Apocalypse - Josh Reynolds Read online

  At Amatnim’s gesture, a series of runes representing the fleet flashed to life. Other runes representing the elements of the fleet he’d sent out as predation forces flickered as well. There were fewer of these now than there ought to have been. Worse, they were retreating, as per the latest reports. ‘We’ve lost four vessels since Pergamon. Four battle-tested ships, as well as escorts and assault craft.’

  ‘The White Scars,’ Apis said. Murmurs accompanied this statement. Amatnim called up a pict-capture. It bloomed to his right, spreading like paint across a canvas. It showed a distorted image of an asteroid field, and bursts of light that all of them could identify as macro-cannon fire.

  ‘Yes – and no. This is a frame from the sensor-feed of Callyon’s Yearning. Even in his final moments, our departed brother Ashu served the Legion. This is the vessel that killed him.’ The pict-capture was rotated and magnified, so that the ship hidden amongst the asteroids was revealed. Black. Sleek. At once stripped-down and lethal. The hull was sloped strangely, perhaps to better baffle sensor sweeps. ‘That, my brothers, is no White Scars vessel.’

  ‘Corax’s whelps,’ Lakmhu growled. ‘They often flock with the Khan’s jackals.’

  Amatnim smiled. ‘And what about this one?’

  The pict-capture wavered. Changed. A new image – another field of asteroids, and beyond them, a world of blues and browns. ‘This is Almace. The image you’re seeing was provided courtesy of our new allies.’

  More murmurs at this. Apis and the others had little patience for mortals. Amatnim pressed on. He magnified the image. A speck of yellow beyond the asteroids grew into a wedge-shaped cruiser, marked with a sigil shaped like a clenched gauntlet. Impossible to misidentify that livery. Like those who bore it, it had not changed in millennia.

  ‘The sons of Dorn,’ Apis said. A sigh ran through the chamber.

  ‘What does this mean?’ Kelim asked. He’d proven himself in the attack on Pergamon, and Amatnim had raised him up to replace Ashu in his council of war.

  ‘It means we are in for a fight,’ Apis said. Several of the others laughed.

  ‘We’re already in a fight,’ Amatnim corrected. ‘We just didn’t realise it.’ He dismissed the pict-captures. ‘Their strategy is simple, but effective. They are forcing us to contract our forces as our captains try to avoid being picked off piecemeal. Their numbers are small, but they’re putting them to good use. I underestimated their pragmatism.’

  Kelim studied the placement of the fleet’s ident-runes. ‘They’re ignoring our attacks on the outer worlds and focusing on the isolated wings of our fleet.’

  ‘I would do the same,’ Apis said. ‘Worlds can be rebuilt after victory is won.’

  ‘Perhaps we should simply do as they wish,’ Kelim said. He looked at Apis. ‘Come together, and then smash them in open battle.’

  Apis shook his head. ‘They won’t play that game. They’ll isolate stragglers and bleed us, until we give chase and then they’ll vanish, until the whole process starts again. Smart.’

  ‘If they will not come to us, we must go to them,’ Lakmhu growled. ‘We must cut off their avenues of retreat, encircle them in a ring of iron and crush them.’

  ‘That will take time,’ Amatnim said. ‘And all the while, Almace fortifies itself.’

  Lakmhu looked at him. ‘You weren’t worried about that earlier.’

  ‘That was before I realised why they were employing this particular strategy. If the Imperial Fists garrison that world, every moment we waste gives them time to dig in just a little deeper.’ He turned to the Dark Apostle. ‘We are not Iron Warriors, brother. I don’t know about you, but I have never enjoyed sieges. Too, there are elements of at least three Chapters of our milk-blood cousins involved in this defence. That implies that our presence here has been noted by elements outside the system. There is no guarantee that reinforcements aren’t en route even now.’

  Kelim grunted. ‘Even so, we need to bring them to battle. All the data indicates that we outnumber them significantly. Even half our fleet should be enough.’

  Amatnim nodded. ‘I would prefer they not dog our heels the entire way, even if that means splitting the fleet to deal with them. The problem is we don’t know where they’re going to strike.’

  ‘But what if we did?’ Kelim asked.

  Amatnim looked at him. ‘What do you propose, brother?’

