Road to Redemption, page 25
Then the lake caught fire.
It rippled outwards like a rampant infection, tongues of dirty flame licking upwards as the chemicals, filth and noxious gases ignited. Not every part of the surface caught, but it kept spreading, leaving dark pools of fluid surrounded by sheets of fire. The Redemptionists on the quay backed away, raising their arms to shield themselves from the sudden rush of heat from the inferno they’d unwittingly unleashed.
Zeke put a burst of autopistol shells into the fuel tanks slung on the back of the man with the flamer, and they blew up. The flamer-wielder was propelled forwards into the lake; the man next to him was doused in ignited promethium and staggered sideways, screaming, before he too fell into the sump. The last of the trio, who’d come to a horrified halt as her warning was ignored, was blown off her feet by the force of the explosion and landed hard on the rockcrete.
Zeke was on her as she shifted groggily, and had the barrel of his gun rammed into her forehead before she knew what was happening.
‘Essy and Donnel!’ he snarled at her. ‘Where are they?’
The woman beneath him froze in the act of reaching up to grab at the sudden pressure on her face.
‘Zeke?’
Zeke looked at her face properly, and his gut twisted in recognition. ‘Bella?’
‘Throne of Terra, it is you,’ Bella said. She relaxed, her hands dropping to the rockcrete on either side of her head. ‘Heard your name, thought it was you come back to haunt us. Punish us for our sins, hey?’
Zeke pressed his gun in a little harder. ‘Essy and Donnel. Where?’
The right hand side of Bella’s top lip quirked into a smile, and she pointed with her right hand. Throne, but she looked old!
‘Shut up in a house, next alley over. Door looks like it was taken out the side of a sump ship, ’cos it was. Got a kid guarding ’em, but you can take him, unless you got older n’ slower than me.’
Zeke scowled at her. ‘Why are you telling me this?’
‘Judgement’s come.’ Bella shrugged, then coughed; the acrid fumes of the burning lake were starting to drift ashore. ‘If I had faith, must’ve lost it years back. Just been doing what I been doing ’cos I been too scared to stop. Ain’t no excuse. Who’re the kids to you, anyhow? Not yours, don’t have your look to ’em.’
‘I owe their parents my life,’ Zeke told her, and Bella nodded.
‘Fair. You seen Lukas?’
‘Seen him and killed him.’
‘Good.’ Bella sighed. ‘Had hopes for that boy, but hope dies faster than anything else down here. So, go on – send me to the God-Empress, and go get the kids. Past my time.’
Zeke shook his head, and lifted his gun. ‘No.’
Bella frowned, as though expecting a trick. ‘Say what?’
‘Lukas told me you shot Kabriel deliberately,’ Zeke said. ‘I owe you my life, too. I can’t level all debts against you, but I can level the one that’s owed by me.’ He got up, leaving her on the floor. ‘Get up and run.’
‘Run where?’ Bella protested, propping herself up on one elbow. ‘Skutting lake’s on fire!’
‘Not my problem,’ Zeke told her. ‘Yet,’ he added, then turned away from her and broke into a run. The next alley over. After all this time, he was close, so close. Bella hadn’t lied; he could almost taste the truth in her words.
A hissing, whistling sound grabbed his attention, along with the skittering of many legs. A bone-white shape well over a foot long hauled itself over the side of the quay some way ahead of him, and disappeared into the nearest alley. It was a sump spider, fleeing the blazing water into the only safe place available, and it was swiftly followed by another, even larger.
‘“No bigger than your head”, my arse,’ Zeke muttered, remembering Zakath’s words at the bridge.
A stentorian screech cut through the noise of gunfire, shouts, and the soft but pervasive spitting of the flaming lake. It was deep, and powerful, and came from further out in the dome, from the places where the lumens had long since failed and the only light to ever split the darkness was borne by reckless humans as they hunted the mighty white sump mares.
The sump lake’s surface began to ripple, more and more.
‘Oh crap.’
