Duty Calls, page 17
It was hard to be sure over the shriek of our Aquila’s engines and the constant low rumble of the geothermal activity, but I thought I could hear an ominous scuttling sound away to our right, and turned my head to face the main cluster of industrial buildings. As I did so a flicker of movement caught the corner of my eye, almost hidden by the clouds of noxious fumes drifting from the fumaroles littering the ground beneath our narrow spire of rock.
‘Simeon, five o’clock high!’ I shouted, barely in time, but his reactions were boosted to preternatural levels by whatever foul alchemy was polluting his blood and he turned faster than I would have believed possible, bringing up his shotgun as he did so. The flat boom of it echoed across the open landing field, and a ball of something cartilaginous, trailing tentacles like some languid aquatic invertebrate, burst messily in midair, spraying some sort of loathsome ichor all around itself. Where it hit the thin carpet of ash the ground sizzled, exuding foul fumes. An instant later another pair of detonations echoed from the buildings ranged around us, as two more of the vile constructs exploded into oblivion without finding targets of their own.
‘What the hell was that?’ Zemelda asked, her voice understandably a little shriller than usual.
‘Spore mines,’ Amberley replied tersely, clearly not wanting to waste any more time in idle conversation.
‘Some kind of bio acid, by the look of it,’ Mott added helpfully. ‘Fortunately every one in a cluster tends to detonate at the same time, which means they’re relatively easy to guard against if one remains sufficiently alert–’
‘Duck!’ I snapped at him, cracking off a shot with my laspistol, which took out another deadly balloon swooping at his head. Once again the rest of the swarm went off with it, sending a few shards of something hard and dangerous-looking pinging off Amberley’s armour and making the rest of us flinch.
‘And that would appear to be a form of frag analogue.’ Mott sounded no more than mildly intrigued by our close brush with death. ‘I’d need an intact specimen to examine to be sure, of course, but my guess would be that the outer shell consists of small segments of chitin, bonded together with cartilage, or perhaps muscle fibres–’
‘Shut up and run,’ I suggested, suiting the action to the word, and not a moment too soon. The sight I most dreaded, a heaving mass of chitinous armour and razor-sharp talons, was bearing down on us from the direction of the manufactoria, so dense and so shrouded in the dust being raised by innumerable claw-edged feet that it was virtually impossible to tell where one malevolent life form ended and its neighbour began.
‘Keep an eye out for the larger ones,’ I counselled, breaking into a sprint towards the distant shuttle. ‘If you can take them down the swarm will lose cohesion.’
‘Fine idea in theory,’ Pelton said, his team taking whatever cover they could in the shadow of the boarding ramp, and beginning to shoot enthusiastically in the general direction of the approaching tide of talon and mandible. ‘Picking them out might be a bit more difficult, though.’ He was right, of course, but that was hardly helpful. The mass of chittering predators was bearing down on us like a tsunami, the fusillade of covering fire from the direction of the shuttle, welcome as it was, seemed about as effective as lobbing pebbles. The horde of nightmarish creatures carried on scuttling towards us at a rate that would have seemed impossible had I not seen it with my own eyes all too often before (and run like a startled sump rat too when I could, but that’s beside the point).
On the other hand the swarm was so densely packed that there could be no question of missing, even at a range so extreme that normally there would be no chance at all of acquiring a target. Following our comrades’ lead we began shooting too, pouring lasbolts and explosive projectiles from Amberley’s heavy bolter into the middle of the scuttling swarm; to no real effect if I’m honest, but it took no extra effort and made us feel better (if that were possible under such dire circumstances). Jurgen’s melta might have made a difference, I suppose, but if he’d stopped running long enough to fire the cumbersome heavy weapon he’d have been gaunt chow for sure within a second. Why he didn’t just ditch the thing and un-sling his lasgun I have no idea, but that was Jurgen for you, once he’d got an idea stuck in his head that was that (and lucky for us too, as things turned out).