  ‘We know the rules now. I say we beat them at their own game. We draw them in to ground of our choosing and strike. If the gods are with us – one strike is all we will need.’

  Amatnim smiled. ‘An excellent plan. Are you volunteering to play the huntsman?’

  Kelim paused, considering. Amatnim was pleased by his hesitation. Kelim was smart. He saw that the request was at once an honour and a challenge. If he succeeded, he might win high acclaim. If he failed – likely, he would be punished. If he survived. But even presented as a request, it was a command. And he was wise enough to realise it. He nodded. ‘I will run them down, my lord, and offer them up to the Lord of Skulls.’

  ‘Excellent. Lorgar’s Word will make a fine flagship. It’s fast and durable. Take the Ucephalot, the Skullhound and Dagmar’s Penitence, as well as any of our new auxiliaries who wish to go. I suggest paying attention to the refugee convoys. They’ll be looking to protect them. Or perhaps use them as bait. It’s what I would do in their place.’ Amatnim turned. ‘The rest of the fleet will continue to Almace.’

  ‘What of the ships still in dry dock?’ Apis asked.

  ‘Leave them. Skeleton crews only. The carrion birds will be picking over Pergo for months yet, and there’ll be slaves and salvage aplenty to aid in the repairs. Too, we may need to regroup, and Pergo will be the perfect fallback position.’

  ‘You fear defeat,’ Lakmhu said. The others fell silent. Apis’ hand fell to the pistol at his hip. Amatnim glanced at him and Apis relaxed.

  ‘I do not fear, brother. I am prepared. Contrary to popular opinion, one must consider the possibility of setbacks when one plans a military campaign. If the gods turn their eyes from us – and you’re a liar if you think they are not fickle – then it is best that we are ready with a contingency. Pergo will make an ideal staging area. It can be made defensible readily. The population – what’s left of it – is adequate for labour purposes. And more importantly, we already control it.’

  Lakmhu made as if to argue further, but instead settled back, frowning. He had been unusually quiet since the revelations in the library. That was good. It meant he was thinking.

  Amatnim waited a moment and then continued with the briefing. But all the while, he watched Lakmhu. He watched too as Yatl murmured in the Dark Apostle’s ear. He did not have to guess as to what they were saying. Yatl was his now as much as Lakmhu’s, and it was Amatnim’s words that the warrior whispered to his former master.

  Lakmhu would make a strong ally if he could be turned from his chosen path. But if fate decreed otherwise, Yatl would be there to put a knife in.

  He felt no satisfaction at the thought. It was all so unbearably tedious. Once, the Legion’s factionalism had been nothing more than competition. Now, it was a war, fought not with gun and blade, but with words and deeds. Every host was a campaign in and of itself, often splintering in victory as easily as in defeat.

  Sometimes, he thought the gods demanded more than a man could give. More blood, more pleasure, more hope, more despair – it was all too much. It turned warriors into slaves. The gods could not help that it was their nature to demand worship – to take all that was given. Like a roaring fire, they fed on whatever they were given, spreading and rising unchecked. Most men were wise enough to feed them only a little. There were always some fools who just wanted to watch everything burn.

  But from the ashes, new growth would rise. From the fires of this victory, the Word Bearers would be reborn, and the Urizen would have no choice but to return
to them.

  Or so the gods had promised.

  Prince Ganor Kabalevsky stood at the centre of the strategium chamber, one hand on his shuriken pistol. ‘Quiet,’ he said. Then, more loudly, ‘Quiet! I invited you here to talk – not scream at each other like frightened pilgrims.’

  The other pirates kept shouting. A dozen of his fellow captains crowded his vessel’s strategium. Some, like Amina Dheel and Fisher Hoon, he knew well. Others, like Skinner Jade, he knew only by reputation. All of them had clawed out an existence on the fringes of the Odoacer System, preying on merchant ships and pilgrim convoys. But like him, they wanted something more out of life. The problem was, none of them could quite agree as to just what ‘more’ might be.

  Hence his invitation to them to come aboard his ship and talk. His vessel, like the rest, drifted near the Word Bearers fleet. Close, but not a part of it. Far enough away to run, if negotiations took a wrong turn. It was also one of the largest vessels in the impromptu pirate flotilla that now trailed in the Word Bearers’ wake. That gave him a certain seniority, not that the others would admit it.