Zeke reached the alley and ducked into it, scanned it quickly to determine that no sump spiders were about to attack him, then headed for the door Bella had described. It was sheet metal, rusted and pitted, and scored down its entire length by what he really hoped hadn’t been spider fangs, but thought probably had been. He grabbed the handle, wrenched it open with the hand that still clutched Alin’s knife, and dived inside with his gun up and ready.
Darkness skulked inside, split only by the flickering light of flames coming in through the windows at front and rear.
A body on the floor, red-and-yellow robes splayed out around it.
Zeke’s heart leapt, half in sudden hope, half in abject fear. He looked up and around, tracking with his gun.
‘Ess–’
Light
Noise
…pain.
He staggered backwards, hit against the wall and moaned as agony speared through him. He could feel blood leaking out of him, soaking his clothes like when he’d fought the slavers, but this wound wasn’t in his arm.
It was in his chest.
‘Essy?’ he managed weakly, as he sank into a sitting position against the wall, hoping desperately that she was in here somewhere. His gun seemed heavy; too heavy to lift properly. His fingers were going cold.
‘Zeke?!’
She flew out of the darkness, tears sparkling in her eyes and a damned stub gun in her hand. He felt a fierce surge of pride in her, suddenly. She’d killed the man set to guard her. He’d failed to protect her, but at least she could maybe protect herself now.
‘It’s me.’ He managed to reach up and get the mask off his head, then threw the hideous thing as far as he could. The effort tore at his insides, and he gasped in pain.
‘They said you had a mask of rags!’ Essy sobbed. ‘I didn’t mean to, I wouldn’t have–’
‘Sssh,’ Zeke told her. ‘Sssh. It’s fine. It’s fine.’ A mask of rags? Yes. Yes, he had. What had happened to that? He tried to focus on the girl in front of him. ‘Where’s Donnel?’
‘He’s here,’ Essy said, with a teary nod. Her face screwed up again as she looked at the hole she’d put in his chest. ‘B-but–’
‘No, he doesn’t… doesn’t need to see this,’ Zeke agreed. His lips felt heavy now. ‘Go on. Go. Run. I’ve got friends here.’
‘Ma and Da?’ Essy begged him. ‘Are Ma and Da here?’
‘No,’ Zeke told her, and what was left of his heart broke as he saw hers break anew. ‘No, they’re… with the Emperor now. You’re going to have to be… your own Ma and Da, now.’
The door was wrenched open again and a great-coated shape stepped inside, laspistol up. Alin! No. No, Alin was dead. Zeke had watched them die.
‘No!’ he shouted, as loudly as he could, as Essy snapped her stub gun up despite the tears in her eyes. ‘Essy, Ash, no!’
‘I saw you come in here. You’re hurt?’ Ash Choll asked. They didn’t seem to have any difficulty seeing in the dim light.
‘I’m dead,’ Zeke corrected them. ‘Ash, this is Essy. Essy… this is Ash. Go with them. You and Donnel. Go. They’ll… keep you safe.’
‘Orlocks?’ Ash Choll said, and there was a dangerous note in their voice that Zeke couldn’t remember hearing before. They almost sounded like their sibling now, but that must have just been Zeke’s ears playing tricks on him. He’d seen Alin die. ‘You never said the children were Orlocks, no?’
‘It’s a Delaque,’ Essy said flatly, her nostrils flaring. ‘Da said–’
‘Ash, Essy, please!’ Zeke pleaded. Was it getting darker? Were the fires outside on the lake failing, or was it his eyes? ‘I’m dead. Alin’s dead.’
Ash Choll’s sharp intake of breath was as good as a scream of anguish from a more demonstrative House.
‘I’m sorry,’ Zeke apologised. ‘Take them… keep them safe.’ There was something else, something else he knew he needed to say, to hurry them both up. ‘The spiders. The spiders… are coming.’
Ash Choll’s head turned, ever so slightly, towards the rear wall of the building, the one closest to what had until recently been the darkest part of the lake. Then they nodded.
‘Come, children.’
‘Essy!’ Zeke said. He dropped Alin’s knife, dimly heard it clatter on the floor, and fumbled with his pouch. ‘I have… I have…’
He pulled out Magos Volt and Sister Purity. He tried to hold them out, but his fingers failed him, and the dolls dropped to the floor too. Essy scooped them up, then, after a second, took the knife as well.
