On Wings of Blood Page 14

  ‘Not really, sir,’ Kaurl answered, standing up straight to look the admiral in the eye. Veniston raised an eyebrow in query. ‘There’s a wave of ork fighter-bombers which has made it through the blockade. They’ll be intercepting the Marauders of Raptor Squadron shortly. But the fighter screen should be able to protect our bombers,’ Kaurl assured the admiral, rubbing the tiredness from his eyes and running a thick-fingered hand through his dark hair.

  ‘Send the Thunderbolts on an intercept course,’ Veniston decided, looking past Kaurl at the display screen. ‘If the orks get too close, the bombers will have to slow down, and timing is all-important. If the Raptors don’t attack in time, the whole plan will be off course and the hulk will still be fully mobile when we get within range. We can’t let that happen, Jacob.’ The admiral’s eyes narrowed and his jaw clenched tightly for a moment as he considered the prospect of the Divine Justice suffering the same fate as the Imperial Retribution.

  ‘What if a second wave of fighters comes up? They’ll be unprotected…’ the captain protested, his voice suddenly hoarse at the thought.

  ‘If that happens,’ Veniston stated coldly, ‘then we shall pray that the Emperor is watching over us.’

  The admiral turned towards the main display again, indicating that the conversation was ended. Kaurl suppressed a grimace and looked to the waiting comms officer.

  ‘New orders for Arrow and Storm Squadrons,’ the captain began.

  Their Thunderbolt escort had peeled away regretfully a few minutes ago, and now the Marauders were on their own. As Raptor Squadron thundered towards the hulk, more details of the battle ahead could be seen. A swarm of ork attack ships duelled with the frigates escorting the Divine Justice. Manoeuvring just outside range of the orks’ crude weapons, the Imperial ships were taking a heavy toll; the wreckage of at least five ork vessels was drifting lifelessly across the battle­zone. Much closer now, the hulk seemed truly immense. Around it orbited a cluster of defence asteroids, floating bases crewed by the orks and bristling with rockets and gun batteries. Some were simply pieces of the hulk that had broken off but hadn’t escaped the pull of the hulk’s gravity. Others, Jaeger had been taught in command training, were deliberately captured by the orks, who used bizarre field technology to grasp on to asteroids and debris, purposefully creating a swirl of obstacles to protect themselves against attack. Whatever the cause of their orbit, and whether they were just floating chunks of stone and metal, or had been fitted out with rocket pods or gun turrets, throughout the Navy they were known simply as Rocks.

  As Jaeger considered this glorious example of understatement, there was a sudden hiss of escaping gas and the control stick in his left hand started juddering uncontrollably.

  ‘Ferix!’ Jaeger snapped over the internal comm-link. ‘These damned controls are playing up. I need stability right now, if you don’t mind.’

  The small tech-adept crawled into the cockpit and took the tool belt from his waist. Pulling a glowing, gold-etched device from one pocket, he set about the fastenings on a panel under Jaeger’s legs. As Ferix unscrewed the compartment beneath the control column he began a low-voiced chant: ‘To see the spirit of the machine, that is to be Mechanicus. To find the malaise of malfunction, that is to be Mechanicus. To administer the Rite of Repair, that is to be Mechanicus.’

  Jaeger let the man drift from his attention as he looked through the armoured glass of the cockpit. The frigates had done a good job punching a hole through the ork attack ships, leaving the way clear for the Marauders. However, something wasn’t quite right. Jaeger’s spine tingled with some inner sense of foreboding. Looking at the approaching hulk, a sinister suspicion began to rise at the back of his mind.

  ‘Berhandt, can you get a fix on that Rock, five o’clock, about twelve by thirty-five?’ Jaeger asked the bombardier, his unease rising.

  ‘Got it,’ the bombardier replied, a question in his voice.

  ‘Plot a trajectory prediction, impose over our course.’

  ‘Okay, Commander Jaeger. Metriculator processing right now. Coming through… Damn! You were right to ask, sir. We’re heading straight for the damn thing!’ Berhandt exclaimed.

  ‘Avoidance course?’ Jaeger knew that there wouldn’t be one even as he asked.

  ‘No, sir. Not with the time we’ve been given. Emperor’s mercy, we’re gonna have to deal with the bloody thing ourselves…’ The bombardier’s voice was barely a whisper.

