A number of souls burned fiercely in the room, one so bright it caused him pain just to look upon it. Word Bearers.
With a thought, Liventius slammed into the mind of one of the traitors. It was vile and repellent, and the Word Bearer struggled against him, but he drove into him with all the focus of an assassin’s knife, overcoming his will completely.
He blinked and turned his meat-puppet towards the psychic black hole, so as to see it with physical eyes.
It appeared before him: a spinning orb of silver held captive within a series of rotating arcs.
Seven other Word Bearers stood in a circle around the device, but if they realised an impostor was within their midst, they did not show it. There was another being within the room, reclined as if in a trance upon a high-backed throne, and Liventius knew instantly that this was the psyker who had erected the defences around the Word Bearers fleet, the one who was hunting him now. He dared not let his gaze linger, lest the monstrously powerful psyker feel his touch.
Not yet fully in command of this borrowed flesh, Liventius’ movements were sluggish and awkward. He took one ponderous step forwards, breaking the circle of Word Bearers. He felt the attention of the others turn towards him. In his hands he held a corrupted bolter, and this he lifted towards the spinning silver device, the source that held the Boros Gate in its thrall. His finger tightened upon the trigger of the borrowed weapon.
The awesomely powerful mind of the Word Bearers apostate caught up with him, slamming into him with staggering force. He was almost dislodged from the flesh of the Word Bearer, but he clung on, ignoring the searing pain. He was desperate to finish his task, knowing the fate of the Boros Gate rested with the destruction of this infernal device.
The Word Bearers puppet was fighting him once more, attempting to regain control of his own movements, and he began to lower his weapon. Redoubling his efforts, Liventius dragged the bolter back up towards the spinning device.
Bolt rounds struck him as the other Word Bearers turned their guns on their brother, and he staggered. Again, the Apostle struck him psychically, this time with even more force, and he was knocked out of the borrowed flesh.
Now you are mine, thundered the voice of the Apostle.
Liventius roared in agony as his spirit was wracked with soul-fire. Agonising psychic shackles closed around him, but he thrashed and struggled against them, until with a final surge he tore himself free.
With a gasp, Librarian Epistolary Liventius opened his eyes. Agony crashed in upon him, and his vision wavered. Steadying himself, wiping blood from his nose, he looked around him. All the candles in the antechamber were out, but even in the near pitch darkness, Liventius could see the thirteen psykers that had aided him were dead. He had failed.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Ostorius knelt before the holo-images of Chapter Master Titus Valens and his Captain, Marcus Decimus of 5th Company. His head was bowed, and he held his power sword flat in his hands as he waited for an answer.
“If I allow this,” said the ghostly image of the White Consuls Chapter Master, “it will leave Kronos critically undermanned.”
“If you do not allow it, we stand no chance of ending this war,” said Captain Decimus. “Liventius failed in his attempt. A direct assault upon the device is the logical next step.”
“If it fails, Kronos will belong to the Word Bearers.”
“If it fails, then none of this matters anyway,” said Decimus.
“Were it practical, I’d lead the attack myself,” said Valens. Ostorius could hear frustration in the Chapter Master’s voice. “But I believe you two are right. This is our best chance to end this war. Do it.”
“Assemble your kill-team, Ostorius,” said Captain Decimus.
“Thank you, my lords,” said Ostorius.
“May the Emperor guide your sword, Proconsul.”
Burias-Drak’shal raced across the battlements in bounding leaps, his claws gouging deep rents in the marble. Like a shadow chased by the sun, he moved across the rooftops in a blur.
Bunching his powerful leg muscles, he exploded off the top of a bastion, his leap carrying him clear over the wide-laned street far below. Chimeras and front-line Leman Russ battle tanks were advancing along that boulevard, completely unaware that their movement was being shadowed by the possessed warrior high overhead.
Arms bulging with daemonic muscle, Burias-Drak’shal came down hard, clearing the thirty-metre expanse with ease. He turned in the air, landing on the rooftop of the lower bastion. He rolled and came to his feet smoothly, and again was off, bounding and leaping on all fours.
