Legion:The Horus Heresy,Book 7 Part 1/6
Legion:The Horus Heresy,Book 7 Part 1/6
Transcript
00:00:00Legion by Dan Abnett, read by David Timpson.
00:00:26God has given you one face and you make yourself another.
00:00:31Attributed to the dramaturge Shakespeare, flourished M2.
00:00:37Of the fabulous Hydra, it is said, cut off one head and two will grow in its place.
00:00:44Antique proverb.
00:00:46No one is enough of a fool to choose war instead of peace.
00:00:50In peace, sons bury fathers, but in war, fathers bury sons.
00:00:57Attributed to the chronicler Herodotus, flourished M0.
00:01:03War is simply the galaxy's hygiene.
00:01:07Attributed to the primarch Alpharius.
00:01:20My name is Hurtado Bronzey.
00:01:23There, I've said it.
00:01:26I've said it and I can never take it back.
00:01:29The secret is out.
00:01:31Ah, the rest.
00:01:34Well, if I must, sir, my name is Hurtado Bronzey, a Hetman, which is to say a senior captain
00:01:44of the Geno V2 Chiliad, imperial army, glory of terror, beloved of the Emperor.
00:01:52I'm an Edessa-born man, proud of my liberty, catharic by devotion, a brother to two sisters
00:01:59and a brother.
00:02:01My ears hear only the orders of my estimable Lord Commander, Namat Jira.
00:02:07My hands know only the purpose of the Emperor and the correct business of a carbine laser.
00:02:13My mouth, well, my mouth knows a great deal more and knows when not to say it.
00:02:22Because he has taught us to be scrupulously secretive, no, I will not be drawn to say
00:02:28his name.
00:02:30I said he has taught us to be scrupulously secretive.
00:02:35That is his way, and we love him for it.
00:02:38The greatest gift he has bestowed on us is to share his secret with us.
00:02:43Why?
00:02:44Because we were there, I suppose, at Tellutan and Mon Lowe Harbour, and now the Shivering
00:02:51Hills.
00:02:52If it hadn't been us, there would have been others.
00:02:56Why are you whispering?
00:02:58I can hear you whispering.
00:03:01What don't you want me to hear?
00:03:03What secrets are you plotting?
00:03:06Pain?
00:03:08Is that it?
00:03:10Is that all you have to offer me?
00:03:12Well, yes, it does open secrets.
00:03:16Some secrets, some mouths.
00:03:20Have you planned for me?
00:03:22Ah, I see.
00:03:26Well, if you must, I won't welcome it.
00:03:30What will it be?
00:03:32Eyes?
00:03:33Genitals?
00:03:34The gaps between my toes and fingers?
00:03:38First, you should know—
00:03:40Oh, merciful!
00:03:48Quite the expert, your little man, quite the expert.
00:03:54He's done this before, hasn't he?
00:03:57No, wait, I—
00:03:58Beloved terror!
00:03:59Oh, shit!
00:04:00Oh, little bastard!
00:04:01Let me finish, please, let me finish what I was saying, please, yes?
00:04:15All right, then.
00:04:18This won't work.
00:04:20This simply won't work.
00:04:22Because I'm telling you it won't.
00:04:25I will not tell you anything.
00:04:28It doesn't matter what you do to me.
00:04:30Really, it doesn't.
00:04:31Burn me all you like.
00:04:32My mouth is shut, because that's all he asks of us.
00:04:39The only thing, I can tell you who I am and who I was, but I can't, I won't, betray his
00:04:47confidence.
00:04:48Oh, shit!
00:04:49Oh, shit!
00:04:50Holy fire!
00:04:51Bastard!
00:04:52What?
00:04:53What?
00:04:54Ask what you like.
00:04:55Burn me again, if you must.
00:05:05My name is Hurtado Bronzy.
00:05:10That's all you're getting.
00:05:14Chapter 1 Reptile Summer
00:05:19Chapter 1 Tell Yutan, Nerth, two years before the heresy.
00:05:27The Nerthene uttered some of the usual gibberish before he died.
00:05:32He pointed at his enemies with his dust-caked fingers and jabbered, spitting out curses
00:05:37on their families and dependents, and particularly miserable dooms on the heads of their children
00:05:42far away.
00:05:44A soldier learns how to ignore insults, but there was something about the Nerthene way
00:05:49of cursing that made Sonica blanch.
00:05:54The Nerthene lay on his back on a slope of dry red sand where the blast had thrown him.