‘If we are going, we should go now, yes?’ Ash Choll said. Essy turned and darted back into the darkness, then returned with Donnel in tow. She covered his eyes before he caught sight of Zeke, whispering comfortingly in his ear, then steered him out of the door.
‘Thank you… Ash,’ Zeke managed. Everything was cold now.
Ash Choll made a sign Zeke didn’t recognise, something involving their left hand and their face. ‘Walk always in shadow, and may your soul hear truths.’
They left, and the door swung shut again behind them, but the fumes from the burning lake were seeping in under it.
Zeke lost his fight against the encroaching darkness with the smell of smoke in his nostrils.
Not the sour smoke of the dried fungus trunks that Ava and Vorn had used to heat their home. Not the whiff of char that meant someone hadn’t been watching the rat on the spit. Not even the sweet scent of incense paying homage to the God-Emperor, or a particularly recalcitrant machine-spirit. This was smoke like he used to smell.
Thick, choking, and scented with death.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Mike Brooks is a science fiction and fantasy author who lives in Nottingham, UK. His work for Black Library includes the Warhammer 40,000 novel Rites of Passage, the Necromunda novella Wanted: Dead, and various short stories. When not writing, he plays guitar and sings in a punk band, and DJs wherever anyone will tolerate him.
An extract from Kal Jerico: Sinner’s Bounty.
‘Oh, scav.’
Kal Jerico was already dropping into a crouch as the exclamation left his mouth. The axe was little more than a rusty fan blade lashed to a length of bone, and it cut the air with a thin whistle. With no Kal to stop it, the makeshift weapon continued its arc unimpeded, burying itself in a steam pipe. A boiling fug gushed, filling the causeway corridor.
Kal cursed again and fired one of his laspistols in the general direction of the axe-wielding mutie. He threw himself aside as a second cannibal erupted from a side corridor opposite him, autogun blazing. The newcomer wasn’t aiming, just shooting. A fine old underhive tradition – fill the air with enough lead, you were bound to hit something.
‘Scabbs,’ Kal snarled. Then, ‘Yolanda!’ The only answer he received was more shooting. No sign of his partners anywhere. Slugs perforated support struts, and the causeway gave an audible groan. It only remained aloft thanks to centuries of rust and a bit of luck.
Kal shoved himself across the floor, returning fire with more enthusiasm than accuracy. No time to worry about where the others were now. Not when he could hear the whoops and howls of his attackers, as they raced up creaking gantry stairs or shimmied down through broken transit shafts. He needed to be elsewhere, and quickly.
The fug began to thin, leaving a greasy residue on the air. The mutie with the axe was down, having caught a slug meant for Kal. But the other one was still standing, curses dripping from his blistered lips as he struggled to clear a jam in the autogun’s firing chamber. Kal rose to his feet, laspistol extended. The mutie froze, staring.
Kal winked, and shot him.
A moment later, he was running down the causeway, the rest of the cannibals in pursuit. Kal fired in his wake without looking. At worst, the volley would slow the fastest ones down. At best, he might kill one or two, and the rest would stop to eat them.
The causeway was a long stretch of rusty iron and sodden ferrocrete – one of a dozen extending across the upper reaches of the ruined hab-dome. Phosphorescent flora climbed the struts and girders that held the causeway in place, and slow drifts of glimmering pollen hung heavy on the air. The causeway was crumbling in places. Wide gaps made the path treacherous, but Kal was an old hand at running for his life in difficult terrain.
Even so, he was soon forced to holster his weapons. He needed his hands free to haul his lean frame along the more unstable sections of the causeway. But however cautious he was, he didn’t slacken his pace. The muties were hot on his heels, and they were hungry, by the sounds of it. Then, they were always hungry.
Of course, they also weren’t supposed to be this far south of Pipefall. Even as he ran, he wondered what had drawn them to this badzone. If the mutie tribes were moving south, that meant they were heading up from hive bottom, and that was bad for everyone. Bad, but also profitable. Mutie scalps were worth five credits apiece in Steelgate. Too bad there was no time to stop and collect a few.
