Space Marine Battles - the Novels Volume 1

by Warhammer 40K

  He looked as if he was about to deliver a speech, profound last words before expending his duty but before he could say anything, Brandd’s blade, already slick with blood, ran him through. With both hands, she tore upwards, parting the flesh to open up his insides.

  Ajanipol moaned in pleasure-pain and placed his hands inside his wound. Moments later he removed them, covered in dripping crimson gore, and began to daub haphazardly upon the wall of the vestibule. His bloody smears formed crude sigils, blasphemous icons that were painful to look upon, and when he had made three identical marks in a triangular pattern he took his finger and drew a bloody trail to link them.

  The instant the final sigil was connected to the others, the mountain itself started to shake and the already warm surface of the wall radiated an intense heat. Brandd and the other cultists retreated back to the far wall of the cavern but Ajanipol, struck dumb by loss of blood and awe at what he had set in motion, remained still, his flesh blackening as it fried. The tremors within the mountain grew more intense and a deafening noise, like two tectonic plates scraping against each other, forced the four lucid figures in the chamber to clamp their hands tightly to the side of their heads in defence of their eardrums. With one last violent shudder, a wide crack, the girth of two men, formed in the base of the smooth wall and raced up the inside of the mountain, chasing itself up towards the peak.

  As quickly as the tremors and the cacophony had begun, they ceased.

  ‘Lord Corpulax gives you both his blessing and his thanks, Ajanipol,’ Brandd said, stepping over the smoking body of the cultist and into the crack.

  913959.M41 / Hangar Level, Imperial Command Centre. Olympax Mountains, Pythos

  Thorne was still cursing himself for allowing the traitor to get the better of him when parts of the hangar roof came showering down.

  The floor began to rock and, avoiding chunks of stone that were dropping from above, he sought sanctuary in the open hatch of a Valkyrie undergoing repairs. Others too had the same idea, and for the duration of the quake Thorne was confined to the enclosed space with almost a score of sweating Catachans, unable to cover his mouth and nose as the noise from debris hitting the hull forced him to cover his ears. For what seemed like far longer, but was in reality only a matter of seconds, the Valkyrie swayed from side to side, battering its occupants against the walls and each other.

  As quickly as the tremors and the cacophony had begun, they ceased.

  Emerging from the grounded craft into a billow of rock dust, Thorne took stock of the situation. All of the Valkyries within sight had sustained damage but, apart from those that had suffered damage or malfunction prior to the quake, looked airworthy. Something told him they were going to need them soon.

  ‘What the hell was that?’ asked a slab-muscled woman rubbing her shoulder from where she’d taken an impact.

  ‘I don’t know, but I’ll wager any of you a year’s rations it’s something to do with that traitor inquisitor,’ said Thorne, wiping rock dust from his eyes. ‘Come on. Let’s get this place cleaned up and start assessing the damage.’

  ‘Sir. Over here. You need to see this,’ called a bearded officer from the lip of the hangar entrance. Thorne strode over to join him, unable to see what the sergeant was trying to point out until he was practically alongside the man, such was the volume of dust choking the hangar.

  Away in the distance, at the very limit of unaugmented human vision, the sky was full of tiny black dots, a hundred at least by Thorne’s reckoning.

  ‘Is that Colonel Strike, sir?’ the sergeant asked.

  ‘I hope so,’ said Thorne gesturing to another sergeant to bring him a set of magnoculars. ‘For all of our sakes, I damn well hope so.’

  913959.M41 / The Tunnel System, Imperial Command Centre. Olympax Mountains, Pythos

  Feeling the first vibrations, Tzula threw herself flat against the tunnel wall. Her home world was criss-crossed by multiple faultlines and the practice drilled into her as a child returned instinctively. If there had been a table or desk to duck under or a doorway to stand beneath, she would have used that as cover but, exposed as she was in the tunnel, pressing her back against the wall was the most protection she could afford herself.

  The Catachans followed Tzula’s lead and spread out along the rockface. A couple were too slow and in amongst the fist-sized chunks of stone that were pouring down, a weighty slab of rock crashed amongst them, pulverising bone and meat and pinning their corpses to the tunnel floor. The others could only watch on helplessly as the tremors intensified and the mountain threw more of itself down.