00:06:00His pink silk robes were stiffening in places where his blood was drying rapidly in the
00:06:05late afternoon sun.
00:06:07His silver breastplate, with its engraving of stylized reeds and entwined crocodilia,
00:06:13hinked like a mirror.
00:06:15His legs lay in a limp position that suggested his spine was no longer properly connected.
00:06:22Sonica trudged up the dry bed of the wadi to inspect him.
00:06:26A terribly dark, terribly blue sky met the red horizon.
00:06:32The sinking sun picked out the facing edges of rocks and boulders with a bright orange
00:06:38sheen.
00:06:40Sonica was wearing glare-shields, but took them off out of courtesy, so that the Nerthene
00:06:45could see his eyes.
00:06:47He knelt down, the small gold box around his neck swinging like a pendulum.
00:06:53"'Enough with your curses, all right,' he said.
00:06:58The troop stood around him on the slope, watching, their weapons ready in their hands.
00:07:03The desert wind brushed their embroidered waist-length coats and made them flutter.
00:07:09Lon, one of Sonica's bachors, had already snapped the Nerthene's falx with his lich-knight,
00:07:15and flung the broken stump away over the rim of the wadi.
00:07:19Sonica could still smell traces of the lich-knight's spray in the warm air.
00:07:24"'It's over,' he told his enemy.
00:07:27"'Will you speak to me?'
00:07:30Looking up at him, grains of sand stuck to his face.
00:07:33The Nerthene murmured something.
00:07:37Tears of blood formed at the corners of his lips.
00:07:40"'How many?'
00:07:42Sonica asked.
00:07:43"'How many more of you are there in this sink?'
00:07:46"'You,' the Nerthene began.
00:07:50"'Yes, you.
00:07:52You are carnal with your own mother.'
00:07:57At Sonica's shoulder, Lon raised his carbine sharply.
00:08:00"'Relax, I've heard worse,' Sonica told him.
00:08:04"'But your mother is a fine woman,' said Lon.
00:08:08"'Oh, now you lust for her, too?' asked Sonica.
00:08:12Some of the men laughed.
00:08:14Lon shook his head and lowered his carbine.
00:08:16"'Last chance,' said Peto Sonica to the dying man.
00:08:20"'How many more?'
00:08:23"'How many more of you?' replied the Nerthene in a dry whisper.
00:08:31His accent was strong, but there was no denying that the Nerthene had mastered the Imperial
00:08:35language.
00:08:36"'How many more you come from the stars in your droves, and you do nothing?'
00:08:46"'Nothing?'
00:08:48"'Nothing, except prove the universal presence of evil.'
00:08:53"'Is that what you think of us?'
00:08:56Sonica asked.
00:08:58The Nerthene stared up at him.
00:09:00His eyes had gone glassy, like the sky at dawn.
00:09:04He burped, and blood welled up out of his mouth like water from a borehole.
00:09:09"'He's dead,' observed Lon.
00:09:13"'Well spotted,' said Sonica, rising to his feet.
00:09:18He looked back at the men gathered on the slope behind him.
00:09:21Beyond them, two Nerthene-armoured vehicles were burning, sweating soot and smoke up into
00:09:26the blue sky.
00:09:28On the other side of the waddy, Sonica could hear sporadic lass-shots.
00:09:31"'Let's dance,' Sonica said.
00:09:38From the rim of the waddy, looking west, it was possible to see Tell Utan itself—a jumble
00:09:44of terracotta blocks and walls capping a long loaf-shaped hill ten kilometres away.
00:09:50The intervening landscape was a broken tract of ridges and ancient basins, and in the sidelong
00:09:57evening light the basins had filled with shadows so black they looked like pools of ink.
00:10:05Sonica felt a comparable blackness in his heart.
00:10:09Tell Utan was proving to be their nemesis.
00:10:13For eight months it had held them at bay through a combination of terrain, tactics, stoicism,
00:10:19and plain bad luck.
00:10:22The Geno V-2 Chiliad was one of the oldest brigades in the Imperial Army.
00:10:28An elite force of one thousand companies, it had a martial tradition that stretched
00:10:32back through the time of the Great Crusade and into the era of the Unification Wars that
00:10:37had preceded it.
00:10:39The Geno was a proud member of the Old Hundred, the strife-epoch regiments that the Emperor,
00:10:46in his grace, had maintained after unification, provided they pledged loyalty to him.
