Angron's Monolith - Steve Lyons Read online

  ‘Baeloch, you’re our guide. Don’t let your auto-senses do all the work – question everything they tell you. Kantus and Tarryn, don’t take your eyes off your auspexes, not for a single second. You see any unusual readings – even the slightest flicker – I want to hear about it.’

  ‘Nabori, I’ll need a time check from you every two minutes. On each check, I want the four of you to sound off loud and clear. Let me know you’re still with me, in mind as well as in body, I mean.’

  Tarryn knew what he meant, and he made a vow to himself: that the jungle wouldn’t cloud his senses again, if indeed it had before. He recited a litany of protection under his breath, building barriers around his mind against any intrusion.

  He focused on the readings from his auspex, as Juster had instructed him.

  He found out – later – that it was Kantus who had walked into the tripwire.

  All Tarryn was aware of at the time was a violent flash, before the blast wave hit him like a brick wall in front of a speeding Scout bike. He saw it coming, thanks to his augmented reflexes, for a fraction of a second: too short a time to drop to the ground or brace himself or do anything but try to ride the wave out.

  For the second time, he came to floundering in the dirt on his back. Tiny metal fragments showered down on top of him. Tarryn felt his ears popping. Wispy fingers of smoke crept over him, as small fires flickered in the brushwood around him.

  He could make out a grey and black heap lying close by, but he couldn’t tell which of his brothers it was, nor if he was conscious or even alive. For a moment, it felt as if the world were holding its breath.

  Then, the feral orks descended upon them in force.

  Six

  Tarryn and his brothers – his surviving brothers – were in retreat.

  He wasn’t happy about it; he had never withdrawn from a fight before, but he had had no choice. Sergeant Juster had given the order. He had also led the retreat to begin with, though Baeloch had taken his place when he had faltered.

  They retraced their steps to the site of the feral ork massacre. From here, they had a choice of trampled paths. They turned north, towards the camp site. They had hoped that their recent tracks criss-crossing this area might baffle their pursuers; failing that, that the sight of their brethren, cut down and left to rot, might give the orks pause.

  An eager war cry was raised, too close behind them. The greenskins had the scent of blood in their nostrils and wouldn’t give up the hunt so easily.

  Brother Kantus had died first.

  He must have felt the tug of the wire across his greave and known, an instant before the others knew, what it portended.

  Somehow, the orks had acquired a cache of explosives. They had bundled them together, the entire cache, probably, and lodged them in the cleft of a tree. They had attached the tripwire to them, then waited to spring an ambush on any enemy who survived their explosive trap.

  Kantus had hurled himself onto the explosives as he had seen them falling. He had taken the brunt of the blast and his armour had been shattered.

  Nabori had fallen next, overpowered by the weight of their enemy’s numbers. The feral orks had kept coming at them, wave after relentless wave, at least a hundred of them and probably many more.

  Tarryn had been fortunate that Baeloch had been thrown close to him. They had fought back to back, so that neither of them could be taken from behind. He had lost count of the number of green hides that his chainsword’s teeth had tasted.

  He had found himself duelling with a heavy-jowled brute. He blocked its first axe blow with his blade, but felt the jolt of it up to his right shoulder. His bolter, he was using to discourage an attack from his left.

  The big feral ork grappled him, pinning his sword arm to his side. Despite its squat shape, it stood almost as tall as he did. It strained to reach his throat with its teeth, and he found himself looking right down its gaping maw. He could see tiny jungle creatures, still twitching between its jagged teeth.

  He lodged his bolter beneath the brute’s grinding jaw and squeezed the trigger.

  It let go of him and reeled away in blind panic; its huge body wasn’t quite aware yet that its head was gone.

  Tarryn’s victory had come at a cost, however. One of the orks to his left had landed a blow on him. Its axe head had struck him between the ribs, the very point at which his armour had been cracked by a studded club three days earlier. He had patched up the damage as best he could manage on the move, but until they returned to camp, he lacked the resources to effect a full repair.