  Jaeger pressed the long-range communicator. ‘Bridge, this is Raptor Leader.’ he announced. ‘We have a problem.’

  The bomber squadron banked round slowly, shaken by the engine blasts of the vast rockets soaring past. Each of the ork missiles roaring from the Rock was larger than a Marauder, designed to blow apart a massive starship but equally capable of wiping out the whole squadron with one unlucky blast. Crude faces had been painted onto the tips of monstrous rockets, leering grins and sharp-teethed devils seeming to leap from the darkness on columns of raging flame.

  Jaeger was listening in to the comm-net, his mood grim.

  ‘This is the Apollo, we cannot disengage currently.’

  ‘This is the Glorious, unable to reach your position in time.’

  And so it went on, each of the fleet’s frigates too busy or too far away to attack the rapidly approaching Rock. Another flare erupted from the ork defence platform in front of the Marauders, hurling six more rockets at the incoming bombers. Jaeger switched to the inter-squadron communicator.

  ‘Split one-four, on my lead,’ he ordered, his voice low and abrupt. ‘We’ve only got time for one pass. Make it count.’

  As an icon flashed green on the panel beside him, Jaeger switched frequency to listen to the incoming message.

  ‘This is Tech-Priest Adramaz of the Excellent,’ a tinny, unfamiliar voice reported. ‘We have surveyed your target and established a primary detonation point. Transmitting information now. It appears to be some kind of power source, which may destroy the target if you can hit it. I would make your departure as expeditious as possible though, we are unsure how large the resultant blast will be.’

  ‘Thanks, Adramaz,’ Jaeger replied, turning to see if Berhandt had received the information.

  The bombardier gave a nod as the targeting data for the Rock’s reactor was received and with the turn of a dial and a flicked switch, he transmitted the details to the other Marauders. Berhandt swivelled in his seat to grasp the forked control stick that guided and fired the Marauder’s nose-mounted lascannons. One shot from those could punch through a cubit or more of reinforced armour and smash apart rock with equal ease.

  ‘Signature suggests it ain’t laser shielded,’ the bombardier said, smiling grimly. ‘A couple of good hits should do the trick.’

  Jaeger broadcast to the rest of the squadron again. ‘Lascannons only on this one – save your missiles and bombs for the main target.’

  Phrao’s voice came back first. ‘What do you mean “main target”? Ain’t this what we’re here to destroy?’

  ‘This is just incidental!’ Jaeger snapped back. ‘Our main objective is on the hulk itself.’

  ‘You’re joking! Five Marauders are going to have as much effect on that beast as a swampfly biting a grox’s backside!’ Drake chipped in.

  Jaeger barely suppressed a growl before opening up the comm-channel. ‘We don’t make the orders, we just follow them. If you have a problem with that, we can sort it out back on the flight deck. We’ve got a job to do, so let’s just stay calm. We’ll deal with this Rock and then we’ll push on to our main objective.’

  ‘If we get that far!’ Phrao’s voice, even taking the hiss of the comm-net into account, was rasping and bitter. ‘Damned Raptor’s luck!’

  Jaeger stabbed at the transmit rune. ‘Silence, all of you!’ he snapped. ‘Everyone listen to me right now. You all know your jobs, you’ve all flown combat missions before. So I’ll
hear no more of this “Raptor’s luck”. Is that understood?’

  A series of affirmatives were broadcast back and Jaeger nodded to himself. Doubt sows the seeds of fear, the abbot of the Extu schola progenium had taught him when he was young. Crush it at birth or suffer the growth of heresy.

  Flicking his gaze over the control panels, Jaeger saw that all systems were working within acceptable levels. Everything was ready. He took a deep breath, his hand poised over the comm-link. Letting it out slowly, he touched the rune.

  ‘Raptor Squadron, this is Raptor Leader.’ Jaeger made his voice deliberately calm, even though inside his heart was racing and he could feel the excitement of combat beginning to surge. ‘Break and attack! Break and attack!’

  A dozen small turrets swivelled into firing position and unleashed a torrent of shells at the Marauders as they screamed in towards the Rock, their engines at full burn. Dodging through the hail of death, now was the time for each pilot to prove his worth. Jerryl took the lead, followed by Jaeger then the other bombers. From his position, Jaeger had the perfect opportunity to see the magnificent Marauder in action.