00:10:53Many thousands of others had been forced to disband, or had been actively purged and neutered,
00:10:58depending on their level of resistance to the new order.
00:11:02Peto Sonica had been born in Theodosia, and had served in his youth in the local army,
00:11:09but he had petitioned eagerly for transfer into the Geno V-2 because of their illustrious
00:11:14reputation.
00:11:15He had been with the Geno for twenty-three years, achieving the rank of Hetman.
00:11:22In that time they hadn't met a nut they couldn't crack.
00:11:25There had been tough dances along the way, of course there had.
00:11:31Off the top of his head Sonica could mention Phoetium.
00:11:34There they had slogged toe-to-toe for six weeks with the greenskins in lightless, frozen
00:11:40latitudes, and Xanthium, where the dragonoid cadres had almost bested them in a series
00:11:46of running battles and ambuscades.
00:11:49But Nerth, Tell Yutan in particular, was as stubborn as anything they'd ever met.
00:11:56Word was the Lord Commander was getting edgy, and no one wanted to be around Namat Jira
00:12:01when that happened.
00:12:04Sonica pulled his glare-shields back on.
00:12:06He was a lithe, slender man of forty-two years' standard, though he could pass for twenty-five.
00:12:14He had a striking angular head, with hard cheek and jaw-lines, a pointed chin, and a
00:12:19generous full-lipped mouth full of gleaming white teeth that women found especially attractive.
00:12:27Like all of them his skin had bronzed in the Nerthine light.
00:12:31He made a signal, and his bacheurs brought the troops in along the rim of the wadi and
00:12:36down into the dry basins beyond.
00:12:39Geno Armour followed them, bounding along on their treads and spewing wakes of red dust
00:12:44behind them as they churned out across the basin floor.
00:12:48Sonica's Centaur was waiting, its engine revving, but he waved it on.
00:12:54This was a time for walking.
00:12:57There was half an hour of daylight left.
00:13:00Night, they had learned to their cost, belonged to the Nerthine.
00:13:06Sonica hoped to run his troop as far as the forward command post at C.R. 23 before they
00:13:10lost the light.
00:13:12The last tangle with the Nerthine had slowed their advance considerably.
00:13:16Dislodging them from this country was like pulling out splinters.
00:13:22Sonica's troops looked very fine as they strode forwards.
00:13:25The Geno Uniform was a bulky, tight-buckled body-glove of studded leather and armour links,
00:13:31with a waist-length cape of yellow murdocaxi, a terran silk much rougher and more hard-wearing
00:13:37than the pink silks of the Nerthine.
00:13:41The ornate leather armour was marked with devices and trimmed with fur, and the backs
00:13:46of their capes were richly embroidered with company emblems and motifs.
00:13:51They carried lightweight packs, munition slings, long-sword bayonets, and the bottles of their
00:13:57double-water rations, which clinked against the lichnite cylinders they had all been issued
00:14:02with.
00:14:03Standard weapons were laser carbines and RPG sowers, but some men lugged fire-poles or
00:14:09support cannons.
00:14:12They were all big men, all genic-bred, and selected for muscle.
00:14:18Sonica was slight compared to most.
00:14:21Their headgear was spiked helms, either silvered steel or glossy orange, often edged with brims
00:14:28of fur or neck-veils of beaded laces.
00:14:33The glare-shields were goggle-eyed, bulbous, paired hemispheres of orange metal with black
00:14:39slits across them.
00:14:42Sonica's troop was coded the Dancers, a name that they had owned for almost eight hundred
00:14:47years.
00:14:48In those last few minutes of daylight the Dancers were going to take the worst beating
00:14:53they had ever known.
00:14:56"'So who's that?' asked Bronzy, quietly.
00:15:01"'Do you know?'
00:15:03Bashaw Chay, busy with the wrapper of a ration, shrugged.
00:15:08"'Some kind of something,' he grunted.
00:15:11"'You're a world of use.
00:15:14You know that,' Bronzy replied, punching Chay in the arm.
00:15:17Never sure of the regimental uterine stock, and considerably bigger in all measurements
00:15:22than Bronzy, gave his Hetman a tired look.
00:15:26"'Some kind of specialist,' they said, he volunteered.
00:15:31"'Who said?'
00:15:32"'The Uxor's aides.'
00:15:35The Jokers had reached the CR.23 forward command-post about an hour earlier, and had been billeted
00:15:41in the eastern wing of the old brick-built fort.
