Bastion Wars

by Henry Zou

  They rested in the settlement for two nights and left on the third dawn. Gumede and Sindul slept in borrowed beds, the sheets still smelling of death and their previous owners. They ate what they could from the abandoned larders, touching only the knots of chewy dried caprid and some dry sugar fruits. Barsabbas did not sleep, nor did he eat anything more than a handful of jerked meat once a day. He spent his hours watching the distance, plotting his course and cleaning, always cleaning his weapons.

  As they trekked, Gumede tried to point out the shimmering silver mirages that steamed from the hot clay ground. He gestured at the exposed coal seams that ran like black blood through the gullies and ravines. Barsabbas was unimpressed. He did not even seem to be listening. The plainsman’s attachment to his land irritated him and distracted him.

  Sometimes, when the march became weary, Gumede even spoke of his kinship. His voice would be heavy with bitterness. He spoke fondly of his kinship and the pain his loss caused him every day.

  The Chaos Space Marine simply could not understand how Gumede could come to feel emotionally involved with rocks and soil or other people. Home and family was not a concept his mind could appreciate. His lack of comprehension irritated him. It made him angry, and Barsabbas reacted to anger by killing and breaking.

  Everything seemed to matter to these humans. Barsabbas wondered how their fragile intellects could withstand the emotional assault. The Blood Gorgon knew only training and fighting. There were events in-between, but those things did not matter to him. His mind had been sharpened to a singular focus. Barsabbas felt no remorse or guilt at the death of Gumede’s people. There was no right or wrong, it had been an act of will in achieving a goal. He simply found no logic in the man’s reasoning.

  Four more days in the empty badlands brought them to a broad basin of split clay. The cracked minerals tessellated with regularity like brown tiles. The basin was endorheic, an evaporated ocean floor littered with fossil and coal.

  There was a familiarity to the landscape that gave Barsabbas hope. He felt a sense of recollection, and yet he knew he had never seen this place with his own eyes. Without a doubt, Sargaul had been here before, for the feeling of paramnesia was too compelling. Barsabbas remembered the smoke stacks that rose from the hard ground, fluted chimneys that belched smoke. When he peered at the furnaces through his bolter scope, he could see the barbed gravitational tanks of the dark eldar framed within his crosshairs. They were narrow, sword-shaped vehicles that hovered above the ground.

  ‘This is the location?’

  Sindul shrugged. ‘This is the only place where we strike out on raid, yes. We have herded our captives here.’

  Nodding, Barsabbas breathed deep, reliving the sense of familiarity that he had not really experienced firsthand. He felt Sargaul’s presence, he was sure of it, as his heart rate began to rise.

  ‘My kabal will still be here,’ Sindul said, pointing with his chin.

  ‘Then I will kill more.’

  ‘Give me a blade, let me fight.’

  Barsabbas rolled with laughter. ‘You think I am stupid? Let you go and you will fight for me?’ Barsabbas laughed again.

  But Sindul did not. The narrow, slitted features of his face remained gravely serious.

  ‘I cannot allow the kabal to see me captive. I would rather be a traitor.’

  ‘I will not release your chains, eldar. Save your tricks.’

  ‘In my culture, we have a different word for traitor. Muri’vee. It means gambler, or opportunist. But its meaning is more subtle than that. It means the “warrior who outplays”.’

  ‘You wish to be a traitor.’

  ‘Of course. Otherwise I will be a slave in their eyes forever. Even when I am dead I will be remembered as a slave.’

  On some level Barsabbas understood. Shame and pride were the foundations of character. Oddly, the dark eldar way of thinking made sense to him. Sindul could not return to his people a captive, a slave or a neutered warrior. The dark eldar would rather be remembered as a traitor. His people valued guile and cunning so at least there was conviction in that.

  ‘Then it will be so,’ Barsabbas agreed. Shame was not something that he wished his enemies to feel. He preferred they died fighting him, with a blade in their dead hands.

  Barsabbas lunged forwards without warning, seized Sindul and hauled him into his lap by his hair. Sindul squirmed in response, cycling his legs in the air. Pinning Sindul’s head with an elbow, Barsabbas began to unscrew the extractor cap hidden inside his mace.