  His helmet lit up with warning runes as ceramite and plasteel splintered, leaving his flesh unprotected. A fibre bundle, part of his armour’s electrical nervous system, had been nicked too, and suddenly his left leg was almost too heavy to lift.

  He pivoted on his foot instead and repaid his attacker in kind for its impertinence.

  The feral ork’s only armour was a patchwork of animal hides, secured around its torso by dried-out vines. Tarryn’s chainsword sliced through it – and through the flesh, muscle and bone underneath – and out the creature’s other side.

  He had earned a momentary respite, which he used to take stock of the rest of the battlefield. That was when he saw that Sergeant Juster was in trouble.

  We should have held our ground, thought Tarryn. We should have fought.

  They could have beaten the feral orks, despite their numbers. At the very least, they could have punished them for their cowardly attack. They could have ensured that those few of them that survived would live the rest of their lives in abject terror of the holy wrath they had seen unleashed.

  At best, they might have saved Brother Nabori.

  When last Tarryn had seen him, he had still been struggling, despite his grievous injuries, from a prone position. A score of feral orks had leapt on top of him, but half had been hurled away as quickly. He had disappeared beneath a writhing mountain of green flesh. He might still have been alive. It seemed unlikely, but if the Emperor were with him, it was possible.

  Space Marines were a hardy breed; many enemies over the millennia had pronounced one dead when he had simply withdrawn into a healing coma.

  Sergeant Juster was no coward – that went without saying – so, why would he have abandoned their brother when there was still a chance, however slight, that he might be saved? Why were they retreating?

  Juster had been closer to the explosion than the other survivors.

  It had taken him a moment longer to recover his senses. The feral orks had been on him before he could clamber to his feet. He had been out on his own and was suddenly surrounded, overwhelmed. They had battered his head with their clubs. They had dented his helmet and smashed his eye lenses, effectively blinding him.

  Every time he tried to stand, they had dragged him down again.

  Tarryn had seen his sergeant’s plight and snatched a frag grenade from his belt. He had pitched it into the heart of the blood-crazed mob. The feral orks had recognised it for what it was, and had known what it could do to them. They had scattered, leaving Juster to take the blast; but there was no blast.

  Sergeant Juster had scrambled to join Tarryn and Baeloch, gratefully. A pair of feral orks had emerged from cover to follow him, howling indignantly at the way they had been fooled – as the time-delay on the grenade expired and it burst in their faces.

  ‘I’m slowing you down. Leave me.’

  Sergeant Juster had wrenched off his helmet. He said he couldn’t breathe in it. His handsome face, unblemished by a century of service, had been ruined. His skull, above his left ear, was cracked and his fair hair was matted with blood.

  His right eye had been dislodged from its socket and his nose ground into mush. He had lost his left pauldron too, and his collarbone was broken.

  ‘You can make it,’ Tarryn urged him.

  ‘I said leave me,’ spat Juster. ‘That’s an order.’

  He had already stumbled three times during their flight. The third time, he had l
anded on his hands and knees and resisted Tarryn’s efforts to help him stand again. His eyelids had drooped, his speech had slurred, but he had fought his way back to awareness – or been stimulated back to it by the auto-injectors in his armour.

  ‘We could make a stand here, sergeant,’ suggested Tarryn. ‘We could–’

  Juster found the strength to seize him by the wrist and glare up into his eye slits. His jaw was set determinedly, his nostrils flaring and his undamaged eye was clear and bright. ‘Listen to me. I don’t matter. None of our lives matter. The only thing that matters is the message. Don’t risk the message for my sake.’

  Tarryn glanced up at Baeloch, who simply shrugged.

  ‘Tell the captain and the inquisitor what we found,’ said Juster. ‘The massacre, the ambush, what the jungle doesn’t want us to see. They have to know.’

  ‘Know what?’ asked Tarryn, confused. ‘What have we found?’

  ‘The monolith,’ said Juster, almost choking on the words. ‘Angron’s Monolith.’

  They heard footsteps, crashing along the trampled path behind them.