He launched himself off another vertigo-inducing drop-off and landed halfway up the side of a vertical antennae-pylon, clinging to the sheer surface like a spider. With swift movements, barely pausing to find handholds, he scurried up the vertical incline, pulling himself hand over hand to its peak. There he paused, tasting the air and cocking his head to one side, listening. All his daemon-enhanced senses were utterly focussed on the hunt.
The sound of battle was loud; a major confrontation was playing out less than ten kilometres away. It was a battle that the Chimeras were angling towards.
He was ahead of the armoured column now, and as it rounded a corner, it was forced into single file to navigate past a fallen building.
Burias-Drak’shal’s eyes focussed on the third Chimera in the line. The APC had a cluster of communication arrays rising from its hull, like the spines of an insect, differentiating it from the others. This was the one that Burias-Drak’shal had seen the White Consul enter, several hours earlier.
The possessed Icon Bearer dropped off the pylon, falling like a stone. He landed thirty metres below, crouched on all fours. His bestial head turned from side to side, sniffing. Then he set off once more, closing inexorably with his prey.
The full extent of the 34th Host had come together, and the warrior brothers of the Host fought shoulder-to-shoulder, laying waste to all that dared oppose them.
The turrets of corrupted Predator battle tanks rotated, spewing torrents of high-calibre shells down boulevards and byways, killing hundreds. The air crackled as Land Raiders unleashed the power of their lascannons, targeting armoured columns and tank formations.
The heavy, bipedal forms of Dreadnoughts ranged out in front, roaring with mechanised insanity as they killed, gunning down scores of Guardsmen with heavy gauge weapon systems and ripping them apart with power talons and electro-flails. The Warmonger stalked amongst them, bellowing catechisms and holy scripture, reliving the days when he was a warrior of flesh and blood, fighting upon the walls of the Emperor’s Palace and exhorting his Host to kill and kill again in the name of Lorgar and the Warmaster Horus, ten millennia earlier.
Daemons numbering in their thousands had been summoned forth from bleeding rents ripped in the fabric of reality, and they brayed in fury and bloodlust as they charged into the densely packed ranks of Guardsmen. Kathartes descended upon the Imperial soldiers in flocks a hundred-strong, dragging their victims high into the air before ripping them limb from limb and dropping them into the streets below.
Titans as tall as buildings stalked in the distance, their bestial howls reverberating across the city. Their princeps and moderati had long been subsumed into the substance of the Titans, and powerful daemonic entities bound and infused with them, making the mighty engines more living, breathing beasts than mechanised constructs.
Heavily armed Warlord- and Reaver-class engines laid waste to entire city blocks with the power of their ordnance. Their armoured hulls were pitted from ten thousand years of warfare, and kill-pennants hung from their weapons.
Comparatively smaller Warhound-class Titans loped through the streets, hunting. Unnervingly stealthy for engines four storeys high, they stalked through the mayhem of battle, annihilating colonnades of battle tanks, and butchering entire brigades of Guardsmen with salvoes of their Inferno cannons.
Their bestial howls ululated across the city as they claimed ano
ther kill.
Somewhere out there was the enemy that had come to be known as the White Angel. That individual was the lynchpin of the enemy’s resolve. Kill him, and the world would soon falter.
“Come on, Burias,” Marduk hissed.
The tainted stench within the Word Bearers Thunderhawk was vile, yet Ostorius repressed his revulsion. He had claimed the assault shuttle a week earlier, and although he could not have said why at the time, he had not ordered its immediate destruction.
Now, as it carried him and his carefully chosen kill-team of White Consuls across the gulf of space between Kronos and the largest of the enemy battleships, he hoped that his decision had proved a wise one.
Priests of the Ecclesiarchy had cleansed the shuttle of the worst of its taint, yet Ostorius could still feel its corrupting touch all around him. It made his skin crawl, and he repressed a shudder of disgust. He wore his helmet so as not to breathe the foetid air within the Thunderhawk, yet even so he could taste the poison of Chaos in his throat. He was not alone in his discomfort. The White Consuls of his kill-team murmured prayers of purification, and several of them held holy icons tightly in their hands.
