A hundred layers of war were piled up on top of one another. Luko
forced himself to look at the bloodshed and the suffering, to go through
every incarnation until he found one that didn’t fit. A single circular
room, haunted and tortured, on a spaceship. He saw himself lying on
the floor, convulsing at the mercy of the Panpsychicon’s spirit-grinder.
He pushed himself to his knees, and so did the Luko he saw. He
looked around and saw the face of Sister Aescarion ghosted over the
trenchworks and burning fortresses.
Luko lunged drunkenly towards the spirit-grinder. His lightning claw
sliced through the tangle of struts and wiring. Crystals rained down
and shattered.
Sister Aescarion followed him in destruction. She buried her power
axe deep in the machine’s core, and grimaced as she tried to wrench
it out. Luko was unable to judge distance or direction properly and
slashed around him with abandon, scattering components of the
psychic machine.
The thousand wars peeled away and fell apart. Fortresses turned to
dust. The mud dried and blew away, leaving a desert devoid of battle.
The Panpsychicon became the dominant reality, then the only one,
and Luko was able to shake the confusion from his mind.
The Space Marines lay in various stages of consciousness. Varnica
was on his feet, too. The Imperial Fists were scattered, groaning and
shifting as their own realities returned to them.
One did not move. Pallas, holding his own head in pain, knelt beside
the Imperial Fist and read his lifesigns off the fallen warrior’s armour.
‘He is gone,’ said Pallas.
‘What was his name?’ asked Graevus, who forced the words out in
between coughs as he knelt, bent double.
‘Gorvan,’ replied one of the other Imperial Fists.
‘Prexus?’ said Luko. ‘Sergeant?’
Aescarion tapped Luko on the shoulder guard and pointed to the
wall near the cell block warren. Prexus sat against the wall, his bolt
pistol in his hand, his chainsword discarded on the floor. His head
lolled, revealing the massive exit wound in the back of the skull.
Prexus’s brains were spread up the wall behind him, thrown across the
mosaic in the characteristic pattern of a bolter wound.
No one said that Prexus had shot himself. They didn’t need to.
‘What must he have seen?’ said Pallas.
‘Think not on it,’ said Varnica. ‘Let us move. Sister, commend their
souls.’
The strikeforce crossed the Panpsychicon, armoured feet crunching
through the remains of the psychic machine. Aescarion, head bowed,
followed the Space Marines towards the double doors at the far side of
the room, murmuring a prayer for the departed.
Sarpedon braced his remaining talons against the floor and put all his
strength into forcing the bridge doors open. The blast doors,
automatically sealed in the event of boarders entering the Phalanx,
creaked and gave way a little. Hydraulic lines split and the resistance
lessened, and the door slid open wide enough to admit the bulk of a
Space Marine.
‘Daenyathos!’ shouted Sarpedon as he stepped onto the bridge of
the Phalanx.
The bridge was a palace, built to glorify the captain who had once
held court there – Rogal Dorn, primarch of the Imperial Fists Legion,
the first master of the Phalanx. Under him, this ship had darkened the
sky of Terra herself when Horus laid siege to the Emperor’s Palace. A
mighty throne, three storeys high, dominated the bridge, plated with
gold. The flight of steps leading to the oversized pulpit-throne was
flanked with displayed weapons captured from enemies or discovered
during the Great Crusade.
The vast viewscreen facing the throne, taking up most of the curving
from wall of the bridge, showed a panorama of the Veiled Region, with
the star Kravamesh glowing along one edge. Kravamesh had turned
dark and smouldering, black swarms scudding across its burnt orange
orb, as if the star was drained of power to fuel the gate across to the
warp that had brought Abraxes into realspace. Below the screen were
dozens of command helms, each controlling one of the Phalanx’s
many vital systems, and even when stationary they should have been
bustling with crewmen and Imperial Fist overseers. Now, only a few
slumped dead crewmen remained, felled by bullet wounds where they
had sat.
One body was piled on the floor beside his chair. In the chair, at the
communications helm, sat a hunched elderly figure, bony fingers
playing across the controls. The man turned at Sarpedon’s voice,
revealing an ancient, lined face broken by a smile.
‘Lord Sarpedon,’ said the old man. ‘For so long I have waited for this.
Of all the pieces of Master Daenyathos’s future, you are the one that
shines the brightest in his plan. I am Father Gyranar, honoured to lead
my congregation.’
Sarpedon stalked warily through the bridge, casting his eyes over
the monumental sculptures looming in the shadows around the edge of
the bridge, the suits of ancient armour gleaming and polished around
the foot of the throne-mount. ‘Where is Daenyathos?’ he said.
Gyranar stood up, his bent frame meaning he was barely taller than
when he sat. A trembling finger pointed as the old man took a few
steps towards Sarpedon. ‘So blessed am I that I lived to see this. I
dared not hope it might be during my lifetime that the threads would
come together, that the one Daenyathos wrote of would lead his
Chapter to the fulfilment of our dreams. But you stand before me, Lord
Sarpedon. And we all stand at this confluence of fates.’
