Defender of the Imperium Omnibus, page 97
‘Here you are, sir,’ Jurgen said, handing me an amplivisor, and I raised it to my eyes cautiously, but he’d already set the polarisers to maximum, so despite my fears I remained undazzled by the glare.
‘They’re coming in just above the deck,’ I said, impressed in spite of myself. Even a pilot of Sprie’s calibre would probably think twice about attempting to fly nap of earth at high speed in mountainous terrain, let alone in tight formation and poor light conditions. Their recklessness was a weakness, I reminded myself, typical of the low value followers of Chaos placed on their own lives, as well as those of everyone else.
‘Hold your fire,’ Rorkins said, on the general command channel, his voice sounding calm and professional, and everyone complied, even the PDF, to my vague surprise. ‘Let them get close enough to be sure of a target.’ I could hear the howl of their engines now, a rising note which set the hairs on the back of my neck bristling, and drew my laspistol, although I wouldn’t have the slightest chance of damaging any of the incoming shuttles with it. The turret of the Chimera next to me shifted a little, the motor of its traverser whining like the motivators of Julien’s power armour, and I glanced up.
‘Steady there, gunner,’ I said. All we needed was for some trigger-happy idiot to open up prematurely, and what little advantage we had would be blown. If, on the other hand, everyone kept a cool head, with any luck the enemy wouldn’t realise that we’d been reinforced, at least not until it was far too late for them to do anything about it.
‘It isn’t him, sir,’ Grouber volunteered, a little diffidently. ‘It’s that thing the tech-priests put in.’
‘What thing?’ I asked, lowering the amplivisor for a moment.
The young lieutenant peered down at me from the turret hatch, looking a little confused, as his perch continued to rotate, barely perceptibly, under him. ‘I don’t rightly know, sir,’ he said at last. ‘But the one with the metal face said you’d authorised it.’
‘Oh, right, that thing,’ I said, as though the matter was of little interest, and turned away, activating my comm-bead. ‘Felicia. What have you done to my Chimeras?’
‘Given them a little edge,’ the familiar voice said cheerily. ‘Tied an automatic targeter into the auspex array of the command one, with a vox-link to the rest. It’s an unholy lash-up, given the time we had available, but it’ll just have to do until we can burn the incense properly and recalibrate. If it works at all.’
‘Well it seems to be doing something,’ I assured her, feeling the first faint stirrings of optimism for what felt like a very long time.
‘Good.’ Felicia sounded as pleased with herself as ever, and I found myself wondering if she was actually enjoying the chance to relive the adventures of her youth. ‘If we managed to propitiate the machine spirits with the right prayers and programming, they should open fire as soon as they’ve got a lock. If not, you’ll have to get the gunners to do it manually.’
‘How will they know if they have to?’ I asked, and Felicia chuckled, the warm sound I remembered so well from so many years ago.
‘The pict screen will light up, and display the message “Fire Now,”’ she said. ‘I remember how you always took the direct approach to things.’
‘Lieutenant,’ I said casually, glancing up, ‘the magos tells me her people blessed the targeting systems so the Omnissiah itself can manifest through them, and strike down our enemies. Don’t be alarmed if they…’
I never got the chance to complete the sentence, as the multi-laser in the turret fired, the miniature thundercrack drowning out everything, even the rising scream of the approaching shuttle engines. For a moment I thought the sound was echoing from the surrounding hills, then I realised that the vox-relay had done its work despite the lack of incense, and the other five had fired too, almost simultaneously. Raising my amplivisor again I tried to focus on the approaching shuttles.
‘A hit, by the Emperor!’ I cried jubilantly, then corrected myself. ‘No, two at least!’ The outermost aircraft on either side of the formation were both losing speed and altitude, which made sense to me, as the Chimeras were ranged along each side of the valley, and the machine spirits, logical as ever, would simply have sought the nearest targets. The turret rotated rapidly, Grouber looking a little seasick, as the cogitators tried for another lock, but the pilots had reacted almost at once, diving for the floor of the valley, lower than the barrels could depress. The engine of the shuttle farthest from us was leaking smoke, and it seemed to be responding more sluggishly, but it followed its fellows nevertheless.