He bounded over a chunk of rubble, his sword clanking against his legs, and saw that the path fell away into darkness ahead. Without slowing, he holstered his laspistols and darted out across a broken girder that extended partially over the gap. A tumble of torn hoses and conduits dangled over the empty space and as he reached the end of the girder, he leapt.
His intention, formed in the half-second before his leap, was to swing across the gap and land adroitly on the opposite side. Unfortunately, his weight pulled many of the artificial vines loose from their corroded housings. He found himself clinging desperately to a single length of electrical conduit, his momentum lost in his momentary flailing.
As he swung out over the gap, he glimpsed a forest of glowing flora below, and the polluted streams cutting through it. The lower levels of the hab-dome had collapsed under the weight of strange growths, and he could smell the sickly-sweet stink of toxic fumes. He heard a giggle, and saw that the muties had caught up with him.
They stared at him from the edge of the gap, eyeing him the way a rat eyed a hunk of meat. At least a dozen, maybe more. Starveling-thin, or bloated with cancerous tumours, they shifted and murmured, following him with their eyes as he swung gently from side to side. A few might have been licking their lips, but it was hard to tell, given the malformation of their faces. One of them looked down, picked up a length of pipe and jabbed at him.
‘Stop it,’ Kal said, kicking ineffectually at the pipe. The effort sent him in a slow circle. This seemed to amuse them, and more jabbing followed until he managed to kick the pipe out of the mutie’s grip. It clattered away into the dark below. They watched it fall, and then looked back up at him. Kal stared back at them.
Muties were the worst of the worst. The flotsam and jetsam of hive bottom, scraped out and churned up. Inbred, gripped by disease and malnutrition, they murdered, robbed and ate anyone they could catch. In Kal’s professional opinion, life in the underhive would have been vastly improved if every mutie was dead and their corpses safely incinerated.
Nonetheless, he tried an ingratiating smile. ‘So… what’s the cost of safe passage, these days? I’m all out of credits, but I’m always up for a bit of bartering.’
‘Nice boots,’ one of them grunted.
‘Nice coat,’ another wheezed.
‘Looks like he tastes nice, too,’ a third said, smacking her lips in a manner that was decidedly not lascivious. Heads nodded, and grunts of assent followed this assertion. Kal shook his head.
‘I warn you, I’m fairly certain I’m mostly gristle.’
‘Soft,’ a mutie crooned. ‘Soft uphiver. Smells so sweet.’
Kal began to regret taking his weekly bath so recently. It was just that a man wanted to look his best before going on a job. He had a reputation to maintain, after all. He was glad there was no one to witness him dangling here.
At the thought, he looked around, hoping to spot the familiar forms of his partners. They’d got separated when the muties had sprung their ambush. It was every man – or woman – for themselves in such situations, and Scabbs and Yolanda were experienced enough to look after themselves. Unfortunately, the muties had followed Kal, rather than the others.
‘Go find Scabbs,’ he said. ‘He’s slow and I’m sure that unsightly dermatitis of his will make him easy to chew.’ The muties, unfortunately, didn’t seem inclined to follow his advice. ‘No one ever listens to me,’ Kal muttered, as he spun slowly around and around. ‘I’m doomed to be unappreciated in my own time. Or eaten. Or both.’
He looked down, trying to gauge the distance to the bottom of the hab. Or even just to the glowing canopy of flora. But it was too far, even for someone with his luck. He looked up. The conduit wasn’t going to hold forever. There was no telling if it would last long enough for him to try and climb it. He was stuck, good and proper.
‘I admit, this is not a good day for the underhive’s greatest bounty hunter,’ he said, out loud. A mutie laughed and Kal made an obscene gesture. ‘Who asked you, you blister-faced sump-rat?’
One of them tossed a chunk of stone at him, and he drew a laspistol. Those closest drew back. Others levelled their own weapons.
‘Not the wisest option,’ Kal called out. ‘Shoot me and that’s your dinner gone.’ He gestured downwards meaningfully. ‘Wouldn’t want that, would you?’