‘They’re not going to make it!’ Zemelda said, an edge of panic beginning to enter her voice, which was hardly helpful, I thought, although it was hard to disagree with her. The horde of slavering killing machines was hideously close now, a front line of hormagaunts bounding clear of the pack, their scything claws extended eagerly to rend our flesh as they leapt towards us. The termagants behind them were moving a little more sedately, and my bowels spasmed at the sight of their fleshborers swinging towards us, taking clear aim in our direction. Behind them a larger silhouette loomed, rending claws and a deathspitter ready to do their deadly work, but the real danger the warrior form represented was its ability to focus the will of the hive mind, co-ordinating all these disparate creatures into what amounted to a single entity, fixated on our destruction.
‘Pontius,’ Amberley said, with what I thought was a surprisingly pettish cast to her voice considering the peril we were in. ‘If you’re quite ready?’
‘Just waiting for you to get a little closer,’ the pilot responded calmly, and I felt a sudden flare of hope. The Aquila’s primarily a workhorse, of course, but it’s also a mainstay of the Navy auxilia. Amberley’s might look like a standard civilian model, but that was no guarantee that it was unarmed, as I’d assumed from its external appearance. Almost as soon as the thought had formed, concealed gunports slid smoothly aside to reveal the welcome silhouettes of twin lascannons, flanking the stubby snout of the sturdy little shuttle. ‘Targets coming into optimum range… now.’
The lascannons spat their heavy bolts, smashing into the onrushing tide of chitinous death, felling half a dozen of the vile creatures in an instant, but the rest came on with undiminished fury.
‘Flicker! Board now!’ Amberley snapped, and with a final volley that actually succeeded in downing another couple of gaunts, which were promptly mashed flat by the onrushing horde behind them, Pelton’s team scurried up the ramp to safety. My lungs burning, and my feet slithering in the thin drift of ash, I pounded towards the blessed sanctuary offered by the Aquila’s hold, intent on nothing more than reaching it alive. The lascannons fired again, reaping another bountiful harvest of tyranid flesh, but as always the relentless monstrosities came on regardless, indifferent to their own losses.
‘Hurry!’ Zemelda was hovering at the top of the ramp, sending laspistol bolts whining around our ears, her commendable desire to help somewhat diminished by the reflection that she could well end up doing the ’nids’ work for them. Yanbel and Mott clattered up the incline to join her, and I flinched as a volley of fleshborer bugs missed me by centimetres, spattering off the portside landing skid, where in the absence of anything to devour they twitched feebly and expired.
‘Still with you, commissar,’ Jurgen reassured me, pausing on the lip of the ramp to turn and aim his melta. My own bootsoles rang on metal at last, and I turned to see what had happened to Amberley.
It wasn’t good. The warrior directing the swarm had evidently determined that she was the greatest threat, and concentrated most of their ranged fire against her power suit. The intricate engraving had been scored by a myriad of tiny abrasions where innumerable fleshborer and deathspitter shots had struck, mercifully without finding a weak spot that would allow their living ammunition to work their way inside, but they’d clearly been chewing away at the armour’s joints. She was moving stiffly now, more slowly than she had been, and the bolter on her arm had expended all its ammunition. A crowd of hormagaunts was pressing her hard, their scything claws scoring visible rents in the ceramite beneath the ornate decoration on the surface of the suit, and once again the image of the Reclaimer terminators being ripped to shreds aboard the Spawn of Damnation rose to the surface of my mind. These were no ’stealers, of course, but their sheer weight of numbers was beginning to tell, and it could only be a matter of time before they found a weak point and managed to get at the woman inside.
A second later, to my vague astonishment, I found myself moving into the attack, my laspistol picking off the nearest of the biological constructs as my trusty chainsword left the scabbard, howling like one of the tyranids themselves as its teeth bit deep into chitin, and my boots crunched once again in the carpet of volcanic ash. What was uppermost in my mind then, I honestly couldn’t say. I’d like to believe that, just for once, my innate pragmatism had been outweighed by the affection I felt for her, but I’m bound to admit that it had also occurred to me that Pontius wouldn’t get the Aquila off the ground until Amberley was safely on board it, and every second we delayed was another chance for the tyranids to cut me down too.
