03 - Savage Scars (34 page)

The weapon’s systems had shed much of the heat, but it was still impossibly
hot. Even through his armoured gauntlets, Sarik felt the flesh of his hands
cooking. His power armour pumping ever more palliative elixirs into his system,
Sarik strained, hauling the weapons around as the feed chambers peaked at full
capacity.

The pilot could not possibly have known Sarik’s intentions, and in truth,
neither did he, for he was acting on pure instinct, his body flooded with
adrenaline and potent combat drugs. The fusion blasters discharged, the
furnace-beams enveloping a second battle suit, towards which Sarik had tracked
the weapons’ barrels.

The other battle suit’s energy shield cast a shimmering blue bubble. Sarik
bellowed as he held the weapons on target, forcing the fusion beams to burn
through the shield. Overwhelmed by the titanic energies, the shield pulsated,
before collapsing in upon its projector.

The battle suit’s armour withheld the raging sun storm for all of three
seconds before the panels peeled back, one laminate at a time, each layer
disintegrating into billowing black gas. The instant the armour was gone, the
rest of the suit was turned to liquid fire which scattered on the hot winds
stirred up in the wake of the devastation.

Finding that his gauntlets were fused to the barrels of the weapons, Sarik
hauled with all his strength to tear them free. The battle suit bucked and
kicked beneath him, but could not dislodge his bulk. Then one hand tore free,
pain flaring until his armour systems administered yet another dose of elixir.
Though he could barely feel his free hand, he made a fist and powered it down
into the open wound atop the battle suit’s torso. It crunched through a layer of
internal systems, before striking something soft. The battle suit went
immediately limp and as it crashed to the ground, Sarik finally tore his other
hand free and rolled clear.

As Sarik braced himself to bound upright and engage the last of the three
battle suits, he heard a voice bellow, “Sarik! Keep down!” Bolt-rounds tore
overhead, followed by a missile streaking in from a position further behind. He
was barely able to hold his berserker fury in check, the urge to spring to his
feet and charge the last enemy almost overcoming the danger of the gun and
missile fire.

He rolled sideways, and saw the last battle suit enveloped in a roiling mass
of flames and smoke as the missile struck its energy shield and detonated. The
shield defeated the missile, but the battle suit’s pilot was retreating and was
outside of the effective range of its fusion blasters. As the smoke cleared, the
suit’s back-mounted jets flared to life and it sprang up and backwards in a
great bounding leap.

Sarik was overcome with the desire to tear the battle suit’s pilot from the
infernal machine, and surged to his feet with a snarl on his lips.

“Sarik!” he heard from behind.

He started forwards, his chainsword raised, before his name was called again,
this time from closer behind. “Sarik!”

Something in the voice caused him to pause. It was Brother Qaja, his old
friend, who he had known since both had served as scouts in the 10th Company.
For a brief moment, he was back on Luther McIntyre with his fellow neophytes.
Qaja was wounded and Kholka cornered by the mica dragon…

…Sarik drew his bolt pistol and threw himself forwards, determined to save
his fallen brother from the beast’s rage. Qaja called his name and tackled him
to the ground, pushing him away from the creature’s snapping maw. The beast
distracted, Kholka darted clear, helping Sarik as he dragged the wounded Qaja
from the cave. Only Qaja’s shouted intervention had saved him from a fool’s
death…

Reality crashed back in on Sarik, and he realised he was standing in the open
twenty metres beyond the laager. Brother Qaja had hold of his blackened, fused
shoulder plate and was dragging him around to face him. Shots whinnied all
around and savage explosions rent the air.

Sarik turned and looked his fellow White Scar in the face. For a moment, it
was not
Brother
Qaja that stood there before him, his face a latticework
of honour scars. It was
Scout
Qaja, his face untouched and unlined.

“Never do that again!” Scout Qaja had said as the three neophytes had
cleared the mica dragon’s cave.

“You said you would never do that again!” Brother Qaja said angrily. “There
is honour, and then there is foolhardiness… I thought you understood the
difference!”

