Captain Taelos’ wounds were, it appeared, even graver and more serious than Taloc had originally suspected. Once they were within the Bastion and the hatch was secured, the captain had been forced by his injuries to seat himself on the ground, leaning against the wall a dozen paces from the hatch. While his implants struggled to heal his battered frame, even the Larraman cells that crowded his blood vessels failing to completely staunch the bleeding from the wounds in his abdomen, the captain held his bolter in a steady two-handed grip, the barrel trained on the hatch. Any of the Roaring Blades who managed to get past the two Scouts would fall quickly in a hail of bolter-fire.
But there were no guarantees that the captain would be able to maintain his vigil, and there was every possibility that his injuries might eventually leave him unable to aim and fire his bolter with any accuracy. For the moment, Scouts s’Tonan and Zatori were the first and best defence for the hatch.
A Roaring Blade rushed through the opening, jinking towards the left while waving a sabre like a fan-blade in the air before him. Taloc stood fast, only glancing over as Zatori blocked the Roaring Blade’s inexpert thrust and riposted with a graceful slice of his combat blade that effectively cut the heretic’s legs out from under him. As Zatori dispassionately stabbed his combat blade downwards and dispatched the Roaring Blade in a surgically precise killing stroke, Taloc remembered the killing stroke that the Sipangish squire had inflicted on Tonan, chief of Eokaroe’s proudest warrior-clan. Taloc had never forgotten that Zatori still held his father’s blood-debt. And it was only the discipline of the Imperial Fists, and the threat of a life of endless servitude as a Chapter serf, that prevented him from seeing that blood-debt paid. But if one or the other of them were to die here on this Emperor-forsaken world? What then of Tonan’s blood-debt?
Taloc’s reverie was disrupted by the appearance of two more Roaring Blades slipping through the narrow opening the second close on the heels of the first. Both wielded long, razor-sharp scimitars, and as they broke left and right the heretics managed by happenstance to put themselves in good positions to attack the two Scouts, and to defend against the Scouts’ attacks.
Zatori shifted forwards to deal with the heretic on the left, while Taloc blocked the first attack of the heretic on the right. But it quickly became apparent, as the one parried Zatori’s thrust and the other almost managed to get past Taloc’s block, that these two were either more skilled combatants than the half-dozen who had preceded them through the gap, or else the example of the first six to slip through the gap had urged caution on those who followed. After all, while these two howled and shouted like all the rest of the Traitor Guards, they seemed to devote themselves less to their hellish hymns than they did to the business of wielding their blades and staying alive.
While the two Scouts contended with the pair of Roaring Blades, though, a third slipped cautiously through the gap. From his position, Taloc could see that the fact that Zatori had been forced to sidestep his opponent’s last thrust meant that the captain could not fire his bolter at this third heretic without hitting Scout Zatori in the process. And while the Imperial Fists were not above sacrificing their own to achieve victory, at this stage of the siege it gained them nothing to sacrifice a defender to put down a single invader.
For a frenzied moment, as his combat blade clanged against his opponent’s scimitar, Taloc considered the options available to them, trying to find a solution. But in the next instant, the problem was solved, quite unexpectedly.
As Taloc and Zatori blocked and attacked, thrust and parried, the sound of boots pounding on rockcrete crescendoed behind them, and a figure in gold raced between the two Scouts and flung itself at the third Roaring Blade. The newcomer, who had been eyeing the contests on either side, was caught completely unawares, and went down without a fight.
Glancing over his shoulder with a devilish grin, Scout Jean-Robur du Queste brandished his combat blade. “I was told you could use some assistance,” he said, and it was clear that he fought not for glory nor for honour, but for fun. “But I don’t know how you got along even this far without me!”
Down in the catacombs beneath the Bastion, Veteran-Sergeant Hilts sprayed bolter-fire down the passageway while Scout Fulgencio readied the melta gun for another burst.
“Rhomec!” Hilts voxed over the chatter of his bolter and the echoing din of the enemy’s infernal song. “Continue to lay down suppressing fire and prepare to move ahead!”
“Acknowledged,” Rhomec voxed in response.