  As quickly as the tremors and the cacophony had begun, they ceased.

  With the noise of the rockfall still echoing along the tunnel, Tzula knelt down to check the bodies of the two Catachans pressed beneath the slab and, after confirming what she already knew, retrieved their knives. Handing them over to one of the surviving death worlders, she began to pick her way through the carpet of debris to continue her pursuit of Brandd.

  She hoped she was not too late.

  In her time as a servant of the Davinicus Lycae and while posing as the apprentice to not just one, but two inquisitors, Tryphena Brandd had witnessed many things, both wondrous and abhorrent. As she stepped inside the vast subterranean cavern opened after untold millennia by dark ritual, she wasn’t sure which category to mentally file this one under.

  A flickering blue glow bathed the entire area, rising in a column through the gloom. It illuminated the recesses of the vaulted ceiling high above and highlighted immense stalactites descending from the roof like giant fangs. The effect was spectacular but it was the source of the light that both repulsed and enthralled her.

  Upon a raised dais in the centre of the cavern, a stasis field hummed and crackled gently, pulsing rhythmically in a strobe-like manner. Beneath the protective canopy of energy, thirteen robed figures, emaciated to the point of skeletism, moved in grotesque slow motion, like a pict feed slowed down to a single frame every few seconds. The attire they wore was threadbare and rotted in places, exposing cadaverous frames entirely bereft of muscle or fat. Limp skin hung from their limbs, giving the impression that they wore a second set of robes beneath the top layer. Their mouths moved in a fashion that was painful to observe, taut skin slowly stretching and cracking as their jaws opened and closed over a lengthy cycle. Other than the almost imperceptible movements, the only other sign that the occupants of the chamber were still alive was the puffs of breath that condensed in the freezing air of the stasis cocoon. If they were aware of the newcomers to their home, they were showing no outward signs.

  ‘Psykers,’ Brandd spat. ‘Thirteen bound psykers left to watch over the final seal. All that remains now is to slay them, and after ten thousand years the Damnation Cache will be open once more. Our masters will soon walk this realm again as lords of all!’

  Unprompted, one of her companions drew a crude autopistol and pointed it at the dais.

  ‘Stop!’ yelled Brandd, a moment too late.

  The cultist pulled the trigger and the bullet sped inexorably towards the dome of blue energy. It hit the stasis field and bounced off, ricocheting crazily off the walls of the cavern, given new impetus by its deflection.

  ‘The field doesn’t just keep them alive, you fool. It protects them too. Killing them is going to take–’

  She was interrupted by the changing sound of the rogue bullet. Instead of bouncing off the cavern walls, it had hit something metallic before dropping to the floor and rolling towards her feet from out of a benighted recess.

  ‘What was that?’ she asked.

  Activating a lume strip, the shooter lit up the alcove. What they saw there gave them a moment’s pause.

  Covered from helmet to boots in verdigris, moss and fungal mould the form of a Terminator-armoured Space Marine stood sentinel in the alcove. Halberd in one hand, the helmeted figure was a near-perfect representation of the superhuman elite of the Imperium’s armies, right down to the bolt pistol h
olstered at its hip and the numerous purity seals applied to its pauldrons and breastplate. A glint of silver reflected the light of the lume strip where the bullet had grazed a knee guard and removed the detritus of the ages.

  Even a representation of the mighty Adeptus Astartes was enough to instil awe and it was several moments before anybody spoke.

  ‘It’s a statue,’ said the cultist holding up the light. ‘How typical of the Emperor’s curs to leave a mere statue to keep guard over–’

  A creak emanated from the recess. As one, the cultists’ guns came up and aimed at the monument.

  ‘It moved! The statue just moved,’ the cultist said, shining the lume strip up and down to find the source of the noise. The statue remained immobile.

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ Brandd scoffed. ‘It was probably just a rat.’ She lowered her weapon to emphasise her point, as did the other cultists.

  ‘That was no rat. This thing–’

  He never got to finish his sentence.