00:15:45Fort Referent 23 was a Nerthene outpost captured two weeks before, and lay just eight kilometres
00:15:51from the Tell.
00:15:53It formed part of the noose that Lord Commander Namatjira was tightening around the enemy
00:15:59city.
00:16:00Hurtado Bronzy, a sixty-year veteran possessed of boundless charisma and a stocky body going
00:16:08to seed, leaned out of the billet doorway and took another deliberate stare along the
00:16:13red-brick passageway.
00:16:16At the far end, where it opened out into a central courtyard, he could see the newcomer
00:16:21standing in conversation with Honan Moo and some of her aides.
00:16:26The newcomer was a big fellow—really big—a giant, dressed in a dust-grey male sleeve,
00:16:33and a head-shawl with a soot-dulled bolter slung over his shoulder.
00:16:38"'He's a sizeable fugger, though,' said Bronzy, idly toying with the small gold box dangling
00:16:44on the chain around his neck.
00:16:46"'Don't stare so,' Che advised, gnawing on his bar.
00:16:51"'I'm just saying.
00:16:53Bigger than you, even.'
00:16:55"'Stop staring.'
00:16:56"'He's only where I happen to be aiming my eyes, Che,' Bronzy said.
00:17:04Something was going on.
00:17:06Somebody had a feeling in his water.
00:17:09Something had been going on for the last few days.
00:17:12Uxor Honan was unusually tight-lipped, and had been unavailable on several occasions.
00:17:19The man was big.
00:17:22He towered over Honan, though everyone towered over her.
00:17:26Even so, he had to be two-twenty, two-twenty-five, maybe.
00:17:31That was gene-build big.
00:17:34A star-tee is big, even.
00:17:38Honan was looking up at him, craning up, nodding once in a while at a conversation Bronzy couldn't
00:17:44catch.
00:17:45Despite the fact that she was conferring with a giant, Honan's posture was as tenacious
00:17:50as ever, spiky and fierce, like a fighting cock, full of vigour and attitude.
00:17:56Bronzy had long suspected Uxor Honan's body-language was a compensation for her doll-like physique.
00:18:03Bronzy looked back into the billet hall.
00:18:07His jokers were busy sacking out, drinking and eating, playing bones.
00:18:12Some of them were cleaning off weapons or polishing armour scoots, wiping away the red
00:18:17dust that had slowly caked on during the long day in the field.
00:18:22Think I might go for a little stroll, Bronzy told Che.
00:18:28The bashoor, munching, simply stared down at the Hetman's feet.
00:18:32Bronzy was still fully armoured, but he'd taken off his boots when they'd arrived.
00:18:37His thick, dirty toes splayed out through the holes in his woolen socks.
00:18:42"'Not cutting a dash?' Bronzy asked.
00:18:46Che shrugged.
00:18:48"'Well, thuggit!'
00:18:50Bronzy pulled off his embroidered cape, his webbing and his weapon belt, and dumped them
00:18:55on the baked earth floor.
00:18:57He kept hold of his water bottles.
00:18:59"'I just need a refill,' he said.
00:19:04Bronzy padded out into the passageway, his water bottles dangling from his pudgy fingers.
00:19:09He was disappointed to see that the Giant had vanished.
00:19:13The Uxor and her aides were heading away across the courtyard, talking together.
00:19:18Honan turned as Bronzy wandered into the yard.
00:19:22The air was still warm, and the day's heat was radiating out of the shadowed brick.
00:19:28Something had washed the sky overhead a dark, resiny purple.
00:19:33"'Hetman Bronzy!
00:19:36Was there something you wanted?' she called.
00:19:38The words came pinging out of her mouth like tiny chips of ice.
00:19:43Bronzy smiled back amiably, and waggled the empty water bottles.
00:19:47"'Going to the pump,' he said.
00:19:51Uxor Honan pushed through her waiting aides and came towards him.
00:19:56She was such a tiny thing, built like a girl-child, compact and slight.
00:20:02She wore a black body-glove and a grey wrap, and walked on heeled slippers, which served
00:20:07only to emphasise her lack of stature.
00:20:10Her face was oval, her pursed mouth small, and her skin so very black.
00:20:16Her eyes seemed huge.
00:20:20At twenty-three she was exceptionally young, given her level of responsibility, but that
00:20:25was often the way with Uxors.
