03 - Savage Scars (37 page)

A high-pitched whine announced that the war spirit within Qaja’s plasma
cannon was ready and eager to slay its foes. The weapon’s containment coils
blazed a livid violet, and then the blunt nose erupted as a concentrated ball of
super-heated plasma cascaded forth. The beast was so close it had no chance to
avoid the shrieking ball of energy. It was engulfed in seething arcs of raw
plasma, its beak gaping wide as it threw its arms out as if in denial of its
imminent death, roiling energies spilling across its muscular form.

Then it exploded. The beast was torn apart as the raging power of the heart
of a sun transformed the solid matter of its body into another state entirely.
Sarik and Qaja were blasted by a wave-front of black ash, all that remained
after the hideous transformation. The air was filled with the flash-stink of
body fluids turned to super-heated steam and the blast wave scoured away the
smoke of battle.

Sarik and Qaja looked to one another in the wake of the explosion. Each saw
that the other was a blackened mess, his face streaked with bloody soot. Both
warriors’ proud white and red livery was almost entirely obscured, and Sarik’s
armour was blistered and deformed down one side.

“You look like a ghak-sifter, Brother Qaja,” Sarik grinned, his white teeth
bright in the midst of his blackened face. “You’re a disgrace.”

“And you look like a midden-herder, Brother-Sergeant Sarik,” Qaja replied.
“If I may be so bold.”

Sarik’s brow creased as he considered Qaja’s words. “A midden-herder?”

“Aye, brother-sergeant.”

“Hmm,” Sarik said, as he turned towards the horde of at least a thousand
screeching carnivores thundering towards the Space Marines.

“Glad we’ve got that settled.”

Lucian saw staccato lightning a kilometre up ahead, and lowered his
prey-sense goggles to get a better idea what was happening at the head of the
advance. He was riding in the turret of the Chimera, the vehicle lurching and
jolting so hard he could barely keep the image through the goggles steady.

Activating the goggles, Lucian’s world became a grainy, green wash, but he
could now see something of the Space Marine column where before all that had
been visible was smoke, shadow and muzzle flare. Advanced elements of the 2nd
Armoured were pushing through the middle distance, and beyond them, the Space
Marines’ Rhinos were formed up and stationary, their rear hatches down. The
battle-brothers were spreading out and forwards while the column’s support
vehicles ground to a halt behind the Rhinos.

Guessing that the Space Marines had dismounted to deal with some threat they
could not either bypass or smash straight through, Lucian shouted down to the
vehicle’s commander. “Slow down! The Space Marines are engaging on foot, we need
to give them space.”

The commander nodded, and relayed the information to the company officers of
the Brimlock 2nd Armoured. The Brimlock tanks up ahead slewed off the road to
either side and ground to a halt, and a moment later, the Chimera that Lucian
rode in did the same. Behind, the entire regiment was strung out in a line of
tanks, transports and support vehicles three kilometres in length. And that was
just the first regiment of nineteen, all of which were pushing hard for the star
port at the heart of Gel’bryn.

Tracking his goggles from the view up ahead to the nearest tau buildings,
Lucian saw a cluster of luminous blobs moving across the flank of a tall,
sail-shaped structure. With a twist of a dial at his temple, he increased the
magnification. The side of the building was swarming with long-limbed and nimble
figures, scuttling across the surface like insects.

Lucian activated his vox-link at the same moment as he swung the
pintle-mounted heavy stubber around. “Contact right, high.”

The turrets of two dozen nearby tanks and armoured transports swung around to
the right in response to Lucian’s warning. He squeezed the stubber’s trigger
plate with his thumbs, thumping off a three second burst that would tell the
gunners exactly where the enemy were. Tracers streaked towards the enemy, and
Lucian was surprised to see several of the carnivores blown to bloody chunks as
his un-aimed fire thundered in. Realising they had been detected, the remainder
of the carnivores redoubled their speed as they crossed the surface, jumping
down to the ground as soon as they reached a safe height to do so.

Then C Squadron opened fire. Twelve Leman Russ battle tanks fired as one, the
flaming discharge from their battle cannons turning night into day. The shells
slammed into the side of the building the carnivores had been scaling, blowing
out the entire fa�ade in a mass of blossoming explosions. Clouds of pulverised
resin swelled upwards, illuminated by raging inner fires, and then the whole
face collapsed, burying the aliens beneath tons of debris.

“Contact left!” a tank commander from B Squadron called.

“Contact right!” D’s squadron sergeant-major called.

“Movement rear!” B Echelon’s commander reported.

“All units,” the voice of Colonel Armak cut into the channel, his code
overriding the transmissions of his subordinates. The colonel’s tone was
measured and calm, exactly what his men needed at that moment. “We’re surrounded
on all quarters by large numbers of xenos carnivores. We can’t push forwards
until the Space Marines get going again, and I’m sure as hell not going to be
the first commander in this regiment’s history to order a retreat. All units,
prepare to address! Don’t stop firing ’til they’re right on you, then up and at
’em!

“Good luck.”

“Battlegroup Arcadius,” Lucian said into his command-net once the colonel had
finished his address. “Dismount. Keep well clear of the tanks while they fire,
then address as the enemy close. Out.”

Closing the channel, Lucian tracked the heavy weapon back and forth, seeing
movement in the darkness. He magnified the view through his goggles, penetrating
the thick banks of smoke drifting across the scene. What at first appeared a
blurred, undulating mass resolved into the front rank of a thousand-strong horde
of alien carnivores. The gangly xenos were bounding forwards in great leaps,
their dreadlock-like head spines erect like the hackles of an attack canine.
They bore their long, primitive rifles, firing from the hip as they advanced,
though not with any accuracy. Their beaks were open wide as they hissed and
screeched, their vile war cries filling the air.