  ‘I can assure you, traitor,’ said the statue drawing and firing its bolt pistol in one swift movement, turning the cultist’s head to a cloud of crimson mist, ‘I am far more than a “mere statue”,’ it added before opening fire on the remaining cultists.

  913959.M41 / Hangar Level, Imperial Command Centre. Olympax Mountains, Pythos

  The Valkyries were so close now that Thorne could make out the colour schemes and markings of the individual craft. All of them were gunships that had set out from Olympax weeks earlier, and none of them were showing obvious signs of hostile intent.

  But neither had the traitor inquisitor when she flew straight in and passed herself off as a Catachan captain. How did the old saying go? Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.

  ‘Chief, we still can’t raise the incoming Valkyries,’ called a vox-operator from the back of the hangar. ‘The quake knocked out the comms tower. It’ll be hours before it’s operational again.’

  ‘What do you think, major? Is this another ploy by the enemy?’ asked the sergeant beside Thorne.

  The major put the magnoculars back to his eyes. The full glare of Pythos’s sun reflected back off the cockpit canopies making it impossible to see who was piloting the craft. Would that make a difference anyway? The enemy had already tried to pass themselves off as soldiers of the 183rd, and the jungles and delver-strongholds were rife with dead Catachans from which to pilfer uniforms.

  ‘They’re about to come into range of the anti-aircraft batteries, chief. If we hit them now we should be able to down most of them before they have a chance to return fire. Do you want me to give the order to fire?’ The sergeant gestured for a runner to be ready to deliver the order to the flak gun crews.

  Thorne ran a hand across his bearded jaw, deep in contemplation.

  ‘We’re going to lose our chance,’ the sergeant urged. ‘You need to make the call now, major.’

  913959.M41 / The Tunnel System, Imperial Command Centre. Olympax Mountains, Pythos

  The last sound Tzula Digriiz expected to hear as she picked her way through the rock-strewn tunnels of the depths of Mount Olympax was the report of a bolt pistol echoing up from below. When she raced through the vast crevice that had opened up in the heart of the mountain, plasma pistol already in hand, the source of the firing was the last thing she had expected to see.

  Halberd in one hand blazing with blue energy, a Terminator-armoured Space Marine was exchanging fire with Brandd and her cronies. The cultists were using the stasis field as cover, circling around it and taking shots at the armoured goliath, but the mixture of solid autopistol shot and las-fire did nothing more than reveal more of the silver armour beneath the conglomeration of lichen and filth.

  Sensing the presence of others in the chamber, the Space Marine aimed his pistol at the entrance but stopped short of firing it when he saw that Tzula and the soldiers accompanying her were also attacking his targets.

  The air filled with the heated discharge of las and plasma fire, punctuated by the staccato of bolt shells. The Space Marine dealt with one flank while the Catachans and Tzula drove up the other, cutting off the cultists’ means of escape and pinning them down under a steady barrage.

  Over Tzula’s shoulder, a Catachan went down hard, a well-placed volley taking off the left side of his face. Tzula avenged his death instantly by doing likewise to the cultist who had made the shot.

  A scream rang out from the other side of the chamber as a bolt shell evaporated the shoulder, arm and most of the chest of a cultist. Using his corpse as a shield, another rattled off a string of las-bolts, all of which missed the onrushing Space Marine. In response, the giant fired a single shot into the cultist whose life he had just ended, the round passing straight through him and exploding the torso of his comrade behind.

  That only left Brandd.

  Out of options, she reached into her satchel and pulled out the vial of dark liquid given to her weeks ago by Corpulax. She held it above her head, using her other hand to alternately point her weapon at Tzula and the Space Marine.

  ‘Do you know what this is?’ Brandd said.

  ‘Hold your fire,’ Tzula ordered the Catachans behind her. ‘It’s a vial of Life Eater, the same thing that’s used in virus bombs. Not nearly enough to threaten the planet or even the base but more than enough to kill everyone in this chamber.’

  ‘Very good, Tzula. I knew Dinalt didn’t just keep you around for your looks.’ Cornered like a dog, Brandd’s tone was still one of superiority. ‘Do you know what else it’s good for?’