00:20:28Bronzy had a bit of a thing for her, so perfect, so delicate, so much power emanating from
00:20:35her tiny frame.
00:20:37"'Going to the pump?' she asked, switching from Low Gothic to Edessan.
00:20:42She often did that.
00:20:44She made a habit of speaking to the men one on one in their native tongues.
00:20:49Bronzy supposed these displays of linguistic skill were meant to seem cordial, while emphasising
00:20:55her formidable intelligence.
00:20:58Where Bronzy came from—Edessa, funnily enough—that was called showing off.
00:21:04He switched with her.
00:21:06"'For water.
00:21:07I'm out.'
00:21:09"'Water-rationing was done earlier, Hetman,' she said.
00:21:12"'I think that's just an excuse to be nosy.'
00:21:17Bronzy made what he hoped was a lovable shrug.
00:21:20"'You know me,' he said.
00:21:23"'That's why I think you're being nosy,' Honan said.'
00:21:28They stared at one another.
00:21:30Her enormous eyes slowly travelled down to his stockinged feet.
00:21:34He saw her fighting a smile.
00:21:37The trick with Honan was to appeal to her sense of humour.
00:21:41That was why he'd left his boots off.
00:21:44Bronzy tried to hold his stomach in and still look natural.
00:21:48"'Hard, isn't it?' she smirked.
00:21:52"'What's that now?'
00:21:54"'Holding that gut of yours in.'
00:21:57"'I don't know what you mean, Aksor,' he replied.
00:22:01Honan nodded.
00:22:02"'And I don't know why we keep you around, Hetman Bronzy,' she remarked.
00:22:07"'Isn't there a mandatory fitness requirement any more?'
00:22:12"'Or a weight threshold,' suggested one of her aides, four blonde teenage girls who
00:22:18gathered around Honan with wry smiles on their faces.
00:22:22"'Oh, you may mock me,' Bronzy said.
00:22:25"'We may,' agreed one of the aides.
00:22:28"'I'm still the best field officer you've got.'
00:22:32Honan frowned.
00:22:34"'There's some truth in that.
00:22:36Don't be nosy, Hurtado.
00:22:38You'll be told what you need to know soon enough.'
00:22:42"'A specialist?'
00:22:44Honan shot a questioning glance side-long at her aides.
00:22:48She reached out to them with her sept, too.
00:22:52They all looked away, recoiling from the touch of the scolding sept, concentrating on other
00:22:57things.
00:22:58"'Some one's been talking,' Honan announced.
00:23:03"'A specialist, then?'
00:23:06Bronzy pressed.
00:23:07"'As I said,' Honan answered, turning her attention back to him.
00:23:11"'Yeah, yeah, I know,' said Bronzy, rattling his water-bottles together as he gestured.
00:23:17"'I'll know when I know.'
00:23:21"'Get your men settled,' she told him, and turned to go.
00:23:25"'Are the dancers in?' he asked.
00:23:29"'The dancers?'
00:23:30"'They should be in by now.
00:23:33Petto owes me a pay-out on a wager.
00:23:35Are they here yet?'
00:23:37Her eyes narrowed.
00:23:38"'No, Hurtado, not yet.
00:23:42We're expecting them soon.'
00:23:43"'Oh,' he said, "'then I request permission to take a foray team out, on a ramble, to
00:23:50find out what's keeping them.'
00:23:52"'Your loyalty to your friend does you credit, Hurtado, but permission is not granted.'
00:23:58"'It'll be dark soon.'
00:24:01"'It will.
00:24:02That's why I don't want you rambling around out there.'
00:24:06Bronzy nodded.
00:24:07"'Are we clear on that?
00:24:09No clever or ingenious misinterpretations of that order forming in your mind this time?'
00:24:16Bronzy shook his head.
00:24:18"'As if.'
00:24:19"'There'd better not be.
00:24:23Good-night, Hetman.'
00:24:24"'Good-night, Uxor.'
00:24:27Honan clicked away on her heels, sending out a command with her sept.
00:24:31Her aides paused for a moment, scowling at Bronzy, and then followed her.
00:24:37"'Yeah, stare at me all you like, you blonde bitches,' Bronzy murmured.
00:24:44He padded back to the billet.
00:24:46"'Jay!'
00:24:47"'Yes, Het.
00:24:49Get a foray team up and ready in ten minutes.'
00:24:52Jay sighed at him.
00:24:54"'Is this sanctioned, Het?' he asked.