The floor of the passageway ahead was carpeted with the enemy dead, but still the Roaring Blades hurled themselves at the defenders. Since Scout Fulgencio had arrived with the melta gun and Scout du Queste had gone to aid in the defence of the main hatch, the veteran-sergeant had led his team in pushing the enemy further and further back from the main intersection that had previously served as the defenders’ bulwark. If they were to stem the tide of heretics streaming into the catacombs, they would need to seal the barricades in the tunnel mouths, and the Imperial Fists wouldn’t be able to accomplish that by remaining safely behind cover at the intersection.
“Ready,” voxed Fulgencio, raising his weapon and preparing to fire another strafing burst of melta-fire down the passageway.
“Rhomec, hold fire,” Hilts voxed. “Fulgencio, fire at will.”
An instant later, a blast of incredible heat lanced from the muzzle of the melta gun and down the passageway. The weapon itself produced almost no sound as it fired, but Hilts could hear a distinctive hiss as the air through which the blast travelled super-heated to dangerous levels. And when the quartet of Roaring Blades who were rushing towards the defenders with shotguns and lascarbines firing caught the brunt of the blast, Hilts could hear the roar of their bodies’ moisture vaporising instantly. In a matter of eyeblinks the four heretics had been incinerated to little more than blackened bone. And even though the blast did not hit them directly, the crowd of Roaring Blades who had been following close behind the quartet fell to either side with fatal burns, howling in redirected euphoria as they went.
“Lay down suppressing fire and advance!” Hilts voxed, and he and the two Scouts scooted further up the passageway, with Hilts and Rhomec spraying bolter-fire as they progressed.
They had been leapfrogging up the passageway in this manner for several minutes, and had already closed half the distance between the intersection and the first of the compromised barricades. The main body of the subterranean invaders was still ahead of them, but no matter how many of the Roaring Blades they put down it seemed that there was still an inexhaustible number of them following close behind.
But while many of the Roaring Blades simply rushed headlong towards the defenders, heedless of any risk or danger to themselves, not in the slightest averse to any potential pain and, quite the contrary, often seeming to seek it out, there were others of their number who appeared somewhat more cautious and calculating in their actions.
Hilts signalled to the two Scouts to take up new positions on either side of the passageway. The veteran-sergeant crouched low against the right hand wall, while Rhomec and Fulgencio crouched against the left, with Rhomec a few paces ahead. When they were in position, Rhomec and Hilts would lay down suppressing fire to give Fulgencio a chance to sidle over to the centre of the passageway, where he would rise up and fire a long melta-burst down the straight passage towards the enemy. Though his movements were slowed by the injuries he’d sustained in the march from the blockhouse, Fulgencio was still able to limp into position given enough time. And while they were not moving as quickly towards their goal as Hilts might have liked, they’d already done this leapfrog manoeuvre several times, and each time without incident.
But their success rate was about to fall. As Rhomec and Hilts lay down bolter-fire while Fulgencio readied the melta gun, they paid little mind to the bodies scattered up and down the passageway between them. Some had been charred and burned by previous melta-blasts, while others had apparently been felle
d by hails of bolter-fire. But before any of the Imperial Fists realised what was happening, one of the seemingly lifeless bodies suddenly stirred to motion, having only feigned death. The all-too-alive enemy rose, springing up to a kneeling crouch and firing the lasgun in his hands on full-auto towards the left-hand wall.
“Sergeant!” Fulgencio shouted as he saw the las-fire rain on the wall ahead of him, but in the split-second it took Hilts to swivel and clip the Roaring Blade with rounds from his bolter, it was already too late.
Scout Rhomec had been hit from the side by a welter of las-fire, and if the first shot hadn’t killed him, then the sixth one had, or the twelfth. Though lasguns were not nearly as accurate on full-auto, at such short range the Roaring Blade had been virtually unable to miss his target.
As Fulgencio knelt over the lifeless body of his squadmate, Veteran-Sergeant Hilts sprayed the nearest of the bodies on the passageway floor with bolter-fire, just as a precaution. Then, as the enemy fire from further up the passageway increased once more, Hilts turned his bolter towards the living enemy and opened fire.