At any moment Ostorius expected the Thunderhawk to be gunned down. Even as the shuttle entered the shadow of the monstrous enemy flagship, the Crucius Maledictus, and began to angle down towards one of its gaping launch bays, he still expected the enemy to see through the ruse and obliterate them.
His fears proved to be unfounded, and after what seemed like an eternity, the Thunderhawk’s landing gear touched down. They were onboard the enemy vessel.
“Move out,” he said grimly.
There was an almighty crash that shook the occupants of the Chimera, and it ground to a halt. Voices were raised.
“What was that?” said Aquilius. It had not sounded like ordnance.
Gears ground together, and the Chimera began slowly backing up.
“Apologies, my lord,” said one of the other occupants, Versus of the Boros 232nd. “There is a blockage ahead. This area has suffered heavy shelling, and is structurally unsound. We are being forced to re-route in order to rejoin the column.”
“Casualties?”
“None, my lord.”
Aquilius shifted his weight in discomfort, and cursed as his head hit the roof with a dull thud. The APC had not been designed to hold the bulk of a Space Marine.
“I’m going up,” he said, and began clambering awkwardly across the right enclosed space within the Chimera towards its cupola.
Climbing the slender ladder, his shoulders only barely fitting through its aperture, Aquilius popped the cupola hatch and pulled himself up. He breathed in deeply, pleased to be out of the enclosed space. A pintle-mounted heavy stubber lay at rest within arm’s reach.
A massive statue lay smashed across the boulevard twenty metres in front of the Chimera. Dust filled the air. Shielding his eyes, Aquilius looked up to see from where it had fallen.
There was a heavy thump behind him, and the Chimera rocked. Aquilius’ first thought was that more falling masonry had struck the APC, but then the tainted smell of Chaos reached his nostrils.
“Enemy!” he shouted, reaching for his bolt pistol.
There was a blur of movement behind him and he caught a glimpse of a horrific, daemonic creature crouched upon the back of the Chimera’s hull. He lifted his bolt pistol as the thing snarled and leapt towards him, but the weapon was smashed out of his hand. A taloned claw grabbed him around the neck and he was hauled out of the Chimera and hurled aside.
Aquilius hit the ground hard, crashing down onto a pile of rubble that had been pushed up against a shattered building wall. He heard frantic shouting above the growl of the Chimera’s engines.
He came to his feet quickly, reaching for his blade, but his daemonic foe was faster. It leapt from on top of the Chimera and tackled him to the ground again, snarling and spitting. The Astartes was hauled back to his feet and slammed face-first into the side of his turning Chimera, denting its armoured plates and shattering Aquilius’ nose.
The Chimera’s rear hatch was thrown open, and he heard boots hitting the ground as the APC’s occupants leapt out to aid their Coadjutor.
A lasgun burn seared across the back of the possessed warrior’s head, and he snarled in anger. It drove Aquilius’ head into the Chimera once more before releasing him and leaping towards these new enemies, its jaw opening wider than should have been possible.
Screams and the sickly sound of meat being hacked apart reached Aquilius’ ears as he steadied himself. He drew his thick-bladed combat knife and rounded on his foe.
Four men were down, screaming as blood poured from their horrific wounds. One was missing his left arm, the limb having been ripped from its socket, while another was clutching vainly at his savaged throat. The daemon’s maw closed around the head of another, helmet and all. It popped like an overripe fruit, and blood splattered across the beast’s face and chest.
Aquilius bellowed a challenge and leapt towards the unholy creature that was butchering his men. It turned towards him as it heard his cry, eyes narrowed to blood-red slits.
The butt of a lasgun slammed into the side of the monster’s head. It was a powerful blow, delivered with all of Verenus’ strength, but for all his size and strength, he was but a man. The daemon grabbed him around the neck and hurled him away, throwing him deep into the ruins. Still, Verenus had distracted the creature long enough for Aquilius to close the distance.
