Salamander, page 39
Mob leaders, totem carriers, psykers – these were the Salamanders’ targets. Cripple the orks’ leadership. Show them their mightiest could all fall beneath a Fire-born’s flame and blade. Here the Assault squads excelled, Vargo and Gannon conducting raiding attacks on vulnerable positions or leaders exposed by the sudden death or retreat of their brethren.
Thousands of greenskins lay dead for little reply. That said, every Salamander casualty was felt keenly. Fugis had returned to the fight with Brother-Sergeant Agatone. The two fought shoulder-to-shoulder, their courage worthy of even Vulkan’s praise. But the Apothecary, as heroic as he was, couldn’t minister to all of his fallen brothers. If they survived this fight, there would be much work for Fugis to do in the aftermath.
Tsu’gan had lost sight of them after N’keln’s full assault order and he wondered if they fought still.
It was stretched and the ash dunes were like a copper desert now, so stained were they with blood. Tremors wracked the undulating landscape almost constantly and dark lightning ripped strips into the sky as the volcanoes vented. Their voices were a doom-laden refrain to the heavy thunder overhead.
‘The world is ending, brother,’ roared Tsu’gan. He had not left Praetor’s side, although the sergeant’s squad had fragmented in the dense melee. Iagon, for instance, was elsewhere on the field of war. Tsu’gan hoped he was still alive.
‘A fitting end for us then,’ Praetor replied, crushing an ork with a crackling blow from his thunder hammer, ‘consumed by smoke and fire. All is ash at the end of days, brother.’
Tsu’gan smiled to himself – it sounded like something Brother Emek would say.
‘All is ash,’ Tsu’gan agreed and fought on.
Above the rising tumult of Scoria’s last storm, just audible over the raging battle, the churning report of metal could be heard echoing from the innards of the iron fortress.
Peaking above the lip of the wall, the stub-nose of the long cannon forged by the Iron Warriors but purified by the Salamanders emerged. Dust and rock was cascading from its metal casing in huge drifts, its pneumatic platform raising it from the depths of the keep to glower imperiously over the surface of Scoria like the metal finger of a dark and vengeful god.
For a moment, a fleeting second only, the fighting slowed as all who beheld the cannon’s emergence gaped in awe. Its eye was fixed heavenward as it sought to destroy a black sun.
Fyron-fuelled capacitors charged the air, their throb and pulse emitted as a wave of force as the cannon was empowered and a second later, unleashed.
II
Retribution
Dak’ir’s world was darkening. His arms grew heavy as his vision faded to black and his struggles against Ghor’gan ebbed.
‘That’s it,’ he heard the crackling magma voice say. ‘That’s it, find peace…’
A trembling in the earth below prevented the Salamander’s fall into oblivion. When it shook the very ground, its violent insistence threw the grappling Space Marines apart.
Clutching his neck, Dak’ir coughed and spluttered hot, smoky air back into his lungs. The sensation reminded him of Nocturne and the caves of Ignea – it was like breathing in a panacea.
Ghor’gan was getting to his feet as Dak’ir’s vision cleared. The Dragon Warrior braced himself against the rock wall as the entire cavern shook. A huge crack ran up the side of it as geysers of scalding steam and fire roared through the slowly fragmenting ground. In places small chasms and crag-walled pitfalls opened up like yawning mouths, their liquid tongues hot and glowing below. The renegade moved around them, stalking towards Dak’ir, determined to finish what he had begun.
‘Relent, little Salamander,’ he said, his voice low and weary.
Ghor’gan didn’t see the combat blade in Dak’ir’s hand until it was too late. The blade was only half a metre long but the Salamander sank it to the hilt in the renegade’s chest. The precise blow exploited a gap in the ceramite plates and penetrated armour, bone and flesh.
‘A life for a life,’ snarled Dak’ir. ‘My captain must be avenged.’
Ghor’gan’s mouth curled in pain; his eyes narrow slits of agony. Even as Dak’ir twisted the blade, searching out vital organs and soft tissue, the renegade fought on and dug his claws into the Salamander’s neck.
Dak’ir cried out, aiming a savage punch to the Dragon Warrior’s ear even as he shoved the combat blade harder with his other hand. Ghor’gan shifted his head, and took the blow on his much harder jaw instead, but it jarred enough to force him to release his claw.