“Fulgencio, take up position and prepare to fire!”
The Scout turned away from Rhomec’s body, which even in death wore the same scarred-cheek grin, and nodded in the veteran-sergeant’s direction. He tightened his grip on the melta gun and, as Hilts fired his bolter up the corridor, crab-walked into position.
“Fire!” Hilts voxed.
After the melta-blast had hissed its way up the passageway, burning the enemy who stood in its wake, Hilts shifted forwards and motioned for Fulgencio to follow.
“Ahead!” the veteran-sergeant called, and opened fire with his bolter again.
They were halfway to the target, and a man down, with an unknown number of enemy elements between them and their goal. There was no time to waste.
Scout du Queste stood with his body perpendicular to the hatch, his right foot forwards and pointing ahead, his left foot planted beneath him and parallel to the hatch. He held his combat blade in his right hand, with his left hand held lightly behind him for balance. The slightest of smiles still played around the corners of his mouth, but in his gaze there was only steel and determination.
The loading bay appeared to be wreathed in silence, and Jean-Robur could hear nothing but the sound of his own breathing and the pulse of his own heartbeat. He knew the Scouts who stood beside him were likely ensconced in silence, as well. All of them had been buffeted by the spill-over of the sonic attacks the Noise Marines on the far side of the hatch had fired into the opening, but given the geometry of the hatch and the narrowness of the gap the Emperor’s Children had not been able to fire directly into the bay’s interior.
But while the baffling effects of the hatch were preventing the Scouts from suffering the sonic weaponry’s full effects, and their eyes had not yet vibrated out of their skulls nor their organs liquefied within their bodies, the noise was still sufficiently loud to render them all effectively deaf. Every few moments sound would begin to bleed back into Jean-Robur’s world as his body struggled to heal the damage to his inner ears, but then a Noise Marine would launch another sonic attack and after a brief thunderous din the world would be blanketed once more in complete silence.
Another Roaring Blade slipped through the gap, and another, and another. The three Scouts stood in a broken line before the gap, with Jean-Robur in the middle and Scouts Zatori and s’Tonan to his left and right, respectively, a few paces to either side and a few paces ahead. The three formed a triangle with Jean-Robur at its peak, just out of the reach of each other’s swords, so that they could each fight an enemy intruder without worrying about accidentally striking their squadmates in a parry or riposte. And whether an intruder broke right, broke left or drove straight ahead after slipping through the narrow opening, they would be rushing straight towards an armed defender in every case. So as the three Roaring Blades surged forwards, the three Imperial Fists Scouts were perfectly positioned to deal with them.
One of the three intruders rushed straight at Jean-Robur. It could have been bravery of a sort, or reckless abandon, or simply that the intruder’s eyes had not yet accustomed to the gloom and he didn’t yet realise that Jean-Robur was standing directly in his path. Either way, though, Scout du Queste stood ready to meet the enemy charge, and as the Roaring Blade got within range, Jean-Robur lunged forwards, his right foot leaping forwards while his left stayed planted, and plunging his combat blade up and into the intruder’s belly from below. Then Jean-Robur whipped the blade to the right, slicing outwards through the meat of the intruder’s abdomen and spilling blood and viscera out onto the blood-slicked rockcrete as the blade tugged free. The Roaring Blade clutched his side with his free hand, a look of supreme bliss on his face, but continued onwards, his forward momentum deflected but not deterred. And before Jean-Robur could shift out of the way or bring his combat blade back on line to defend, the dying intruder plunged his own sabre into the narrow band of skin exposed above the point where his breastplate met his shoulder-guard. The intruder’s sabre drove deep into the soft meat above Jean-Robur’s left clavicle.
Jean-Robur shouted in rage and pain.
The Roaring Blade collapsed to his knees, his intestines spilling out onto the ground before him, but his sword was left quivering in place, sticking straight out from Jean-Robur’s shoulder. The intruder listed forwards, swooning in a rash of pleasure.
“The warp take you!” Jean-Robur cursed. He reached up, wrapped his left hand around the intruder’s sabre and yanked it from his shoulder, heedless of the edge cutting deeply into his fingers as he gripped the blade. Still holding the sabre by the blade, he leaned forwards and stabbed the sabre’s point straight down into the nape of the intruder’s neck.