  Sindul’s legs continued to kick as Barsabbas started to work. It was a long and relatively painful procedure, especially given Sindul’s defiant thrashing. By the time Barsabbas had coaxed the larva into the extractor, Sindul’s face was slick with blood. A weeping, gaping hole the size of a thumbnail puckered the flesh beneath the dark eldar’s cheekbone.

  Even as Sindul sulked at the indignity of his manhandling, Barsabbas hauled him up by the arm and yanked at the padlock around his neck, loosening his leash chains.

  ‘Let me make this clear. I do this because I choose to. You present no threat to me, armed or unarmed. A traitor may be martyred in your culture, but in mine, we punish them severely.’

  The lower dungeons of the Cauldron Born were honeycombed with oubliettes. They were no more than a maddening burrow of penrose stairs, ascending and descending while never appearing to end, each leading to a dingy grille hatch. The narrow, uneven steps meandered aimlessly, unlit and moist from the coolant leaks.

  It was here that heavily armed Plague Marines escorted the Blood Gorgons into the dungeons. The action was executed with a façade of cordiality almost as if the Plague Marines were extending their hand in alliance, and the captivity was only an unfortunate side effect. Yet there was an undertone of veiled aggression. Lord Muhr had assured his brethren it was only a temporary relocation, until order was restored and his new leadership firmly cemented against dissenters.

  Resistance was piecemeal, as the squads had quickly been separated upon boarding to prevent any cohesive counter-attack. Many were too drug-fugued to stand. Despite this, many rioted against their captors, fighting back with teeth and fists. But their armouries had been seized and the Plague Marines had the advantage of full combat riggings. Bond-Brothers Gamsis, Paeton and Himerius were shot before order was restored.

  Some, including Squad Hezirah, escaped into the uncharted burrows of the space hulk.

  Over the coming days, order aboard the Cauldron Born continued to deteriorate. Disease spread from the Plague Marines to the sheltered immune systems of the Blood Gorgons’ slaves. Within a week, hundreds within the slave warrens, barracks and engine galleys had fallen ill: fevers, dysentery, pneumonic viruses, dermal infections. Even servitors began to glitch as ailments began to affect their biosystems. Without the menials who maintained the inhabited sections of the space hulk, the vessel ceased to function effectively. Circulation systems became blocked as drainage pipes leaked. The lanterns remained unlit and food rotted in storage, untouched.

  The touch of Nurgle was everywhere. Like a virus incarnate, the Plague Marine intrusion had weakened the Chapter from within. Rapidly deteriorating, it seemed Sabtah’s fears had come true. The Blood Gorgons had become fractured again.

  The undercellar was dark and cold but this did not matter to Sergeant Krateus, who preferred being cold and free than warm and captive. Squad Hezirah had done well to elude the round-up, processing and lockdown. They had escaped to the infirmary wards during the boarding action and smuggled themselves through a large drainage tunnel during the rioting.

  Used to circulate waste, the undercellar was a series of sealed tunnels that laced the lowest sectors of the Cauldron Born. They had hidden there for nine days, finding a sanctuary amongst the stinking tubes and low ceilings. Waste matter sluiced through overhead grates, and the ammonia and faecal stink was stinging to their acute senses, b
ut they bided their time.

  They were weaponless, but they had escaped fully cased in their power armour. The suits aided them, sealing them against the filth. Rebreathers circulated fresh air. Glucose solutions from med-dispensers fed their bodies. But they could not continue in this way. A Traitor Marine’s instinct was to fight and although they had no armaments, they felt compelled to do something.

  Nine days after the seizure, Krateus finally decided they could hide no more.

  Squad Hezirah headed out, following the disposal tubes. Besides Krateus, there were Brothers Cambysses, Zagros, Magan, Khabur and Ngirsu. Retrieving tact-maps from their suit databanks, they followed the blueprints towards the starboard sub-hangars. They made good progress following a sewage main that ran for almost half the length of the space hulk. In some parts, the partition grates were so thin they could hear the scrape of heavy boots above.