  A lone feral ork came lumbering through the undergrowth. It braked when it saw the three Relictors and unleashed a keening howl. Baeloch gunned it down, but there came answering howls from behind it. The orks – every greenskin in the vicinity – knew where their enemies were now, which route they had taken.

  Juster grabbed Tarryn’s arm with his other hand too, and hauled himself laboriously to his feet. His armour’s servo-motors whirred, compensating for the weakness in his muscles. ‘Go. Both of you, go,’ he instructed. ‘Leave the orks to me. As long as I have strength in my arms, they will not pass me.’

  Tarryn agreed, resignedly. Again, he had no choice.

  But Juster hadn’t let him go yet. ‘Give me your blade, and take mine,’ he urged. He tried to bundle his chainsword into Tarryn’s hands. ‘Captain Bylar–’

  ‘I know,’ said Tarryn, but he didn’t take the weapon.

  ‘The history of our Chapter, dating back to when we were Fire Claws, is ingrained within this steel,’ insisted Juster. ‘It has been my honour to safeguard that history and to add my own modest exploits to it, but the honour is yours now.’

  ‘You should keep it,’ said Tarryn. He didn’t feel worthy. ‘Hold off the orks with it. Let the sword be steeped in the blood of one more legendary deed. It will make its way back to us, if such is the Emperor’s will, and be all the more venerable for it.’

  Juster nodded, gratefully.

  Baeloch handed over his frag grenades. Tarryn had used both of his: the first to rescue Juster from the feral orks, the second to keep the greenskins at bay while they ran. The sergeant had two grenades of his own and two more now. They would buy him – buy all of them – a little time, at least.

  They heard a familiar war cry, howling like the wind through the trees.

  Juster was still bleeding from his head. His superhuman physiology hadn’t been able to staunch the flow. The blood had trickled into his left eye and closed it. He sank to one knee and braced himself in that position, sighting along his boltgun. In his right hand, he cradled his first grenade. His treasured blade lay readied against his hip.

  Again, he ordered Brothers Tarryn and Baeloch to leave him; this time, they did as he told them. They retreated, with the knowledge that had been entrusted to their keeping clutched close to their anguished hearts.

  They retreated, and barely was their sergeant out of their sight behind them than they heard the first explosion and felt the jungle trembling beneath their feet.

  They retreated, and Tarryn tried not to think about the weapons they had left behind, lost to them forever, still less the warriors who had wielded them. He didn’t yet understand why three brothers had had to be sacrificed, but he knew there had to be a good reason.

  Angron’s Monolith.

  The very name filled his hearts with dread.

  Priority level: Magenta Alpha

  Transmitted: Adeptus Astartes battle-barge Blade of Vengeance

  To: Relictors sky fortress, outer edge of the Armageddon sector

  Date: 3023999.M41

  Transmitter: Astropath Prime Galdorian

  Receiver: Unknown

  Author: Lord Commander Dante, Blood Angels Chapter Master

  Thought for the Day: Reason is the cloak of traitors.

  Attention: Chapter Master Bardane. As you know, the enemy is straining at the gates of Hive Infernus, to the east of your Chapter’s position. I can spare no other forces to support the garrison there. Hives Volcanus and Tempestora are also besieged and are defended by the Black Templars and my own Blood Angels respectively. I have sent the Iron Champions to reinforce the Celestial Lions at Hive Volcanus, while fighting persists amid the ruins of Hive Acheron. We must not allow another of the Emperor’s cities to fall. Respectfully, therefore, I insist that you abandon your current operations in the jungle and redeploy your Chapter to Hive Infernus as a matter of the utmost urgency. I require that you acknowledge receipt of this directive.

  Seven

  There is nothing to forgive.

  The voice echoed in Decario’s mind again, as clearly as if the speaker had been standing at his shoulder. It was only a ghost, however.

  He waited patiently in front of the great iron door. At the appointed minute – no earlier, no later – he heard the knocking of machine-spirits, as a complex series of locks cycled open. The door gave way with a sigh and a faint crackle of arcane energy, and the Relictors Chapter Master emerged from it.