00:24:58"'Absolutely.
00:24:59The Uxor told me personally that she doesn't want some fuck-fingered ramble blundering
00:25:04around out there, so tell the boys it's going to have to be sharp and professional, which
00:25:10will make a change for them.'
00:25:11"'Not a ramble?'
00:25:13"'I never ramble.
00:25:16Sharp, Jay, and professional.
00:25:18Got it?'
00:25:19"'Yes, sir.'
00:25:21Bronzy pulled on his boots and redressed his weapon-belt.
00:25:24He realised he needed to take a leak.
00:25:26"'Five minutes,' he told the Bashor.
00:25:30He found the latrine, a stinking cement pit down the hall, unbuckled his armour, and sighed
00:25:37as his bladder emptied.
00:25:40Nearby men were showering in the communal air-baths, and he could hear singing from
00:25:44one of the other troop-billets.
00:25:46"'You'll stay put to-night,' said a voice from behind him.
00:25:54Bronzy tensed.
00:25:56The voice was quiet and hard, small yet powerful, like the super-gravity coal of a dead sun.
00:26:04"'I think I'll finish what I'm doing, actually,' he replied, deliberately not looking around,
00:26:11and deliberately keeping a tone of levity in his voice.
00:26:15"'You will stay put to-night.
00:26:19No fun and games.
00:26:21No bending the rules.
00:26:24Are we clear?'
00:26:27Bronzy buckled up and turned.
00:26:29The specialist stood behind him.
00:26:33Bronzy slowly adjusted his stance until he was looking up at the man's face.
00:26:38"'Terror!' he was huge.
00:26:41A monster of a man.
00:26:43The specialist's features were hidden in the shadows of his dust-shawl.
00:26:48"'Is that a threat?'
00:26:49Bronzy asked.
00:26:51"'Does someone like me need to threaten someone like you?'
00:26:56the specialist replied.
00:26:58Bronzy narrowed his eyes.
00:27:00He was a lot of things, but Timid wasn't one of them.
00:27:05"'Come on, then, if you want some.'
00:27:08The specialist chuckled.
00:27:11"'I really admire your balls, Hetman.'
00:27:15"'They were only out because I was taking a leak,' said Bronzy.
00:27:20"'Bronzy, right.
00:27:22I've heard about you.
00:27:24More bare-faced cheek in you than all the arses in the Imperial Army.'
00:27:29Bronzy couldn't help but grin, though his pulse was racing.
00:27:34"'I could mess you up, son.
00:27:36I really could.'
00:27:38"'You could try,' said the specialist.
00:27:42"'I would, you know.'
00:27:44"'Yes, I have a feeling you might.
00:27:48"'Don't.
00:27:49I'd hate to damage a friend.
00:27:52Let me be clear.
00:27:54There are things going on tonight that you must not mess with.
00:27:58Don't let me down by pissing around.
00:28:00Don't get involved.
00:28:03You'll understand soon enough.
00:28:06For now, right now, Hetman, take my word on this.'
00:28:12Bronzy kept his stare going.
00:28:15"'I might—I might trust you, if I could see your face, or know your name.'
00:28:24The specialist paused.
00:28:26For a moment Bronzy thought he was actually going to pull down his shawl and show his face.
00:28:31"'I'll tell you my name,' he said.
00:28:34"'Yeah?'
00:28:35"'My name is Alpharius.'
00:28:39Bronzy blinked.
00:28:40His mouth went dry.
00:28:42He felt his heart pounding so fast it trembled his torso.
00:28:47"'Liar!
00:28:48You liar!
00:28:50That's a pile of crap!'
00:28:52A sudden brilliant flash made the chamber blink white for a second.
00:28:56A deep reverberative boom reached them.
00:28:59Bronzy ran to one of the slit windows.
00:29:01Outside, in the dark, he could see the flashes and light blooms of a major battle flaring behind the ridge.
00:29:07The percussive crump and slap of explosions rolled in.
00:29:10One hell of a firefight had just kicked off along the waddy rim, less than ten kilometres away from the post.
00:29:17It was concussive, bending the air, bending sound.
00:29:22Behind Bronzy, men were rushing up, scrabbling around the windows to see out.
00:29:27There was chatter and agitation.
00:29:31Everyone wanted a look.
00:29:33"'Peto!'
00:29:34Hurtado Bronzy murmured.