Blood was dripping off Ghor’gan’s extracted talon when a ball of fire rolled through the wall of heat nearby, wreathed in flames and trailing smoke. From it emerged Pyriel, furled within the protective confines of his drakescale mantle.
Out of the corner of his eye, Dak’ir saw Pyriel move to assist him but the sergeant urged the Librarian on as he kept the bulky Dragon Warrior pinned.
‘Stop Nihilan,’ he roared, his voice hoarse from being half-choked to death. ‘Don’t let the bastard escape again.’
Pyriel didn’t even pause. The Librarian knew his duty and sped on after Nihilan and his brood.
‘Just you and I again,’ sneered Dak’ir, scenting the sulphur gas streaming from a craterous hole behind the Dragon Warrior. A sudden idea occurred to him. ‘You’re not Fire-born, are you renegade…’
The idling of powerful engines throbbed ahead of him as Pyriel thundered down the tunnel after Nihilan and the other Dragon Warrior.
Dak’ir was right – they could not be allowed to escape again. If it had to end here on Scoria then the renegades would die with them. The Librarian could feel peace if he knew that was so.
Too late, Pyriel arrived at the tunnel’s terminus. In the expansive cavern before him, a Stormbird was waiting. Its engines were burning with a dull, red glow. The embarkation ramp in the gunship’s hold was slammed down. The fang-mouthed Dragon Warrior was ferrying the last of the fyron ore aboard via the six-wheeled loader, his master looking on.
Just before Nihilan turned to see the foe in his midst, Pyriel looked up and realised the roof to the cavern was vaulted. In fact, it tapered several hundred metres up into a narrow chimney that led directly to the surface. Narrow, yes, but wide enough to accommodate the span of a Stormbird if piloted correctly.
A psychic cry ripped from Pyriel’s throat as he recognised his chance to stop the Dragon Warriors was already beyond his grasp. He fashioned a bolt of flame from the essence of the warp, channelling it down his force sword to lash at Nihilan. At least he would sear him.
Some fifty metres away, the sorcerer turned and threw up a hasty force barrier against which the fire bolt crashed and dissipated. Behind trailing smoke and eddies of flame, Nihilan emerged unscathed.
The Dragon Warrior then unleashed a psychic riposte. Black smoke boiled across the ground, resolving into tendrils upon reaching the Salamander. The tendrils coiled insidiously around Pyriel’s arms and legs, invading the protective aegis of his armour and bypassing the safeguards of his psychic hood. Powerless to prevent it, in a matter of seconds the Librarian was utterly paralysed. Thunderous rage burned in Pyriel’s eyes as he regarded his nemesis.
‘It’s been a long time, Pyriel,’ said Nihilan with a voice reminiscent of cracking parchment. ‘I missed you on Stratos, brother.’
‘A shame,’ Pyriel forced a sarcastic reply. He grimaced against the sorcerous hold, trying to unravel it with his mind.
Nihilan walked off the loading ramp almost casually. Despite the raucous engine noise venting around him, his words were strangely clear. ‘How long has it been, then? Over four decades for you? I see you have advanced in Master Vel’cona’s eyes since then. A mere Codicier, if memory serves, and now a vaunted Epistolary.’ Nihilan’s burning red gaze swept over the arcane rank sigils emblazoned on Pyriel’s armour contemptuously. The sorcerer’s mood darkened.
‘Still you deny the raw power of the warp,’ he breathed, lingering on the flame icon on the Librarian’s right pauldron. Enmity, perhaps even jealousy, flared briefly then died like the mirthless smile curling Nihilan’s top lip. ‘I eclipse your meagre abilities now.’
‘Spoken like a true pawn of Chaos,’ bit Pyriel, working as much vitriol as he could into the retort. ‘You are naught but a plaything for the Ruinous Powers. Once your usefulness has ended they will discard you.’
The amused expression returned.
‘I thought it was just the armour of my former brothers that was green. Not so for you of course, Librarian, but then the shade of your eyes make up for it, don’t they.’
Pyriel’s eyes burned an angry red. He wished dearly he could look upon Nihilan and engulf him within the fire of his wrath.