‘That one’s still coming,’ Grouber said, and I focussed on the nearest ship. It seemed to be in a bad way, sideslipping as it came, with most of its control surfaces shot away. Flames were flickering along its underside, and I didn’t envy its occupants in the slightest.
‘See if you can take another crack at it,’ I suggested, and the Chimera’s turret rotated again, but too late; the crippled shuttle roared over our heads, battering us for a moment with the downdraft of its passage, to vanish over the other side of the ridge. A moment later the engine noise ceased, with the unmistakable crump! of impact.
‘Holy Emperor,’ Grouber breathed. For a moment I thought he was reacting to the crash, but the direction of his gaze was in the other direction, towards the dam and the hydro station beside the vast reservoir. The attacking aircraft were rising now, a manoeuvre I recognised from having been in shuttles doing the same thing myself, intending to pop up over the lip of the dam, using its bulk to shield themselves from defensive fire for as long as possible. I started to vox a warning, but there was no need; from my elevated perspective I could see Yaitz’s skitarii fanning out to meet the threat, the more ponderous figures of heavy weapon servitors plodding in their wake, and I found myself wondering just how many of the metal and flesh combat constructs they actually had stowed away beneath the shrine. (Not to mention how they intended explaining their presence to Rorkins.)
‘I don’t think that one’s going to make it, sir,’ Jurgen remarked conversationally, as though commenting on the weather, and I focussed the amplivisor again. My aide was right, I thought, the crippled shuttle was trying to maintain formation with its fellows, but it was clearly responding far too sluggishly. As the undamaged three rose over the lip of the dam, into a barrage of fire from the skitarii and a couple of squads of our storm-trooper cadets, the damaged one ploughed into the rockcrete a few metres below the rim, exploding into a fireball so bright it stabbed my retina. ‘That’s two down,’ my aide said, in tones of unmistakable satisfaction.
‘Let’s just hope it doesn’t–’ I began to say, an instant before it did, and a secondary explosion ripped a ragged hole in the face of the dam. One of the explosive charges we’d placed to blow the structure if we needed to had been detonated by the impact. I held my breath, but none of the others went off, thank the Emperor. Even so, the damage had been done. A section of the retaining wall fell away, propelled by the force of the water behind it, to shatter against the turbine hall at the base of the structure, and a vast new waterfall jetted out through the gap, filling the old river bed beyond as neatly as though someone had turned on a tap.
‘Any casualties?’ I voxed, hoping that none of our people had been caught in the explosion or swept away. The wall of water rushing along the floor of the valley was modest enough compared to the tidal wave we’d unleashed against the orks, but it wouldn’t do anyone down there any favours.
‘Not yet,’ Rorkins reassured me, ‘but we’ve lost the chance of flushing them out if they land in the valley.’ That much was true: I doubted that even Varan would be mad enough to put down there now, the breach in the dam being obvious to even the most cursory of glances. Even if he wasn’t prepared for us to collapse it on purpose, the danger of it giving way of its own accord was now quite manifest.
Any further comment would have been superfluous, and we both had our attention on other matters by then anyway. The surviving shuttles were landing, somewhat heavily, and the first troops were disembarking, taking what cover they could from the withering fire the skitarii and Rorkins’s cadets were pouring into them. They seemed to be giving as good as they got, though; our own people were being very nicely suppressed by the heretics’ heavy weapon teams, and the beachhead might well have been consolidated in pretty short order if it hadn’t been for the combat servitors, which continued to plod forwards, soaking it up and replying in kind.
‘Cain.’ Makan’s voice cut into my comm-bead, on a frequency I was sure no one else had access to. ‘Sparsen says he can sense psykers with them. Looks like your guess was right.’