  They were huge metallic beasts, each weighing more than three battle tanks, with a wide wingspan. Designed for limited-range space combat as well as atmospheric missions, the Marauder manoeuvred with small vectoring engines along the fuselage and wings whilst in the void, and massive control planes and a quad-ramjet when they dipped into a planet’s atmosphere. Nicknamed ‘Big Brutes’ by the flight crews, each Marauder was a flying fortress. Its two dorsal twin-autocannon were capable of unleashing a hail of fire that could punch through the armour of enemy planes and tear apart crew and engines, while the tail gunner’s triple heavy bolters could fire a dozen shells a second at enemy interceptors or strafe soft ground targets. On the nose were the lascannons for precision targeting, and six Flail missiles hung from the wings, each with a plasma warhead capable of creating a crater over fifty feet in diameter or cracking the armoured hull of a spaceship. For more wholesale devastation, the Marauder’s hull also incorporated a spacious bomb bay which could deliver a payload of explosives or incendiaries.

  As he contemplated the sheer destructive potential of just a single Marauder, Jaeger found his faith in the Imperium renewed. The Adeptus Mechanicus had designed this awesome fighting machine. The schola progenium of the Ministorum had given him the fervent faith to serve the Emperor. The Imperial Navy had taught him how to control this murderous creature of metal. And now he was here, once more about to deliver fiery judgement upon the heads of the Emperor’s enemies. For Jaeger, there was no finer feeling.

  As Raptor Squadron roared closer to the Rock, the enemy response grew in ferocity. With stomach-churning suddenness, Jaeger pulled up from the dive towards the Rock, bringing the Marauder’s nose level with the horizon of the small asteroid. Where a second before he had been flying in open space, now there was ground beneath him. As always, it took a couple of seconds to fight off the disorientation, and while he took a few deep breaths, he subconsciously sent the Marauder into a series of short climbs, dives and banks to throw off the enemy gunners. Glancing hits ricocheted around the armoured hull, filling the air with sporadic metallic clangs. A close hit set the plane shaking, and warning runes flashed red across three of the control panels that covered every surface of the cockpit. Ferix’s voice sounded over the comm in alarm.

  ‘Armour breach! Check your vacuum seals and utter the Third Canticle of Protection, praise His name.’

  Jaeger went through the routine of checking the fastenings on his helm, muttering under his breath: ‘Deliver me from the void. Protect me from the ether. Guard well my soul.’

  The bombers were almost within firing range and the fire had slackened as some of the Rock’s gun turrets were blindsided by the mass of the asteroid. A surprise burst of fire engulfed Jerryl’s plane, stripping away great shards of metal. Phrao’s plane swept low, its lascannon blasting apart the ork gunnery turret, exacting instant revenge. Jaeger could see a gaping hole in the starboard wing of Jerryl’s Marauder, trailing sparks as severed power cables discharged their energy into the vacuum.

  ‘Raptor Three, what is your condition?’ Jaeger enquired urgently.

  ‘Lost starboard controls, handling shaky. I don’t think I can hold her, permission to disengage?’

  ‘Okay, Jerryl. Break off and return home,’ Jaeger said through gritted teeth.

  Suddenly the comm-net icons flashed for a priority message. ‘This is Admiral Veniston. Do not disengage, Raptor Three – circle around and reform for attack on primary objective.’

  Jerryl’s reply came through a hiss of static. ‘What the… Damned controls… Order received.’

  Jaeger watched as the lead Marauder pulled up, taking it out of the attack run. Easing his control column left and right, Jaeger steered his craft through the shells screaming towards him. Guiding the Marauder over the steep lip of a crater, Jaeger saw the reactor housing for the first time: a crude conglomeration of twisting pipes and power relays. Berhandt gave a grunt as the orks’ power generator came within range of his lascannon. Bolts of laser energy flashed towards the Rock, sending up plumes of smoke and dust. Berhandt’s lascannon spat forth another volley of fire, tearing through metal and rock.

  ‘Emperor’s blood, missed!’ cursed Berhandt, punching his fist against the lascannon controls.