‘If you’re going to destroy me, then do it and spare the rhetoric before I expire of boredom.’
That struck a nerve. Nihilan seemed like he was going to give Pyriel his wish. Static blurted from the external vox feed in the hold of the Stormbird, arresting any retaliation.
‘Cargo secured, my lord,’ came a rasping voice. ‘Brother Ekrine is ready to take off.’
Annoyed at the sudden interruption, Nihilan managed to keep his irritation from his voice when he replied. ‘Understood, Ramlek. I will be with you momentarily.’ He turned his attention back to Pyriel.
‘I could smite you where you stand, but that wouldn’t be fitting. I want you to suffer before you die, Pyriel. Just like Vel’cona made me suffer when you betrayed my trust.’
Pyriel’s jaw hardened – the dark tendrils binding him were weakening. ‘Traitors are undeserving of trust.’
Pyriel shook off the sorcerous bonds with a feral shout. Force sword held high, the Librarian launched himself at Nihilan, who merely stepped back into the hold before the ramp was pulled up. Mocking laugher echoed down to Pyriel as the Stormbird lifted and the hold hatch closed with a resounding clang. The burst from the gunship’s rapidly vented thrusters sent the Librarian sprawling and the Stormbird soaring up the shrinking mouth of the rock chimney, up into the fractious air of Scoria.
Shrugging off the effects of Nihilan’s sorcerous attack and mouthing a muttered curse, Pyriel picked himself up and went back down the tunnel to find Dak’ir.
He returned in time only to see the Salamander sergeant and his foe pitching over the edge of a fiery crevice, plummeting down, occluded by smoke and rising ash.
Pyriel gave voice to his pain again.
‘Dak’ir!’
The black rock exploded with all the finality and grandeur of a shattered star. At once the blood-red sky flooded with brilliance, a pure white flare that bathed all in its eldritch glow. The flare died but the sun returned with it, weak and yellow but brighter than the forbidding gloom of the eclipse.
Abruptly and violently sundered, the black rock was spread across the firmament. The fragments of its passing became new stars burning in the light of day. Drawn by the gravitational pull of the planet, the stars became larger and larger until they resolved into vast meteorites, swathed in fire and billowing smoke.
The effect of the black rock’s destruction on the orks was almost palpable. The horde faltered, its impetus flagging like a ship with its sails abruptly cut. When the jagged balls of fire arcing from the heavens struck, it only compounded the greenskins’ despair.
Simultaneous meteor strikes punished the rear of the ork lines stretching back across the dunes. The celestial storm wreaked utter havoc, slaying hundreds beneath the fury of the fallen rocks, and cooking hundreds more in the resultant radiation wave.
Tsu’gan watched this all happen between the ever growing gaps in the fighting. As soon as the beam from the seismic cannon rang out, piercing the sky like a radiant lance, N’keln ordered the Salamanders to stand fast and consolidate. Though stretched and scattered, the Astartes became like green-armoured islands in the orkish sea, turning their bolters outward and brooking no interloper beyond their individual walls of ceramite.
Shoulder-to-shoulder with Praetor and three of his Firedrakes, Tsu’gan couldn’t help but stare in awe at the phenomenal display unfolding above. The earth chimed with it, trembling and cracking. Crevices and chasms split open, swallowing orks in their thousands. Those not falling to their doom in the abyssal darkness were consumed by rushing lava torrenting into the air.
Booming thunder pealed from the volcanoes, louder and somehow final as they erupted with hellish force.
Praetor’s laughter rivalled their bellow. The skies were darkening with smoke and ash. Soon artificial night would resume once more.
‘When fire rains from the sky and ash smothers the sun, it is the end of days,’ he shouted.
Tsu’gan’s gaze was still fixed upon the turbulent heavens. ‘That is not all the heavens bring, brother.’
Praetor followed Tsu’gan’s outstretched finger.
The belly of a ship emerged slowly through the billowing smoke clouds. Tsu’gan was put in mind of a giant predator of the deep emerging from a mist-wreathed ocean. Tiny meteorites arced past it on fiery contrails as it hovered a thousand metres above the surface. The backwash of massive ventral engines pressed down upon Tsu’gan despite its altitude. It was an Astartes strike cruiser.