Sarik’s rage lifted as his battle-brother’s words sank in, and he allowed
himself to be pushed towards the laager. The Devastators were falling back in
pairs with disciplined precision, one covering the other with his bolt pistol as
they fought their way back to the vehicles. A lull seemed to have settled on the
scene of the battle, the tau pulling back to regroup after their failed attempt
to breach the Space Marines’ defences. In less than a minute, Sarik and Qaja
were back within the circle of armoured vehicles.

“This time, brother,” Sarik said as he caught his breath. “This time, I mean
it.”

Qaja’s face was grim as his dark eyes bored into Sarik’s. Then he nodded, and
said, “This time, I believe you. You are master here, you must rein in your
battle-lust, but you know that already, I am sure.”

“Aye, brother,” Sarik said, looking around the laager and noting the
casualties suffered in the first wave of assaults. “Too many rely upon me for me
to indulge in such things.”

“Not unless you truly have no alternative,” Qaja said. “I shall say no more
on the matter.”

But Sarik was not content with that. “No, brother,” he said. “If you need to
do so, you must. I shall seek the counsel of the Chaplains later, but in the
meantime, you must be my confessor.”

“And if you do not heed my words?” Qaja said, a wry grin creasing his scarred
face.

“Then you can strike me down,” Sarik smiled, “just like you did on Luther
McIntyre.”

“I promise it, brother,” Qaja replied. “I—”

The air shuddered as the Whirlwinds opened fire again, three-dozen missiles
streaking overhead to detonate amongst another wave of the savage alien
carnivores surging towards the laager. Sarik clapped his battle-brother’s
shoulder, then bellowed orders as he strode to the nearest squad, ready to man
the defences. Qaja hoisted his plasma cannon and checked its power cycle, then
followed after his friend and commander.

“Repeat last, Korvane!” Lucian shouted into the vox-horn, one hand clamping
the phones around his head. “You’re breaking up!”

Lucian was hitching a ride in a Chimera belonging to the 2nd Armoured’s
regimental intelligence cell, and the transport bucked and jolted as it hurtled
at top speed along the road to the Gel’bryn star port. The passenger bay was
cramped, filled with staff officers working field-cogitation stations and
yelling into vox-sets. Lucian could barely hear himself think, let alone what
Korvane was saying.

“I said,” Korvane’s voice cut through the burbling static, “I’m going to try
to rally the council against the inquisitor. I’ve got to do something. I can’t
just stand by and watch him go through with this!”

“I understand, Korvane,” Lucian said. “But there’s nothing the council can
do. It’s been dissolved, as well you know—”

“Only because he says it has, father,” Korvane interjected. “And only because
the councillors accept his authority.”

“He’s an inquisitor, Korvane,” Lucian hissed, trying not to be overheard by
the other passengers of the command Chimera. It was practically impossible, but
it seemed the staff officers had their own concerns and none were at all
bothered with his. “He can do what he wants.”

“Father,” Korvane said, his tone almost chiding. “You know as well as I that
his authority beyond the Imperium relies on others acknowledging it. His rosette
holds no more inherent authority than your warrant, or the council’s charter.
The council only accepts its dissolution because its members are scared of him.”

“And with good reason, son,” Lucian said. “You’re right; we’re all peers out
here, but what happens when we get back to Imperial space? If we make an enemy
of him, a real enemy, we make an enemy of the entire Inquisition.

“And besides,” Lucian continued, “he has a damned virus bomb.”

There was a pause, punctuated by popping static and low, churning feedback.
Then Korvane answered, “Father, I’m going to try to stop him. I don’t know—”

“You cannot!” Lucian growled. “Son, you’re the sole inheritor of the warrant.
There is no second in line!” Not since Brielle had disappeared, presumed dead.
There was a third in line, but he was a pampered imbecile, and aside from a few
distant cousins Lucian had no desire to see the Clan Arcadius go to anyone but
his son on his own death.

“Leave this to me, father,” Korvane replied, his tone resolved. “I have to do
something, and I will. You are needed at the front; I am needed here.”