  The strategium chamber was old, and hadn’t seen the attentions of an enginseer in decades. Bundles of loose cabling spilled from the ceiling, and the ancient stonework was chipped and grimy. The flagstones of the floor were covered in the detritus of a thousand similar war councils. The hololithic projectors had stopped working years ago, and he’d been forced to invest in old-fashioned star maps, bought at exorbitant prices from rogue traders and black market merchants.

  It was also too small for this sort of meeting, but there was no way he was letting any of his peers near the bridge of his ship. Trust was a precious commodity among pirates, but there was no reason to test it unduly.

  At last, annoyed by their shouting, he drew his shuriken pistol and fired, shattering a lumen and raining glass down on the chamber. They fell silent at once and turned towards him as a group. He studied them, frowning.

  Ganor knew two things about pirates. One – they were, by nature, eminently pragmatic. Two – they had little respect for authority, especially of the assumed sort. To the eyes of his fellows, he had committed the cardinal sin of seemingly discarding pragmatism and taking up the mantle of leader. He’d known this, going in. But someone had to do it, and he’d thought that it might as well be him. After all, he was royalty.

  Had been royalty, before the Adeptus Ministorum had stolen his family’s holdings and stripped them of their titles and tithe-privileges. He remembered his mother weeping, as Ecclesiarchial thugs had stripped their home down to the bare walls.

  He brushed the memory aside even as he spoke to his guests. ‘My apologies, but we won’t get anywhere shouting at one another like this.’

  ‘Who are you to give us orders, Ganor?’ Amina Dheel stepped forward, shoving several others aside. She was a big woman, with the muscles of a labourer and a face that might have been pretty once, in a certain light. A variety of tattoos, cruder than his own, covered her bare arms, neck and face. Golden rings perforated her earlobes, nostrils and lips, and her hair had been pulled back into a fraying braid. ‘For that matter, who are you to speak for us?’ There were mutters at this. Dheel seemed to be the spokeswoman.

  Ganor made a placatory gesture. ‘I understand your anger, brothers and sisters, but someone had to stand up.’

  ‘Why you?’ Dheel pressed.

  ‘A better question is, why not any of you?’ Ganor swept the group with a challenging gaze. ‘Why didn’t any of you seize the opportunity fate has handed us?’

  ‘Throwing in our lot with monsters requires consideration,’ Dheel said.

  Ganor laughed. ‘We’re all monsters, woman. Every one of us.’

  ‘Not these kind of monsters,’ someone snarled. Fisher Hoon. He was a pale man, covered in keloid scars and wearing a battered set of carapace armour. ‘I’m all for plunder, but…’ He trailed off, shaking his head.

  ‘But what?’ Ganor said. ‘Don’t tell me you’re afraid?’

  ‘You’re not?’ Dheel said.

  ‘No. Because I see the opportunities before us for what they are. Almace is ripe for the plucking. And you heard them – they don’t want it. They’ll go back to whatever hell spawned them when they’re finished.’

  Hoon laughed. ‘Yes, because you can always trust men covered in dried blood and skulls.’ He spat and shook his head. ‘You’re an idiot, Ganor. You hear only what you want to hear. They can’t be trusted.’

  ‘Then why haven’t you left yet?’ Ganor looked at them. ‘Why haven’t any of you left? If you’re so scared – so fearful of seizing this opportunity – why are you still here?’

  ‘Because they’ll fire on us if we do.’ That was Skinner Jade. Old, as pirates judged things, with a prosthetic arm and a metal plate where part of his skull had once been. He had scars where old tattoos had been scraped from his flesh, and wore filthy fatigues. He ran his mechanical claw through his wispy hair and continued. ‘Can’t have us talking to the enemy, can they? It’s already too late. We got too close. Too greedy. Now they have us.’ He coughed and looked around, rheumy eyes skittering over the others. ‘Ganor is right. Our only chance is to throw in with them and hope they’re telling the truth.’

  It wasn’t quite the sterling endorsement Ganor had been hoping for, but beggars couldn’t be choosers. Jade had influence among the younger captains – he held to his word, which was rare, and was always willing to join forces if the price was right. The same couldn’t be said for Hoon or some of the others.