  Somewhere between mid-sublevel 12 and some unclaimed corridors, a patrol of Plague Marines strode directly overhead. The squad froze, the shadows of the patrol ghosting across the tops of their helmets. Risking an upwards glance, Krateus counted seven Plague Marines, the sacred number of Nurgle.

  They waited until the steps had faded before they began moving again. Krateus thought briefly about moving ahead and ambushing the patrol. They would need the weapons once they reached the docking hangar, but he dismissed the thought. They were too far away and the alarm would be raised too early.

  Leaving the sewage main behind, the squad began to pick their way through the smaller, upward-slanting sluice pipes. It was tough, the drainage systems tight and narrow, and for once their bulk did not aid them.

  Krateus led the way, as he would need to disable the high-torque circular saws that lined the tunnels at the entrance. The fan blades shredded organic waste with powerful motors, buzzing to life when their sensor pads came into contact with any material. Being ‘disposed’ was a common method of culling unwanted slaves through the torque-saws.

  Krateus reached out. Sensing movement, the saw began to spasm, oscillating back and forth with jerky, vicious chops. Jamming his fingers into where the blades connected to the motor, Krateus began to fidget the central shaft with his free hand. Sparks hissed like water droplets as the motor began to grind Krateus’s armoured fingers. He worked quietly, trying to tear out the wires from the axial casing. The torque-saw squealed as his wedged digits began to give out. Finally, Krateus found the wires and clawed them out with the tips of his fingers, breaking their fibrous bunches.

  The torque-saw died. Krateus pulled his hand from the blades. Four of the fingers on his right hand were missing. Blood drooled down his forearm and leaked from his elbow. Proud of his work, the sergeant waved his squad onwards with the stump of his right hand. There would be a time for healing later, perhaps even some augmetic implants, but for now he gave his fingers no second thought. The body was a tool to survive and preservation of non-vital body parts was mere social conditioning.

  The Traitor Marine was functional as long as his primary heart still beat. As his wounds began to coagulate, Krateus had already forgotten how many fingers on his right hand he once had. He knew only to keep moving.

  It was not long before Squad Hezirah reached their intended destination point. Sub-hangar 6 was a minor docking berth. It was essentially a void-shielded section that held a trio of Hag interceptors and a lone Thunderhawk: the Sleepwalker. The armoured compartment was lightly guarded by two Plague Marines, their silhouettes murky and indistinct under the low, red phos-lights.

  Hezirah fanned out wide, sprinting behind the heavy fuselage. Keeping to the shadows when they could, shifting their weight lightly despite their size, they crept past the interceptors. The Hags were servitor-crewed, a swarm of vector-thrust light strikers utilised to hunt down incoming space ordnance. These would be of no use to Krateus.

  He moved on to the larger Sleepwalker, signalling for his squad to remain stationary. The gunship was heavy-muzzled, with a brutishly stubby wingspan and thickly plated fuselage of scratched umber. Using the gunship’s pectoral fins for purchase, Krateus pulled himself up by his arms until he was almost chin-level with the cockpit. The gunship squealed softly as he did so, the tiny creak of metal on metal. Krateus held his breath. But the Plague Marines did not seem to notice. Krateus closed his eyes and counted to five before he dared to move again.

  Peering into the cockpit bay, he checked the console and almost swore aloud. The fuel gauge sat on empty.

  Empty. Krateus felt much the same as he lowered himself down to the decking. Refuelling would be difficult without fuel servitors, and that was assuming the supply lines had not already been locked.

  ‘Empty as we feared?’ His bond, Cambysses, appeared next to him.

  ‘Contingency,’ Krateus affirmed.

  Flexing the piston muscles of his forearms, Krateus with Cambysses at his side rounded the Thunderhawk and stole closer to the Plague Marine sentries. The enemy stood impassive, their backs against the wall, boltguns snug against their chest plates. Auspexes hung from their war belts, the screens greened out on standby.

  Krateus knew what to do.

  Without warning, he burst into a sprint, darting out from behind the Sleepwalker. He rushed for the cover of a Hag interceptor. He felt something clip his shoulder and heard the slamming bark of bolt shot. The Plague Marines gave chase, shouting into their vox-links as they did so. Both sentries ran past the Sleepwalker in pursuit.