  Tzula said nothing.

  ‘It’s an airborne pathogen which makes it excellent at breaching stasis fields. Unfortunately, those psyker slaves in there don’t have their own air supply which means the protective dome, while sufficient to prevent solid objects from passing in and out, is porous enough to allow gas and liquids through.’ She emphasised this point by spitting through the field, a wad of phlegm landing on the hem of an oblivious psyker’s robes. She shook her pistol at the Space Marine. ‘Even he can’t save you now.’

  +Be ready to move when I do.+

  The shock of psychic intrusion registered briefly on Tzula’s face but if Brandd noticed, she did not react. Though he wore no psychic hood of the Librarius, the Space Marine was a psyker. +Do not let the vial hit the ground.+

  +Understood.+ She replied in the manner her former master had taught her.

  Impossibly quickly, more so because of his armoured bulk, the Space Marine slashed down with his halberd, a blur of sapphire energy crackling through the stale air of the cavern. It made contact with Brandd and sheared through bone, removing her forearm at the elbow. Moving not nearly as quickly as the genhanced warrior, but still fast by human standards, Tzula dived forwards and grasped the wrist of the severed arm, stopping the vial from smashing scant centimetres from the hard floor.

  She breathed out in audible relief. Lying next to her on the dais, Brandd screamed and clutched at her cauterised stump. Strangely, her screams soon gave way to choked laughter.

  ‘It’s too late,’ she rasped through gritted teeth. ‘It was on a timer.’

  Looking in horror at the limb she still clasped in her own hand, Tzula heard the hiss of a valve releasing as the liquid within the vial began to seep out and expand. She dropped the arm, container and all, to the ground and scrambled away from it. As the vial shattered, a tiny droplet splashed her on the back of her hand.

  +Move. Now,+ the Space Marine said directly into her mind. When Tzula didn’t react, instead sitting there trying to wipe the noxious substance from her hand, the Space Marine picked her up and bundled her under his arm, sprinting towards the entrance.

  The black ooze spread and multiplied like liquid cancer, consuming all in its path. Brandd’s severed arm dissolved at its touch, as did the still laughing traitor when the dark substance spread over her body and engulfed her. It seeped in through the stasis field and climbed over the husks of the psykers, rising over them before disappear
ing inside them through their slowly opening and closing mouths.

  The Catachans did not need the same warning nor aid that Tzula had and were heading back towards the entrance under their own power. Chased all the way by the proliferating Life Eater virus, one of them tripped and was instantly engulfed by the blackness, all traces of him drowning beneath it. The others continued running for their lives but their efforts were too futile. Not having the speed of the augmented Space Marine, the remaining Catachans could only look on helplessly as he disappeared through the crack, Tzula under his arm, while they became the next victims of the creeping death.

  ‘My arm,’ Tzula said as the Space Marine set her down in the vestibule, confident that the virus was contained to the chamber. ‘It’s… it’s spreading,’ she said, panic rising in her voice.

  The tiny splash that had landed on her hand had expanded across her fingers and up to her wrist in the short space of time it had taken for the Space Marine to outrun the Life Eater. Tendrils were slowly creeping up her forearm and her digits were starting to dissolve.

  ‘This is going to hurt.’ The Space Marine’s voice was dry and he over-enunciated each syllable as if he were speaking High Gothic for the first time.

  ‘What? What’s going to hurt?’ She was only half-concentrating on his words, sickeningly fascinated by the change her body was undergoing.

  ‘This,’ the Space Marine said, slashing down with his force halberd at precisely the same spot where he had separated Brandd’s arm from the rest of her body. Tzula cried out in pain and looked down at the stump expecting to be greeted by a fountain of blood but instead found the wound was smooth and cauterised. Her severed forearm and hand dissolved into nothingness at her feet.

  ‘It was the only way,’ the Space Marine said unapologetically.

  Tzula stared a little longer at the space where the rest of her left arm used to be, experimentally flexing her shoulder and bicep. She closed her eyes and slowed her breathing which had become irregular and sharp. ‘At least it wasn’t my shooting arm,’ she said eventually, wincing through the pain.