  Artekus Bardane had spent two weeks in the purifying chamber, undergoing a series of punishing rituals. He had needed to cleanse himself in body, in mind, and most importantly in soul, before he faced the trial to come.

  Decario had brought him a pitcher of water. Bardane snatched it from him and quaffed it greedily. His shaved head glistened with sweat, his lips were chapped and his eyes were purple-rimmed. A whiff of incense clung to his muscular body.

  He was wearing knee breeches and a simple cotton tunic, embroidered with the Relictors Chapter symbol: a white skull, in profile, on a field of black.

  Bardane looked drained, as if he had been battling all the daemons of the immaterium single-handed, which, in a sense, he had. Decario, however – and he alone – had seen this often enough before. As his Chapter Master straightened and finally looked him in the eye – as Decario met his cool, resolute gaze – he knew that, once again, he had faced down those daemons and won.

  ‘My armour,’ said Bardane hoarsely. ‘I want my armour, and then… Then, take me to the Vault.’

  Decario smiled and nodded.

  They walked the stone-flagged passageways side by side. Despite his recent ordeal, Bardane kept his head up and his back straight.

  Decario filled him in on recent developments. He advised him that the search of the Armageddon jungle was still in progress. The monolith had not yet been located. There had been some promising signs, however, and he expected a report from Inquisitor Halstron in the near future.

  He told Bardane about the distress call from Hive Infernus and Lord Commander Dante’s request, and then his demand that the Relictors attend to it. Bardane absorbed the news in silence. Then, finally, he asked, ‘What did we tell him?’

  ‘The order was received in the last day,’ said Decario. ‘I thought it best, in the circumstances, to hold our response until you could–’

  ‘Why?’ Bardane interrupted him, sharply. ‘What choice do I have in the matter?’

  Decario held his tongue, out of courtesy.

  The Chapter Master sighed. ‘We knew it would come to this.’

  ‘Indeed,’ the Librarian agreed.

  They had come to Bardane’s solar. He halted outside it for a moment, gathering his strength. Then, he squared his broad shoulders, placed both hands on the doors and pushed through them. A small army of Chapter-serfs scurried to greet their master as the door swung shut behind him. Out in the passageway, Decario waited, again. />
  Over an hour passed before Artekus Bardane returned. During that time, he had undergone a transformation. He wore his armoured suit now: a burnished relic, emblazoned with battle honours and purity seals, though he had left off the helmet. Flames danced, reignited, in his eyes, and his jaw was locked into a determined grimace. Frown lines still furrowed his brow, but then they always had.

  He is strong, thought Decario, as strong as ever, thank the Emperor!

  ‘Have you had the vision again?’ asked Bardane, as they resumed their journey.

  ‘I have, and more clearly than before. Codicer Ibraxin has seen it too.’

  ‘Then the warning it bespeaks–’

  ‘Has become no less urgent,’ Decario confirmed.

  They were making better time now; in fact, the Chapter Master’s purposeful stride threatened to leave his companion behind. They descended into the bowels of the fortress-monastery, through secret doors and down narrow, winding staircases rarely trodden and known only to a chosen few. They halted, at last, before a door like that of the purification chamber, over three metres tall and cast from protective iron.

  Torches guttered in sconces to each side of the door, having flared to life at the two Relictors’ approach. Bardane pressed his palm against a panel beside the door, and arcane runes lit up across its surface.

  ‘Who does Dante think he is?’ he grumbled, sourly. ‘I command the Relictors, not him. If I say we have more pressing concerns than one crumbling city out of millions…’ He snapped his bald head around to glare at Decario, as if he were to blame. ‘I have never disobeyed an order before.’

  ‘We must have the shard,’ said Decario.

  ‘And Dante would keep us from it,’ agreed Bardane. ‘The pious archangel with his halo, pronouncing his judgements upon us all from behind his golden mask – how could he ever understand?’

  The Vault was a long, high-ceilinged chamber, more like a museum than a storeroom, albeit a somewhat depleted one.