00:29:36He turned away from the window slit and the rippling light show,
00:29:40pushing his way back through the mob of men to find the Specialist.
00:29:45But the Specialist had already vanished.
00:29:50The world had come off its hinges.
00:29:53For the first few seconds, Peto Sonica thought his company had been caught up in some sort of freak hailstorm.
00:30:00Thousands of luminous projectiles were raining down out of the twilight into the basin,
00:30:05like spits of fire or a cloudburst of little shooting stars.
00:30:10Every one exploded in a searing fireball as it impacted.
00:30:15The overpressure was knocking men to the ground.
00:30:18Sonica reeled as fiery detonations went off all around him,
00:30:23like grenades.
00:30:24The bang of the first few impacts had deafened him.
00:30:28He saw men thrown, burning, into the air by blooming flashes.
00:30:32He saw three of his company's tanks quiver and then explode in wickering storms of shrapnel fragments
00:30:38as the sizzling pyrophoric deluge struck them.
00:30:43It wasn't a freak hailstorm.
00:30:45Despite the dancers' scouts and recon, despite their Orspex and Modar,
00:30:50despite their careful deployment and marching cover,
00:30:54despite the omniscient monitoring of the expedition fleet in high orbit,
00:30:59the Nerthene had surprised them.
00:31:02The Nerthene were of a tech level several points down the scale from the Imperium.
00:31:08They possessed guns and tanks, but still favoured blades.
00:31:12They should have been easy to overrun.
00:31:16But from the opening actions of the expedition war,
00:31:18it had become clear that the Nerthene had something else,
00:31:22something the Imperium entirely lacked.
00:31:26Lord Commander Teng Namatjira had described it in a moment of infuriation as
00:31:32Air Magic.
00:31:34The name had, perhaps unfortunately, stuck.
00:31:38Air Magic was why Nerth had held off the might of an Imperial Army expedition for eight months.
00:31:45Air Magic was why a Titan cohort had been decimated at Tel Kortek.
00:31:50Air Magic was why a 6th Torrent Division had disappeared into the desert sink at Gomanzi
00:31:56and never returned.
00:31:58Air Magic was why nothing flew above Tel Utan,
00:32:02why every attempt to destroy the place with airstrikes, missiles, orbital bombardments,
00:32:07and troop drops had failed,
00:32:10and why they were being forced to assault the place on foot.
00:32:15It was Peto Sonica's first direct taste of Air Magic.
00:32:20All the horror stories that had leaked back from regiment to regiment and company to company
00:32:25were true.
00:32:27The Nerthene had law beyond the Terran range.
00:32:31The Elements obeyed them.
00:32:33They were casters-in of devils.
00:32:37A shockwave threw Sonica over on his face.
00:32:39He had blood in his mouth and sand up his nose.
00:32:43He rose on his hands and saw a Geno Trooper curled up beside him, blackened by heat, smouldering.
00:32:50In the rapid strobe light of multiple explosions, he saw other corpses scattered around him.
00:32:56The sand was burning.
00:32:58Bashor Lon came running out of the flashing air.
00:33:02He was yelling at Sonica.
00:33:04Sonica could see Lon's mouth working, but he heard nothing.
00:33:09Lon hauled Sonica to his feet.
00:33:11Sound was coming back, but only in short bursts.
00:33:15Get to the wi—
00:33:17Impossible!
00:33:18Lon yelled.
00:33:20What?
00:33:21What?
00:33:22Much up to the—
00:33:24Fucking idiots!
00:33:26The hail suddenly ceased.
00:33:28Blinking around at the devastation, Sonica heard snippets of the abrupt quiet, too.
00:33:35Blurts of crackling fire and the screams of men, cut up and mixed with baffling,
00:33:41numb seconds of profound deafness.
00:33:44Oh, fog!
00:33:46Lon cried, suddenly awfully audible.
00:33:49The Nerthene were on them.
00:33:52Nerthene infantry, called Ekvernerth, swarmed out of the shadows and pits of the enclosing night
00:33:58and poured into the firelight.
00:34:00Their swirling pink robes and silver armour shone in the flames.
00:34:05Their falxes whirled.
00:34:07Several of them carried aloft kite-tailed banners,
00:34:10showing the water-reed and river-reptile badge of the Nerthene royalty.
00:34:15The falx was an astonishingly proficient and barbarous weapon.
00:34:19Two and a half metres long, it was essentially a hybrid spear, a scythe straightened out.