He lowered his shoulder and slammed into the possessed Word Bearer, throwing him back into the Chimera. He knew that his combat knife would have no chance of penetrating his enemy’s power armour, so he wielded it like a dagger, driving it down towards his foe’s exposed neck.
The blade bit deep, sinking to the hilt, and hot blood spilt over Aquilius’ gauntlet. The beast roared in pain and fury, and one of its curving horns slashed across Aquilius’ face as it bucked and struggled in his grasp. He ignored the pain and stabbed again but the daemon spun him around, slamming him up against the Chimera, and the knife missed its target, glancing off the Word Bearer’s shoulder plate.
Using all of its infernal strength, the Word Bearer slammed its knee up into Aquilius’ mid-section, cracking ceramite. The White Consul gasped as the wind was driven from him, and sank to his knees. The possessed warrior dropped his elbow into the back of his neck as he went down, slamming him to the ground.
The beast bent over him, and Aquilius felt a warm rivulet of drool upon his cheek. He strained to fight on, but he was helpless. The beast drew back one of its hands, thick talons poised to kill.
“Their hope will die with you,” snarled the beast, in a guttural voice.
“Hope never dies,” managed Aquilius.
The beast’s lips curled in a sneer. Then a blue-hot lasgun burst took the beast in the side of the head, and it was thrown off Aquilius.
He struggled to his feet to see Verenus advancing, lasgun raised to his shoulder. The beast was crouched low, snarling.
Dust rose as a deafening gale roared around them, and Aquilius glanced up, shielding his eyes, to see a Thunderhawk dropping in on his position. It came down, its pilot carefully navigating its way between the steep sides of the ruins.
When he looked back, the possessed Word Bearer had gone.
His vox-bead clicked in his ear.
“Go ahead,” he said, shouting to be heard over the roar of the Thunderhawk’s engines as it touched down.
“The enemy have your position surrounded,” came the voice of Chapter Master Titus Valens as the assault shuttle’s main ramp slammed open. “Get your men inside.”
The blastdoor exploded inwards as melta charges detonated, and Ostorius was through them in a heartbeat, humming power sword in hand.
The directions that Liventius had given him were perfect, and he and his kill-team had made steady progress through the repulsive hallways of the Crucius Maledictus. They had encountered less opposition than the Proconsul had envi
saged, for which he was thankful. The vast majority of the Word Bearers were evidently fighting on the planet below, or intent on taking Kronos. It seemed that the last thing the Word Bearers were expecting was a direct attack upon their flagship.
Even so, only five of Ostorius’ kill-team still lived. Moving warily, the Proconsul led them into a wide, circular room, taking in its details in a quick glance.
The roof was high and domed, and it was ringed with huge stone pillars. One wall was dominated by an immense view portal that looked out across the exterior of the ship. Beyond its armoured prow lay Boros Prime.
A tracked crawler unit was positioned centrally within the room, at the bottom of a stepped dais, and it was to this that Ostorius’ gaze was drawn. Humming arcs of black metal revolved around each other with the hum of displaced air. Within these spinning rings was the device that he had been tasked with disabling, even though Liventius wasn’t certain that nullifying the Nexus would reopen the Boros Gate. To not make an attempt to destroy the device, no matter how futile, would have been akin to conceding defeat. For a moment he was lost in its form, mesmerised by its rotating silver rings, but he dragged his attention away as he registered that there were other beings in the room.
A massive robed figure plugged into the crawler unit turned towards the intruders, tentacled mechadendrites rising threateningly. He was a corrupted mirror image of the tech-adepts that served on Kronos. Ostorius’ gaze flicked towards a circle of Word Bearers standing sentinel around the device, bolters held across their chest.
Finally, Ostorius’ eyes darted up the steps of the dais, and he looked upon what must have been the corrupted Chaplain leading the Word Bearers fleet.
The Apostle sat upon a high-backed throne crafted from the bones of some immense, draconic beast. His eyes were closed, as if he were in some form of trance.
[Word Bearers 03] - Dark Creed Page 23