‘Jurgen, the big one!’ I shouted, blessing the fact that the warrior seemed to be holding back, content to let the cannon fodder wear Amberley down before it closed for the kill itself. My aide nodded, and, forewarned, I closed my eyes for a moment as the actinic flare of the melta burst like a second sun a few metres to my left. When I opened them again the warrior had vanished, along with a handful of its attendant minions, to be replaced by a few gobbets of steaming meat and a stench of charred flesh that even managed to punch its way through the all-pervading stink of Hell’s Edge.
‘Nicely done,’ Amberley said, ripping a gaunt’s head off with her power fist. I disembowelled another with my chainsword, and the swarm surrounding her fell back, all sense of purpose draining away. I dispatched another with a quick lasbolt to the thorax, and they began to break, scuttling away in the manner of their kind when the controlling influence of the overmind is removed. Amberley followed me back up the ramp, and into the welcoming bowels of the shuttle. ‘Pontius, you can lift when ready.’
‘Very well, ma’am.’ The note of our engines deepened, and the ground began to fall away beneath us. The survivors of the swarm were heading for the corner of the plateau by which they’d entered it, and glancing down through the gap left by the closing ramp I just had time to catch a brief glimpse of a narrow isthmus of rock stretching across the lava flow before the thick slab of metal slid smoothly into place. No doubt that was how the swarm had been able to cross the lake of liquid rock and surprise us. Amberley discarded her helmet with a hiss of breaking atmosphere seals.
‘Thank you, Ciaphas,’ she said, shaking her hair free. ‘I thought I was in trouble there for a moment.’ I shrugged, still unsure of my motives and uncomfortable with her gratitude, which I felt I didn’t really deserve.
‘Glad to help,’ I said, taking refuge in the pose of modesty that had served me so well for so many years, and she smiled at me with what looked like genuine affection. Fortunately I was spared any further awkward exchanges by Yanbel, who scooted forward to examine the armour with an audible intake of breath.
‘You won’t be wearing this for a while,’ he said, shaking his head. ‘I’ll need to strip it down completely, bless the components, and Omnissiah alone knows where I can find a new fluid link this side of the Gulf.’
‘I’m sure you’ll do your best,’ Amberley said, shrugging her way clear of the breached exoskeleton and stretching gratefully, in a manner that showed off her skin-tight bodyglove to considerable advantage. She smiled at me again, and led the way through the bulkhead to the lounge.
‘I don’t know about you,’ she said, reaching for the decanter, ‘but after all that excitement I could do with a drink.’
‘I thought you’d never ask,’ I replied gratefully.
‘What I don’t understand is how they knew we were there,’ Zemelda said, dropping into a nearby seat, and staring out of the viewing port. The survivors of the swarm had scuttled down the face of the plateau with their usual alacrity, and were already almost halfway along the narrow causeway they’d crossed to reach us. Pontius swung the shuttle round a few degrees, and hovered in place.
‘They must have seen the shuttle land,’ I said. ‘They’re bright enough to know that our arrival meant more people to consume, so they sent out a small scouting swarm to finish us off. After taking the miners so easily they wouldn’t have expected us to be as well armed as we were.’
Amberley nodded, sipping her amasec with every sign of satisfaction. Below us the narrow spine of rock disintegrated under the impact of a fusillade of lascannon shots, and the remaining ’nids vanished under the lava flow, flaring briefly into patches of greasy smoke as they did so.
‘They’re building up their biomass reserves,’ she said. ‘Now the hive fleet’s in range they’ll be creating an army to consolidate their beachhead, and pave the way for the main invasion force.’
I felt a faint chill of dread as I pondered the implication of her words. ‘That means they’ll strike again,’ I said. ‘Raid more settlements.’
Amberley nodded grimly. ‘I’m afraid you’re right.’ She drained her goblet, and poured another drink, a large one. ‘Hell’s Edge was only the beginning.’
EDITORIAL NOTE:
Cain, of course, doesn’t bother to expand on the consequences of this development for the planet as a whole, or for the campaign to defend it. I have therefore appended the following extracts from other sources, in the hope that they will go some way towards filling in the gaps in his narrative.