‘Then we’d better hope we can hold them,’ I said, catching sight of some movement near the corner of the main shrine, which turned out to be a couple of squads of Grouber’s PDF launching a flanking attack. The lieutenant was inside the command Chimera by now, co-ordinating things with the aid of the specialised vox and auspex kit it carried, and seemed to be doing a reasonable job, so I thought it best not to interrupt him. I was on the point of turning away, to check on the progress of the battle on the other flank, when I saw a couple of black greatcoats moving with the troopers, and steadied the amplivisor again. ‘Nelys,’ I voxed, ‘what in the name of the Throne do you think you’re playing at?’
‘Supporting the troopers, sir.’ The distance was too great for me to make out his facial expression, but I could picture the dogged set of his jaw all too easily. ‘Like you asked us to.’
‘We thought it wouldn’t be too good for morale if we refused to go in alongside them,’ Kayla cut in, backing him up, and I had to admit they were both thinking like commissars.
‘Very good,’ I said, trying not to sound too concerned. ‘Watch your backs, and don’t take too many chances.’ At least Kayla’s streak of common sense ought to keep them out of trouble, insofar as that was possible on the battlefield.
I wasn’t able to observe much of what happened next, although I kept catching enough chatter in my comm-bead to keep roughly abreast of how the clash of arms was progressing, as my attention was suddenly grabbed by the unmistakable sound of lasguns firing on the other side of the ridge.
‘There must have been some survivors of the shuttle crash,’ Grouber said, looking up from his tactical display, an expectant look on his face. There were four other troopers with him, like any command squad, but most of them were busy manning the auspex and comms gear, working flat out to communicate with the other elements of the platoon, and for the first time I began to regret spreading them out so much. The Chimera crew might be dragooned into carrying lasguns and going off to investigate, but that would mean we wouldn’t be able to move in a hurry if we needed to, always a strong possibility with gunfire in the immediate vicinity.
‘But who are they firing at?’ I asked, the palms of my hands beginning to prickle. All our people had been deployed inside the valley. I activated the comm-bead. ‘If anyone’s out of position, report now.’
No one replied, although I gathered from the other vox traffic that Julien and her novitiates were getting stuck in down at the shrine, their bolters and power armour proving more than adequate against the lasguns of the heretics.
‘We’ll have to go and take a look,’ I concluded, trying to filter the reluctance out of my voice. There was no one else to do it, and I could hardly compromise my heroic reputation in front of Grouber, not if I needed him to go on trusting me, which I probably did for my continued wellbeing. Besides, as so often in my life, it seemed essential to know what we were facing, the risk of remaining in ignorance far greater than taking the chance of going to find out.
So Jurgen and I slipped away into the gathering dusk, the sun almost completely set by now, the weight of the laspistol a reassuring presence in my hand, and, if I’m honest, the olfactory reminder of Jurgen’s proximity an even greater one, given the melta he carried. The sky was still light enough to see by, although it wouldn’t be for long, the colours of everything leaching away as the lengthening shadows faded into shades of deep blue.
We crested the ridge cautiously, crouching in the lee of a clump of scrub so we wouldn’t be skylined, and started down the other side. The site of the crash was obvious, vivid orange flames leaping into the purpling firmament, and I found myself grateful that the prevailing wind was at our backs. The bracken covering these hillsides would burn readily, I was sure, but any brushfires started by the blazing wreckage would spread in the other direction.
As we got closer the crackle of lasweapons intensified, and I began to make out a clearer picture of the skirmish taking place in front of us. The shuttle had hit hard, disintegrating on impact, but a few of the traitors within must have survived. They were bunched together behind a tangled lump of metal which looked as if it might once have been part of the engines, exchanging fire with a dispersed group of shadowy figures, who seemed to be using the deeper darkness around the circle of light cast by the flames to pick them off whenever they got a reasonable line of sight, relatively safe from retaliation. Dazzled by the light of the conflagration around them, the heretics would have been unable to make out their assailants, while being brightly illuminated themselves. As Jurgen and I approached the hellish tableau another of the survivors pitched forward, thrashed for a moment, and lay still.