  ‘Jade is right. The time is now. Almace – the system – is ours, if we but reach out and take it. The Imperium has forgotten us, travel outside the system is all but impossible. We could divide the Odoacer System up between us, brothers and sisters.’

  ‘Between those of us who survive, you mean,’ Hoon said.

  ‘To the winners, the spoils.’

  ‘You don’t know that they’ll win.’

  Ganor shrugged. ‘My contacts on Almace have told me everything I need to know,’ he said. ‘As have yours, I’m sure. There’s barely a company’s worth of Space Marines on that planet. You saw what our new benefactors did to Pergo. You think they won’t do the same to Almace?’ He looked around. ‘Face facts, brothers and sisters. The cardinal-governor’s time is coming to an end. The people will see and rise up. Hell, they’re already rising up on the outer worlds – even in the asteroid facilities near Almace itself.’

  Dheel snorted. ‘Optimistic of you, Ganor. More like riots than uprisings – and let’s not even get started on the asteroid miners. Those rock hounds don’t care about anyone who isn’t void-born. Not exactly an army.’

  ‘Doesn’t have to be, sister–’

  ‘And don’t call me sister, you jumped-up, wannabe aristo ponce. You think you’re the only one whose family got driven to the fringes because they crossed the Ecclesiarchy?’ She looked around. ‘Jade’s right. This is a mistake. Picking sides in a war is never smart. We should’ve just stuck to picking the bones, like we always do.’

  Hoon nodded. ‘We’re far enough away – we can go. They won’t chase us. Why bother?’ There were murmurs of agreement. Running sounded better than fighting any day.

  ‘And then what?’ Ganor snarled. ‘Eh? And then what? How long before the Ecclesiarchy sends their new Space Marine attack dogs to purge our enclaves? And what if Amatnim wins? Would he spare us, do you think?’

  ‘He would not.’

  The voice – deeper than a man’s and hideously resonant – caused them all to turn. Dheel and some others went for their weapons, but paused as they saw the Dark Apostle step into the chamber, his monstrous blade slaves trudging in his wake. Lakmhu had his helm clamped to his thigh, and his scarred features twisted into an unsettling smile. ‘Even if you do join us, there is every likelihood that we will butcher you, one and all. That is because you are meat, and desti
ned for the fate of all meat.’

  ‘Then why should we help you?’ Dheel hissed. Her hand was on her plasma pistol. Ganor surreptitiously reached for his own weapon. If Dheel made a move, he would need to respond. Though he wasn’t sure whose side he would take.

  ‘More importantly, how did you get aboard my ship?’ he said.

  Lakmhu laughed. It was an ugly sound, like meat hitting a butcher’s block. ‘I go where I wish. I kill who I like. The gods stand at my shoulder and their blessings are upon me.’ His eyes blazed with an unsettling light.

  ‘That wasn’t an answer,’ Ganor said. He drew his pistol. The blade slaves tensed, growling softly. They were hideous things – not Space Marines any more, but something else. Like walking tumours. The swords they held hurt the eyes if you looked at them too long.

  ‘You do not deserve an answer. Sheep do not question the shepherd. If you try to depart, we will kill you. We will board your ships and take your crews, and use their blood and yours to paint your hulls a pleasing crimson. And then your ships will serve us regardless.’ He spread his arms. ‘Rejoice, for your choices have narrowed to one. There is freedom in servitude, if you choose the right masters.’

  ‘The hell I will,’ Hoon snarled. Before any of them could react, Hoon had his weapon out – a bolt pistol. It boomed. One of the blade slaves slid swiftly in front of its master and intercepted the shot. Black ichor pulsed from the wound, and the creature grunted, but seemed otherwise unharmed. Hoon stared, as if in shock at his own actions.

  Lakmhu gestured, and his creatures lunged. They were faster than Ganor had thought possible – faster, even, than Space Marines. Despite their bulk, they were crimson blurs. He heard the shrill scrape of their blades, and Hoon screamed once. Just once. The other pirates scattered, as the hulking creatures slid through them, blades extended behind them. Hoon stayed where he was. Silent. Staring.

  Then, he unravelled in a torrent of red. Meat and viscera flopped wetly to the floor as his bisected frame unfolded and slid down the shaft of his splintered spine.