From Periremunda Today: The News That Matters to Your Planet, 264 933 M41
TERRORISTS ARE XENOS INFILTRATORS!
KEEP WATCHING THE SKIES!
In a startling announcement, endorsed by no lesser eminence than Lord General Zyvan, commander of the Imperial Guard heroes charged with eradicating the taint of un-mutual deviance from our fair world, Arbitrator Keesh today revealed the shocking truth that the campaign of terrorism that has rocked Periremunda for so long has an even more sinister purpose than simply challenging the benevolent rule of the Emperor’s divinely appointed regents. Far from being mere traitors and heretics, a crime that in itself deserves no less than utter annihilation and eternal damnation, the perpetrators are something even more foul: the changeling offspring of the vile xenos species known as genestealers, which taint the pure bodily essences of the Emperor-fearing, thus perverting them to the cause of the world-devouring tyranids.
Though one of the dreaded hive fleets is reported to be on its way to Periremunda, all true human citizens may take heart from the knowledge that so is a taskforce drawn from the very cream of the Imperial Navy, and the redoubtable warriors of the Imperial Guard, which between them is more than powerful enough to obliterate the cancer of the xenos presence from our blessed corner of the galaxy. Moreover, we still have the unceasing vigilance of Commissar Cain and his valiant comrades-in-arms to protect all true followers of the Emperor.
As for the xenos-tainted vermin still lurking among us, let them tremble in fear, knowing that their inevitable extermination is naught but a matter of time.
IS YOUR NEIGHBOUR A GENESTEALER?
2O WAYS TO TELL!
(See page 7)
Transcript of an address by Planetary Governor Merkin W. Pismire the younger, 266 933 M41
My fellow Periremundans, it’s with a heavy heart that I address you all tonight. Um, unless you’re in a different time zone, of course, when I guess you’ll be having breakfast. Or sleeping, or whatever. Erm…
By now you’ll all have heard what’s really been going on for the last few months, and no doubt you were as surprised as I was when I first saw the news picts this morning. Um, that’s to say my daughters saw them, and lost no time in bringing me up to speed. Um…
You may all rest assured that I voxed Arbitrator Keesh as soon as I became aware of the situation, and demanded a full report, which, I’m sure, will prove extremely reassuring as soon as it arrives, or the young man I spoke to has time to pass on the message.
Anyway, I can state quite confidently that things are completely under control. We’ve all heard these silly rumours about low altitude settlements suddenly losing contact with the rest of the planet, and I’m quite sure there’s no truth to any of them. It’s probably just these genestealer scallywags spreading scare stories to undermine our morale.
I mean, if the enemy was already here in force, I’m sure I’d know all about it. My staff is pretty good at keeping on top of the important stuff.
So goodnight, and Emperor bless you all. You can rest assured that everything that can be done will be done.
Erm… How was that? Gubernatorial enough? Or should we go again?
Err… What do you mean, it was live?
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Amberley was right, of course. Over the next two days we lost contact with another seven outposts, all of them situated among the lowest altitude and most marginally habitable of the plateaux, which at least meant that relatively few people had vanished into the maw of the tyranids[57], to be used as the raw material for spawning another generation of their hideous kind. That raised a whole new set of questions, of course.
‘You must have some idea of where their digester pools are,’ I said. I was sitting in Kasteen’s office, along with the colonel, Major Broklaw, and a portable hololith, in which the disembodied heads of our counterparts from the other regiments on-planet flickered uneasily, orbiting Zyvan’s face and upper torso like cherubs round a high-ranking ecclesiarch. There was still no sign of the hive fleet, or our promised reinforcements, and, under the circumstances, ordering the senior command staff to Principia Mons for a face-to-face briefing would have been the height of folly. Zyvan shook his head.
‘We’ve been looking, believe me, but the sandstorms are still blocking too many of our orbital imagers, and our recon flights haven’t turned anything up either. By the time we’ve established the loss of another settlement and sent a response team in, the wind has obliterated any tracks that were left in the desert.’