Sarpedon hefted the Axe of Mercaeno and scuttled within a lunge
and a strike of Gyranar. ‘I said, where is Daenyathos?’
‘Threaten not those who are merely carried on the eddies of the
fates we weave,’ came an artificial voice, amplified from somewhere
behind the throne-mount. ‘Men like Father Gyranar are ignorant of their
fate and impotent to change it. But you and I, Sarpedon, we are
different. We are the authors of our fates. It takes men like you to forge
the channels into which the future will flow. And men like me to decide
what that future is.’
The shape of a Space Marine Dreadnought stomped from behind the
throne-mount. The colours and heraldry of the Soul Drinkers were
polished and gleaming now, as if it had just stepped from the forges of
the old Chapter. A missile launcher and a power fist were mounted
below its massive shoulders and purity seals fluttered from the blocky
mass of the sarcophagus.
‘Iktinos told me everything,’ said Sarpedon. ‘I know why you are
here. You will take the Phalanx across the galaxy and disgorge
Abraxes’s armies everywhere you go.’
‘That is true,’ said Daenyathos. ‘But did he tell you why?’
‘He tried,’ said Sarpedon. ‘But I could not believe such a thing
spoken from the lips of a Space Marine, even one as corrupted as
Iktinos. So I would hear it from you first.’
‘
It is simple, Sarpedon,’ said Daenyathos. The chassis pivoted so
that the dreadnought’s head, shaped like an oversized Space Marine
helm, looked up at the huge viewscreen and the stretch of void it
showed. ‘The galaxy is corrupt. Its people are damned and its rulers
are cruel. This is the same conclusion as yours, is it not? The
Imperium is a dark and savage place, a breeding ground for the
desperation that gives the forces of the warp the chance to do their
wickedness in our universe. It is through suffering that the Imperium
will be remade. Great suffering, on a scale beyond the imaginings of
lesser minds. Thanks to the plan crafted by me and executed by
many, including you, Abraxes and the Phalanx will combine to spread
such suffering that the Imperium will be remade stronger and more
just.’
‘And you will rule it?’ said Sarpedon.
‘Of course,’ replied Daenyathos, the green-lensed eyes of the
sarcophagus focusing on Sarpedon again. ‘Who else could?’
‘You understand,’ said Sarpedon, ‘that I must try to stop you. I may
die, for no doubt you have included this very eventuality in your plan.
Nevertheless, if there is the smallest chance that the people of the
Imperium can be spared that fate, then I must take it.’
‘Of course,’ said Daenyathos. ‘I would expect nothing less. You
have been a loyal servant to me, Sarpedon, though you played your
part unknowingly. It pains me not a little to have to kill you. But you
will fight to the death to protect the same Imperium you profess to
despise, and so I must ensure you hinder me no further.’
‘It is the Imperium I hate. Not its people. Its people are innocent.’
‘Innocence is a falsehood created by weak and fearful minds,’ said
Daenyathos.
‘Well, then. I do not think there is anything more to say.’
‘Indeed, Chapter Master Sarpedon. I would finish this without delay.’
‘And I would oblige you.’ Sarpedon crouched down on the five legs
he had left, Axe of Mercano held low ready to charge.
Daenyathos’s targeting auspex flickered as it registered Sarpedon,
feeding information into the dreadnought’s internal cogitators.
Sarpedon yelled and sprang to one side as a volley of missiles
shrieked from Daenyathos’s launcher, and the bridge of the Phalanx
was suddenly full of fury.
Chapter 14
The scouts brought back word that the daemons were loading their war
engines with ammunition, heaps of smouldering skulls and ballista
bolts of ensorcelled brass. The scorpion machine was being filled with
boiling venom, biomechanical poison sacs swelling in billows of steam,
daemons scrambling across its lacquered carapace.
Word reached the Imperial Fists lines. Chapter Master Vladimir
made his decision instantly, for there was, in truth, no decision to be
made.
Lord Inquisitor Kolgo stood proud of the defences, his Battle Sisters
gathered around him, the fires of the daemons’ forges flickering against
his polished Terminator armour. He watched the daemon masses
swarming into formation in response.
‘Lackeys of the warp!’ yelled Kolgo. ‘This is what you begged for.
This is why you were spewed from the guts of the Immaterium. To face
us, the Emperor’s own, the shield of Mankind! Well, now you have
your wish. Rejoice as we cleave you apart. Give thanks as we shoot
you down. This is what you wished for. Come, rush onto our blades!’
The daemons leapt over the barricades of wreckage, shrieking in
response. The heralds of their gods bellowed and keened the songs of
the warp, and darkness gathered around like the eclipse of a distant
sun.
Into the darkness charged the Imperial Fists.