“Will you live?” voxed Zatori.
Jean-Robur looked over to his left, and saw his Sipangish squadmate glaring at him with narrowed eyes. It was the same hard look Zatori treated him to whenever they faced each other in sparring matches, or when Zatori seemed to feel that Jean-Robur had spoken out of turn. Jean-Robur had even glanced across a crowded room to find Zatori staring daggers at his back with precisely that expression on his face. Jean-Robur had never known why Zatori hated him so, unless it was simply the congenital hatred of the Sipangish for the Caritaigne that his squadmate simply could not relinquish. Or perhaps Zatori simply suspected Jean-Robur was the more skilled with the blade, and was driven by jealousy to hate him.
“Yes,” Jean-Robur answered with a grunt over the vox-comms, rolling his shoulder to ease the pain somewhat. Craning his head, he was able to peer down past his jaw as the wound scabbed over. It would hurt, and for some time to come, but it wouldn’t kill him. “I’ll live.”
“Then fight, Emperor damn you!” Zatori voxed back with a sneer. “Fight!”
Jean-Robur grinned, and feigned a bow in the Sipangish’s direction. “As you wish.”
“I can’t hold them back much longer,” Veteran-Sergeant Hilts voxed over the chatter of the bolter in his hands. “How near are you to completion?”
From the corner of his eye Hilts could see the flash of the melta gun firing again and again at the confusion of metal and machinery crammed into the tunnel’s mouth. The makeshift barricade was gradually melted into a solid, irregular lump that filled the mouth of the tunnel from side to side, rendering it all but impassable. But while the work was proceeding apace, it was taking precious time.
“Soon, sergeant!” Fulgencio voxed back urgently. “Another few moments, at most.”
Having left the body of Rhomec far behind along the passageway, the two Imperial Fists had pressed onwards towards the enemy, driving the Roaring Blades ever further back along the passageway. But the enemy was not giving up ground without a fight, and both Hilts and Fulgencio had taken a number of shots, some of which had healed quickly, and some of which had not.
They had already sealed up the first of the compromised barricades, with Hilts holding the enemy at bay further up the passageway
while Fulgencio repositioned the salvaged machinery in place as best he could and then melted it all into a single plug of slag. Now, they had managed to push the Roaring Blades even farther back, with judicious application of bolter-fire and melta-blasts, and Fulgencio had set to work sealing up the second of the two compromised barricades, the one through which the Roaring Blades had broken through into the Bastion’s catacombs in the first place.
There had been Roaring Blades climbing up though the tunnels and snaking their way around the gaps in the barricade when Hilts and Fulgencio had arrived, but it had only taken a few short blasts with the melta gun to deal with them. Now, Hilts covered Fulgencio’s back while the Scout made sure no other Roaring Blades would be following behind.
The invaders who had already made it into the catacombs had retreated ahead of Hilts’ bolter-fire all the way up to the dead-end at the far end of the passageway. Even over the chatter of his bolter Hilts could hear the echoing howls and roars of the heretics, and the whistle and whine of their weapons as they fired blindly around the curve of the passageway at his position.
A short distance off lay the bodies of the three Vernalian nobles who had allowed the Roaring Blades into the subterranean passageways in the first place, by removing parts of the barricades that Hilts’ Scouts had put in place. Hilts was sorry to have saved the three wretches from the excruciators of the Inquisition. Heretics such as these did not deserve the Emperor’s mercy that he had bestowed upon them. But he hadn’t the luxury to provide them the justice they so richly deserved.
Hilts realised that his bolter had gone silent, because he had removed his finger from the trigger. The echoes from up the tunnel grew louder, and he knew that the Roaring Blades were approaching. His attentions were wandering, his focus lost. He glanced down at his chest and arms, and saw the countless scorches and pockmarks of enemy fire he’d received in recent minutes. How many times had he been shot since advancing from the intersection? He’d lost count. But the injuries were clearly beginning to take their toll.
[Warhammer 40K] - Sons of Dorn Page 27
