ‘Well met, brothers of the Emperor.’ Her single blue eye drifted past the two Astartes to the others who still waited, bolters at the ready. ‘My Seraphim have driven the enemy from the cliffs. It should be safe for the moment. I can offer medical assistance to any of your battle-brothers who require it.’

  ‘We have our own Apothecary,’ Reinhart said, then stepped closer, his voice low. ‘What I do need are answers. How have you and your sisters come to be here?’