  Twisting in his seat as he steered the Marauder away, Jaeger watched as Phrao’s bomber made its pass. As the craft swept towards its target, leaving a trail of swirling debris in its wake, two bolts of light struck the reactor full on, turning the generator’s armour into a molten slurry and punching through to the highly unstable plasma chamber within.

  ‘Spot on!’ Phrao shouted gleefully. ‘Pull away!’

  Jaeger’s left arm ached as he wrenched the column back and right, pulling the Marauder into a spine-bending turning climb. Through the side-screens, Jaeger could see small eruptions breaking out across the Rock as a chain reaction spread from the reactor to the turrets and rocket batteries. Forks of electrical energy began to arc into the air and the reactor went into critical overload. A cloud of gas exploded through the Rock’s surface from an underground tank, sending shards of rock spinning dangerously close to the following Marauders, before the gas was eaten up by a shaft of blue flame. Raw plasma spewed from the molten remains of the generator, pushing the Rock off its trajectory, sending it spinning further away from the hulk. With an explosion that momentarily blinded the flight commander, the Rock burst apart, sending fragments of debris hurtling in every direction. The victorious cries of Jaeger’s crew and the other pilots rang in his ears.

  ‘Steady, Raptors, that was just the warm up,’ Jaeger chided them. ‘Now for the real target. Form up, Jerryl take the rear.’

  ‘Affirmative,’ Jerryl responded. ‘Where for now, sir?’

  Jaeger grimaced to himself. ‘Not sure,’ he answered slowly. ‘We haven’t received full target information yet.’ Damn it, he thought to himself, the whole mission briefing was hazy. This whole thing was beginning to stink, but of what he wasn’t yet certain.

  ‘Let’s get this straight.’ Phrao’s voice was heavy with sarcasm. ‘We don’t know what we’re attacking, we’ve just got a deadline to meet. That’s it? We just fly in there, easy as you like, drop a few bombs, fire a few shots and go home? Somehow I don’t think it’ll be that easy.’

  ‘Cut the chatter!’ Jaeger ordered, his mood grim. He agreed with the other pilots, but he’d be damned if he was going to sow doubt on the command skills of Kaurl and Veniston halfway through a mission.

  The Marauders roared onwards, the hulk growing ever larger through their cockpit windows. Its massive bulk blocked out a swathe of stars, looking like some lurking shadow waiting to swallow up the Marauders, luring them to their doom.

  Captain Kaurl coughed gently to attract the admiral’s attention. The senior officer pull
ed his gaze from the monitoring station and turned round, one eyebrow raised in question.

  ‘We are in position to initiate the second attack wave, sir.’

  The admiral rubbed one haggard cheek with his hand, gazing at nothing in particular.

  ‘Sir? Shall we proceed?’ Kaurl pressed.

  Veniston’s eyes were flints. ‘Very well, Jacob. Launch Devil Squadron. Proceed with the attack on the engines themselves.’

  With the debris of the Rock scattering slowly in their wake, the Marauders headed onwards towards the hulk. Pressing a series of runes above his head, Jaeger turned on a small viewscreen just above the front canopy, and a flickering, fractured image of the view behind the bomber crackled into existence. The flight commander watched as the Divine Justice moved in towards the hulk, its awesome plasma drives pushing it forward on twenty-mile-long trails of fire. The two surviving frigates formed up in front of the cruiser, ready to defend their capital ship against the few remaining ork attack ships.

  Jaeger could picture the commotion on board the massive warships, as gun and torpedo crews scurried to and fro, readying their weapons for action. He imagined the gun decks bathed red in combat lighting, the gunners sweating and cursing as they heaved powercells into place or loaded shells the size of his bomber into the breeches. In the ­torpedo bays, hundreds of men would be bending their backs to the chains, hauling the massive projectiles, ten times the size of a Marauder, along the loading rails. In the engine room, ­ratings would be sweating heavily, the heat of the thirty plasma reactors permeating even through their thermal shielding and the crew’s protective suits. He didn’t envy them their task: hard work in very cramped conditions for little recognition or reward. Moreover, pilots were all volunteers, while many of the thousands of men who laboured in the depths of the fighting ships were criminals serving their penance to the Emperor, or simply unfortunate men taken unawares by the press gangs. And yet, he thought, everyone serves the Emperor, each in their own way. They will receive their due honours in time, whether in this life or not.