  That was when Cambysses struck. He launched himself out from hiding as the Plague Marines rushed past. He came out low in a wrestler’s prowl and tackled the closest sentry into the decking. They were struggling for control of the boltgun before they hit the ground in a crashing roll. Both hands hanging on to the weapon, Cambysses summoned every shred of his upper body strength. But the Plague Marine held on. They butted heads, grunting with animalistic exertion. Shots went off.

  Suddenly, Zagros and Magan were there too. Magan coiled an arm around the Plague Marine’s throat from behind and Zagros began to drag on his ankles, sweeping his legs out from underneath him. Khabur and Ngirsu rushed the second sentry. The Plague Marine brought up his weapon but could not shoot before Ngirsu closed the distance and clinched up with him.

  There was a brief, intense struggle and loud shouting echoed in the armoured hangar. Another shot rang out. A moment of confusion. Cambysses had shot the Plague Marine. He had finally wrestled the boltgun free. It was more awkward than the Godwyn-pattern boltgun Cambysses was familiar with, with pitted wood panelling and an archaic pre-Heresy sliding track mechanism, but it was a boltgun nonetheless. The shot tore a gaping hole in the Plague Marine’s neck. Cambysses’s next shot killed the Plague Marine who grappled with Ngirsu outright, with a point-blank round to the back of the head.

  By then the alarms had began to wail. The low, red phos-lights were strobing to a regular heartbeat. Shot through the neck, the last sentry continued to struggle against Magan and Zagros. Cambysses pushed the stolen boltgun against the bleeding wound on his neck.

  ‘Take him with us,’ said Krateus. ‘We need him.’ The sergeant had retrieved the boltgun from the slain sentry and was checking the magazine.

  Magan pulled the wounded Plague Marine to his feet. The neck wound was bad, a wheezing entry hole that gaped like a skewed mouth. The exit wound was even worse, a fist-sized crater that punched out between the Plague Marine’s shoulder blades.

  The sentry breathed in short, ragged gasps. The serious wound made him appear slow and lethargic, but he did not seem to be in pain. He even insulted Cambysses’s blood lineage as he applied pressure to his neck with his hands. The warriors of Nurgle were notoriously hardy, even by the superhuman standards of the Space Marines. Their corpulent state killed their nervous system, numbed their flesh and thickened their blood. Essentially, they became immune to pain and shock trauma.

  Pressing the boltgun to the Plague Marine’
s head, they marched him on. Moving quickly, at a jog, prodding their hostage with the muzzle of their boltguns, they left sub-hangar 6 behind.

  Ship alarms all along sub-hangars 6, 12 and their corresponding sub-levels were keening, changing in pitch from long and wailing to short, pulsating howls. Yet on the command deck, all was quiet. Except for the constant throb of air circulators, there was no noise.

  Opsarus lounged in the deck’s command throne without moving.

  Wire spindles and optic thread were interfaced directly into the incisions in his spinal cord. It was a crude surgical method, courtesy of Muhr, which allowed him limited access to the ship’s command functions. The spindles squirted visual data into his cerebral cortex, allowing him to view the vessel’s many surveillance systems.

  But it was precisely the crude nature of the surgery that limited his command. He was not Gammadin, and without Gammadin’s genecodes or the ship’s proper acquiescence, Opsarus did not have full command of the ship’s defence systems. The ship was a predatory steed, but Gammadin’s steed. It had a wild sentience, whether artificial or daemonic, that recognised only Gammadin.

  Opsarus could observe, but he could not control. His frustration was obvious as his fingers fidgeted, spasming every so often.

  He watched impatiently as ghost images flashed behind his eyelids. He saw a rogue squad of Blood Gorgons, mostly unarmed, sprinting down a flashing red corridor. He saw his own, Plague Marines he knew by name, hesitate to shoot. Stalemate.

  ‘This is not right. They need to shoot.’

  Opsarus opened his eyes and the images faded. Muhr stood some distance away, watching the console banks that honeycombed the high walls.

  ‘They need to shoot,’ Muhr repeated, shaking his head.

  ‘You are a strange soul, sorcerer,’ Opsarus chuckled throatily.

  Muhr turned away from the consoles, his voice faltering. ‘Master?’