On the map tables of the Tactica Sigismundi were dozens of
battlefields rendered in stone miniature, some of them depicting
meticulous surgical strikes with every element of an Imperial Fists
force working in harmony, perfectly coordinated, each squad shielding
the next while catching foes in a lethal crossfire. Others were battles
of attrition, the Imperial Fists relying on their enhanced bodies and
wargear to keep them fighting when the enemy were breaking down.
But some of them, the fewest, were headlong charges, frontal assaults
into hell which only a Space Marine could hope to survive. It was
written in the Codex Astartes that a Space Marine should never be
used in such a way, that his value to the Imperium was too great to be
thrown away in a pell-mell slaughter in the teeth of an entrenched foe.
But the Codex Astartes could not cover every possible battle. It
could not predict that one day the Phalanx itself would be invaded, and
that between its survival and its destruction stood a last-ditch battle
where the enemy could only be fought face to face in the open, with no
strategy in the Chapter Master’s arsenal to change it into anything
other than a pitched battle, a duel to the death.
Vladimir and Kolgo led the charge. The weapons already operating
on the daemon engines opened up and flung burning comets into the
midst of the Imperial Fists, throwing armoured bodies into the air.
Daemons surged forwards, heedless of organisation or rank, overcome
with a lust for the fight that spread like a fire.
This was the way it had to be. Vladimir drew the Fangs of Dorn and
hammering, the barrels glowing hot.
The rest of the Imperial Fists crashed into the enemy. If they were to
die, it would be in defence of their Chapter. Few of them gave any
thought to the chance they might live.
Sarpedon skidded along the floor of the bridge as the missiles
streaked over him, the sound of the air ripping behind him as scalding
rocket exhaust billowed around him. The sound of the impacts behind
him was so loud it wasn’t even a sound, just a white wall of noise that
blocked out all hearing except for the alien echo rippling around the
Phalanx’s bridge.
Sarpedon was ready for the shockwave. He took the worst of it on
his shoulder and let the impact throw him into the foot of the throne
pedestal, front legs collapsing beneath him to absorb the impact.
Father Gyranar disappeared in the mass of smoke and flame.
Shattered components from consoles rained down, chunks of burning
metal and cabling. Cracks ran up the viewscreen, marring the view of
the Veiled Region with black jagged fingers.
Sarpedon dragged himself into the dubious cover of the nearest
statue, an Imperial Fists apothecary plated in gold.
‘Did you think, said Daenyathos’s artificial voice from the throne,
‘that I had not thought I would face you one day? You, or someone like
you. Why do you believe I selected a dreadnought as my vessel?’
Sarpedon hauled himself up the nest few steps, crouching down
behind a statue of an Emperor’s Champion from some campaign of
distant legend. His nervous system seemed struck out of kilter by the
missile impacts, his legs uncoordinated, his head ringing.
‘If you know the future,’ said Sarpedon, forcing his mind to keep up
with his surroundings, ‘then you know how this ends.’
The response was another burst of missiles, triple contrails spiralling
towards Sarpedon. The Space Marine flung him across the steps
leading up to the throne. The Emperor’s Champion disappeared in a
burst of golden shrapnel, and the other two missiles howled past to
impact against the viewscreen. Sarpedon dug in with claws and
fingers, clinging to the side of the throne pedestal. Bursts of pain
against the side of his face registered, in a detached, soldierly way, as
shards of shrapnel embedded in his skull. One eye suddenly shut
down, his vision cut in half, depth gone, the scene in front of him
becoming ever more otherworldly.
Massive shards of the viewscreen fell away like black glass daggers,
shattering against the floor. Chunks of the Veiled Region seemed to
have fallen away with it, the galaxy turning dark piece by piece, a
broken mosaic of decay.
Sarpedon’s nervous system caught up and the wrenching pain from
his hips told him he had been hit worse than he realised. He looked
down at the pulpy mess of fibrous muscle and broken exoskeleton. He
had three legs left, and chunks of mutated limb lay straggling down the
steps behind him. No wonder he had felt out of control. He was trying
to push himself forward on legs he didn’t have.
Sarpedon scrambled forwards a little further, to the shadow of the
throne. Daenyathos was in silhouette, the light from the viewscreen
having died, and looming over Sarpedon he looked less like a
dreadnought and more like the vision that Sarpedon had forced into
Iktinos’s mind – vast, monstrous, toweringly powerful, invulnerable to
the efforts of a mere man.
‘It could have been anyone,’ continued Daenyathos, the missile
ports on his arm closing. ‘Caeon could have led the Chapter astray.
Gorgoleon. Iktinos. It could have happened centuries earlier or later.
Whoever it was, I always knew I would have to face one of you. For
you, this is the end. For me, this is just another footnote.’
The storm bolter on Daenyathos’s power fist arm clicked its action
and Sarpedon was suddenly looking down its barrel. Daenyathos
couldn’t fire any more missiles – Sarpedon was too close, the
shrapnel too dangerous. Daenyathos could not risk damaging his