“Enemy at three hundred metres!” Lucian called down to the Chimera’s crew.
“Prepare to—”

“Father, this is Korvane,” the voice of Lucian’s son came over the vox.
“Father, do you receive?”

Settling the heavy stubber’s aiming reticule over the front rank of the
advancing aliens, Lucian replied, “Korvane? This isn’t a good time. Can it
wait?”

“No, father, it cannot!” Korvane replied. There was no mistaking the urgency
in his voice. Lucian’s son had been raised in the rarefied atmosphere of the
high court, and was not given to inappropriate shows of emotion. If he was
spooked, there was a damn good reason.

“Go ahead,” Lucian said, as the aliens surged forwards, his fists tightening
on the stubber’s twin-grips.

“Father,” Korvane continued. “You have to get off the surface, right now…”

“What?” Lucian said as the vehicles on either side opened fire, their
deafening reports drowning out Korvane’s voice and flooding the channel with
interference. “Repeat last!”

“I repeat,” said Korvane. “You must evacuate, now. All of you… everyone!”

“Why?” shouted Lucian over the sound of heavy gunfire. “Calm down and tell me
what’s happened.”

There was a pause as Korvane got a grip, then carried on. “Father, Grand has
brought forward the deadline. The Exterminatus is—”

“What?” Lucian cursed. “And he was going to tell us when…?”

Another pause, before Korvane replied, “He wasn’t, father.”

“Understood, son,” Lucian replied as the alien horde closed and he opened
fire with the heavy stubber. The thump of the weapon firing and the bloody ruin
it inflicted on the aliens’ lanky bodies drowned out the rage rising within him…

A gnarled, scarred hand caressed a sleek, black form, its owner cooing
words of power that penetrated the armoured housing and reverberated through the
cell-hosts. Death heard those words, and heeded their meaning. A trillion
murder-cells quivered with hungry life, as if each and every one tasted the
scent of their prey, far below.

The vessel of death, the Exterminatus torpedo, waited, held securely in a
cantilevered launch cradle. The hand receded, and the words of power fell
silent. Wait… death was told. Wait, and soon you shall feed…

Brielle pulled the hatch closed behind her, the hiss of the saviour
pod’s life support systems engaging filling the small space. The sound of alarms
and the shouts of emergency response crews receded behind the armoured panel,
and everything was suddenly very quiet.

The interior of the pod was sparsely appointed and illuminated with a blue
light that Brielle assumed was the equivalent to the low, red glow the
Imperium’s vessels utilised in similar circumstances. The bulkheads were covered
in crash padding, and the deck consisted of an arrangement of ten grav-couches
radiating from a central command terminal.

Now what? Brielle stepped over the couches and peered out through a porthole.
The glowing orb of Dal’yth Prime filled the circular viewer, the arid surface
clearly visible. It was day below, but Brielle knew that the battle at Gel’bryn
was currently being fought at night. That meant she was half a world away from
where she wanted to be.

She studied the world’s surface for a moment, half entranced by the intricate
patterns of mountain ranges, coastlines and the sparkling reflections of
Dal’yth’s star cast from the pristine turquoise oceans. The other half of her
mind was committing the world’s topography to memory, tracking trajectories and
calculating the flight path she would have to take to reach the Imperium’s
forces at Gel’bryn.

There were so many other risks and variables there was simply no point
worrying about them all. What if the pod would only take one path, directly to
the surface below? What if it was programmed to make for tau territory? Even if
she could control the descent, what if it landed her in the midst of a battle
instead of near friendly forces?

She cast all such things from her mind and lowered herself into the nearest
grav-couch.

As she settled into the couch, the padding expanded to grip her body, holding
her firmly in position. Only her bare feet were left loose, for they were too
different from the tau’s reverse-jointed lower legs to be accommodated. As she
leaned back, giving in to the unfamiliar loss of freedom of movement, a command
terminal lit up on the bulkhead above her. Its screen displayed a single,
flashing word in the angular tau script.

She struggled to decipher the text, recalling the lessons Aura had conducted
weeks ago as she had been transported across the Damocles Gulf. Tree? No, that
made no sense. Nostril? Come on, concentrate… Propel, perhaps… Launch!

But she did not want to launch, not yet at least. She wanted to enter a
flight plan, to ensure the saviour pod took her where she wanted to go. If it
took her to the surface by the most direct route, she would be dumped in the
middle of the desert, to be picked up by the tau, or starve to death in the arid
wastes. She hated arid wastes. They played havoc on the pores.

There must be some way to…

A voice outside the hatch, raised in question.

Brielle’s breath caught in her throat. She was trapped in the grav-couch,
barely even able to move her head. She looked down the length of her body to the
access hatch, and heard the voice again. What she had taken for a question was
in fact a statement. Something like… “Safe to come out.”

Whoever was out there, he thought that Brielle was a tau crewman who had fled
to the saviour pod at the sound of the alarms, assuming the fire raging through
the communications bay would engulf the entire deck, perhaps the entire ship,
and necessitate escape.

The voice came again, this time more insistent. She was being
ordered
out of the pod.

She looked back to the blinking text on the screen above as a thud sounded
against the hatch. Whoever was out there was now pounding on the outside,
evidently losing patience. She knew it was only a matter of time before a
crewman with the sense or authority to override the lock arrived and dragged her
out.

She had no choice. She would have to worry about plotting a course to the
crusade’s ground forces once she was in transit.

“Launch,” she said out loud, as it occurred to her that there was no lever or
command rune to activate to set the pod in motion. The terminal over her head
beeped loudly, and the text changed.