Argos raised his body up out of the ventral thruster conduit in the enginarium. He stretched the stiffness out of his back, eased the knots from his tired muscles and rolled his shoulders beneath his pauldrons to coax back some mobility. He had done all he could.
The fourth, still non-functional, ventral thruster bank was prepped as exhaustively as possible. The machine-rites had been observed, the correct unguents applied and offerings dedicated. His throat was hoarse from the litanies of function and ignition he had performed in concert with his Techmarines. The Master of Forge was a part of this ship; he felt its malady and he knew its moods. If they could replace the parts they’d lost and needed, it would achieve loft. Once free of the dunes, the Vulkan’s Wrath’s main engines would do the rest.
The comm-feed in his battle-helm hissed and spat with static before Argos heard Brother Uclides, one of Sergeant Agatone’s squad tasked with escorting the human civilians aboard the ship.
After undertaking a cursory geological analysis, Argos had determined that the planet’s tectonic integrity was nearing imminent disintegration. Prudently, he had given the order for the auxiliary and all still living casualties to be secured aboard the ship for safety. Those injured who could not be moved were given the Emperor’s Peace and enclosed in medi-caskets for later interment into the pyreum.
‘All of the Scorian settlers are aboard, Master Argos. What are your orders?’
Argos was about to respond when he noticed the radiation spike in the atmosphere detected by the ship’s still functioning sensors, relayed to him through his direct interface.
‘Go to the fighter hangar and help prepare the gunships,’ he answered, changing his mind when he assumed the black rock had been destroyed. Apart from the servitors, the Salamander was alone, having already despatched the other Techmarines to the Thunderhawks still locked in their transit rigs. ‘Our brothers will be in need of immediate extraction and conveyance back to the Vulkan’s Wrath.’ Uclides communicated his obedience and cut the feed.
Argos was about to climb out of the sunken thruster access conduit when the ship’s vox-unit crackled into life alongside him. Uclides would have used the helmet comm-feed. The signal originated from outside of the ship.
‘Brother Techmarine Argos: 3rd Company, Salamanders Chapter, aboard the Vulkan’s Wrath,’ he began, observing protocol. ‘Identify yourself.’
A clipped voice responded with all the warmth and smoothness of rusty nails.
‘This is Brother Techmarine Harkane of his most noble lord Vinyar’s strike cruiser, Purgatory. In the name of the Emperor, the Marines Malevolent bring you salvation!’
Brother-Captain N’keln’s order to stand fast had kept his forces out of bombardment range and the worst hit areas of the meteor shower. The celestial storm had all but abated now and the greenskins, though battered and severely reduced in strength, still lived and fought.
During a brief lull in the battle, N’keln took stock of his surroundings. Mounted upon a high dune with his Inferno Guard and Sergeant Agatone, who had emerged alongside them with Fugis when they’d returned to the battlefield, N’keln surveyed the carnage. He saw tiny knots of Salamander armour out amongst the thrashing horde, lit by controlled bursts of bolter fire or plumes of igniting promethium. Their rear was anchored by the Devastators still. Lok was in able command, several hundred metres distant since the advance. The Dreadnoughts both functioned, prowling the edges of the Salamanders’ deployment zone. Ashamon had lost his heavy flamer and meltagun but he continued to pound on the orks with his seismic hammer. Amadeus was wholly intact, but with several deep gouges in his protective sarcophagus where the greenskins had attempted to forcibly exhume him.
N’keln estimated they had lost approximately thirty-three per cent of their original number. He didn’t know how many of those casualties would fight again. In light of the ork masses it was a lower rate of attrition than he’d expected. The greenskins, in contrast, had died in their thousands. A slew of carcasses lay strewn across the dunes, slowly decaying.
The company banner, held aloft by Malicant, began snapping violently in a sudden downdraft, drawing N’keln’s gaze upward. Above them, the brother-captain saw the long, grey ventral hull of a ship he recognised. Fraught with interference, the comm-feed in his battle-helm opened.
N’keln listened intently to the voice of Brother Argos as he relayed exactly what Harkane on the Purgatory had said to him. Towards the end, the captain’s face became grim.
‘Tell him he has my word,’ he replied, jaw clenched. He cut the feed and ordered the warriors around him back into the fight. N’keln suddenly needed to vent his wrath.