“Well enough, Korvane,” Lucian said, his words belying what he felt inside.
He looked across the command Chimera’s transport bay, towards the glowing map
displayed on a nearby tacticae-station. The 2nd Armoured was coming up on ten
kilometres from the star port, and would soon be linking up with Sarik’s Space
Marine force. Five other regiments were close behind, and the Deathbringers
moving in support. If the combined force could push through the tau and take the
star port, Inquisitor Grand might call off his insane plan to virus bomb Dal’yth
Prime. If not, Lucian might be able to return to orbit and stop his son getting
himself killed.

“Good luck, son,” Lucian signed off. “Damn fool offspring…”

Brielle held perfectly still as the drone approached, its slowly pulsing,
red-lit lens-eye closing on her as she waited in the shadows of the recess off
the communications bay. She pressed backwards into the shadows, feeling her way
behind her with her left hand while with the other she prepared to unleash the
last, precious load of her digital flamer. As she ghosted back, the drone came
on—surely, it had not discovered her presence, for it would have raised an
alarm had it done so. Perhaps it had just glimpsed movement and was following
some pre-programmed imperative to investigate. Or perhaps it had raised a silent
alarm, and a squad of armed warriors was rushing to detain her even now.

A small, levered arm unfolded from beneath the drone’s disc-shaped body, an
unidentified tool clicking at its end. It was less than three meters away, level
with the end of the shadowed recess, and still it had not seen her. From her
hiding place, Brielle studied the drone, deciding that it must be some low-level
maintenance machine, with a correspondingly low level of intelligence or will.

The tool levered out in front of the drone, and touched a piece of
wall-mounted machinery. Brielle’s eyes followed the movement, and she saw that
the drone was more interested in the communications sub-systems lining the
recess than in her. In fact, she saw with a small smile, it was straightening up
a piece of looped cabling she had disturbed as she had pressed backwards.

A thought struck her. Keeping her eye on the drone’s pulsing eye-lens, she
stepped backwards still further, the recess becoming all the more narrow and
cramped as she penetrated deeper into the communication bay’s innards. Her hand
behind her tracing the wall, she located another cable run, and took it in her
grip. Then she looked around slowly, careful not to make too sudden a movement
in case she drew the drone’s attention, and found another. She knew enough of
the tau script to understand the meaning of the characters stencilled across a
junction box the second set of cabling led to: danger.

Last chance, she thought as she flexed the finger on which she wore the
concealed flamer. Use the last charge, or take a risk on the cabling. She had
never shied away from risk, and would not be starting now.

The hand that gripped the first loop of cabling tightened, and Brielle
committed herself. She pulled hard, and yanked the cable from its terminal,
darting backwards beyond the second cable’s junction box as she did so. A sharp,
bright discharge filled the dark recess, and Brielle was blinded for a brief
moment. She felt her way along the walls, and crouched down. As her vision
returned, she saw that the drone had closed on the damaged cable, its tool-arm
re-seating the ripped-free cable even as she watched.

Knowing it was now or never, Brielle reached up and gripped the second cable.
This time, she closed her eyes as a bright arc of power leaped from the end.
Raising the spitting cable high, she stabbed upwards, and plunged its end into
the drone’s exposed underbelly.

With a high-pitched, electronic screech that sounded disturbingly organic,
the drone’s systems erupted in sizzling lightning. Small arcs of power seethed
around its body, up and down its levered tool-arm and along the cable it was
holding. The drone hovered there, shaking violently as smoke begun to belch from
vents around the upper facing of its disc.

It hovered there for another ten seconds, Brielle watching from the very end
of the recess. Then it shuddered one last time and exploded, white-hot,
razor-sharp fragments of its body scything in all directions. When the smoke
cleared, a dozen small fires had sprung into being amongst the systems hidden in
the recess, but Brielle was unscathed.

Brielle suppressed a wicked laugh as she realised that the drone’s
destruction might be the perfect way of crippling the communications bay. Then
she heard a hissing sound, and glanced upwards. Some manner of fire suppression
system, mounted in the recess’ ceiling. It hadn’t yet kicked in, but it would,
within seconds. She guessed that whatever gas would spring forth would starve
the fire of oxygen, hence there would be an in-built, if slim, delay to allow
crew the chance to get clear.