‘I got one!’ a feminine voice cried.
‘Shut up, Franka! They can hear you, even if they can’t see!’ a testy voice admonished in a hoarse whisper. A moment later, as if to emphasise the point, a las-bolt cracked through the darkness in the general direction the girl’s voice had come from. A second squeal, and a sudden thrashing of undergrowth, told me that she’d belatedly dived for cover, but that the shot had predictably missed. ‘Stupid girl!’ the other voice added.
‘Manrin?’ I asked quietly, keeping my back to the fire to allow my eyes to adjust to the low light levels, confident that Jurgen would pick off anyone discourteous enough to take aim in our direction. ‘What the hell are you doing here?’
‘Commissar?’ the corporal asked, equally dumbfounded, coming gradually into focus as a block of thicker shadow a few metres away from me. ‘I thought you’d gone back to Havendown.’
‘Long story,’ I told him, in a tone that effectively precluded any explanation at the time, then softened it, injecting just the right degree of friendliness. ‘Besides, I asked first.’
‘We saw the shuttle come down,’ Manrin explained, ‘and came to investigate. They opened fire as soon as we approached, so we knew they were heretics.’ A reasonable inference, as any loyalists would know Chilinvale was still in Imperial hands. ‘What’s going on in the valley?’ It was pointless to deny that something was, as the sounds of the battle were carrying clearly on the wind, and occasional flashes of light lit the sky like Conflagration Night fireworks.
‘The enemy are trying to take the Mechanicus shrine,’ I said, sticking to the highlights. ‘It’s imperative that they don’t.’ I listened to the chatter in my comm-bead for a moment, learning that two of the enemy shuttles appeared to be in our hands by this time, and that Julien’s charge seemed to have broken the back of the enemy assault. ‘Fortunately we seem to be winning.’ Until the second wave got here, anyway. I glanced at the burning wreck behind us, and the dwindling band of heretics within its dubious shelter; the militia detachment were making up in enthusiasm what they lacked in accuracy, and I didn’t imagine the beleaguered traitors would be able to hold out for much longer. ‘Do you think we could take any of them alive?’ Not that we’d get much useful intelligence, if our experience with the Madasans was anything to go by, but anything at all we could learn about the main battle force before it got here would be a bonus.
‘Good idea, sir,’ Jaq put in, materialising at my shoulder. ‘There’s only a couple of them left. Go in with the straight silver, sir, they don’t like it, heretics don’t. They’ll surrender before you can say “The Emperor Protects”.’
Well, it wasn’t much of a plan, but it was the best we had, and I’d match my duelling skills against a heretic foot soldier any day, so after a few moments consultation the PDV contingent started laying down suppressive fire against the survivor’s fragile refuge. It wasn’t particularly well co-ordinated, but it did the job, and as soon as I was certain that our targets’ attention was fully engaged, I charged forward into the burning wreck, Jurgen at my heels. (To be honest, I was more worried about taking a stray round from the militia by that point than any retaliation from the heretics.)
The heat was greater than I expected, slapping me in the face as we began dodging through pieces of debris, and those passengers who hadn’t survived the initial impact. We took the traitors completely by surprise, a trooper in the uniform of a Perlian being reduced to a greasy stain by a blast from Jurgen’s melta, while I accounted for a Madasan on the other flank with a single las-bolt. There was only one survivor left after that, clad in a grubby greatcoat, a scarlet sash knotted at his waist, aiming a laspistol in my direction.
Astonished, I faltered for a heartbeat, aware that the hesitation might be the death of me, but unable to override the impulse despite that. ‘Donal?’ I asked, still not managing to believe the evidence of my own eyes.
‘Death to the servants of…’ he began, then a look of confusion drifted across his face, and his aim wavered. A powerful burst of Jurgen’s body odour, intensified as always by high temperatures, arrived at my shoulder an instant before the man himself. ‘Commissar? What’s happening?’ His tormented expression, so different from the easy self-confidence I was used to seeing, intensified.