00:34:26Half its length was a straight hand-grip, the other half a long blade with a slight
00:34:32bias hook, the inside curve of which was razor-sharp.
00:34:37Spinning and sweeping a falx like a flail,
00:34:40an expert Ekvernerth could lop off limbs and heads and even bisect torsos.
00:34:46The blades went through almost any metal.
00:34:49Only lich-knight could break the blades, but it was impossible to use it in combat.
00:34:55Lich-knight canisters came out when the fight was done,
00:34:59to neuter the fallen weapons of the enemy.
00:35:02A spray of liquid nitrogen froze the metal brittle, so that it could be shattered underfoot.
00:35:09Ekvernerth rushed at them from the ditches of the sink.
00:35:12The first dancers they met were scythed down by the long whirling blades like tall corn.
00:35:18Arms and heads flipped into the air, arterial blood squirted, truncated bodies fell like sacks.
00:35:25A few carbines fired, but it was hardly a proper reply.
00:35:29Sonika started running forwards.
00:35:32Wake up! Wake up! he howled.
00:35:34Gun them down! Use your guns! Don't let them in!
00:35:38They were in already.
00:35:40The night sand was littered with geno-corpses and body parts.
00:35:44There was a fine haze of blood in the warm air.
00:35:47Sonika could taste it.
00:35:50His hearing was back, and his ears were filled with the hiss and chop of butchery
00:35:55and the screams of his men.
00:35:57He kept running.
00:35:58He fired his carbine one-handed, drawing his sword bayonet in the other.
00:36:03An Ekvernerth ran at him, and Sonika blew his face off.
00:36:07The man cartwheeled backwards.
00:36:09A falx swung, and Sonika sidestepped, kicking its owner's feet out from under him,
00:36:14so that he fell on his back.
00:36:15Sonika ran the Nerthene through with his bayonet.
00:36:19He dropped on one knee, raised the carbine to his shoulder,
00:36:23its barrel resting on the fork of his blade grip,
00:36:26and picked off two more of the charging enemy with aimed shots.
00:36:30Their pink robes trailed out as they crashed backwards.
00:36:34Lon was beside Sonika, along with three other men, firing in sustained bursts.
00:36:40Their shots made bright darts in the air.
00:36:42Ekvernerth toppled and fell, one on fire, another with his ribcage blown wide.
00:36:49"'Dancers, dancers! This is the dancers!' Sonika yelled as he fired.
00:36:54"'CR-19! We need help here! Immediate! Major incursion!'
00:37:00"'Stand by, dancers,' he heard an Uxor's voice reply.
00:37:03"'We are aware. Retasking units to your position.'
00:37:07"'Now!' Sonika yelled.
00:37:09"'Now! We're being slaughtered!'
00:37:11One of the men beside him suddenly fell sideways, split in two from shoulder to groin.
00:37:17Pressurized blood escaped in all directions at once.
00:37:20Sonika wheeled and saw an Ekvernerth spinning his falx back from the blow to strike again.
00:37:26Sonika slashed with his sword bayonet in an attempt to block.
00:37:30The long blade of the falx, just a blur of blue metal in the violet twilight,
00:37:36went through Sonika's hand in a line across the base of the thumb,
00:37:40severing his fingers, his thumb, and the upper half of his palm,
00:37:43and snapping the grip of his sword bayonet.
00:37:46The blow was so clean that there was no pain at first.
00:37:50Sonika staggered backwards, watching the thin sprays of blood jetting out of his ruined hand.
00:37:57The falx circled again, tracing a glitter in the air.
00:38:01It did not land. Another falx blocked it.
00:38:05Blade struck blade, and the attacking falx shivered away.
00:38:10A dark figure slid into view and killed the Ekvernerth with a single explosive shot.
00:38:17The newcomer was a huge brute, done up in a dark male sleeve,
00:38:22his head and shoulders swathed in a shawl.
00:38:25He carried a falx in one hand and a bolt gun in the other.
00:38:30He looked down at Sonika.
00:38:32Courage, he said.
00:38:36Who are you? Sonika whispered.
00:38:39Lon had run to Sonika's side.
00:38:42Yet this man's hand bound, the big man told the Bashor.
00:38:46He turned back to the fight, rotating the falx expertly in his left hand like a baton.
00:38:52He wasn't alone.
00:38:54As Lon wrapped his hand, Sonika saw that a dozen anonymous men had entered the fight,
00:38:59coming out of the darkness like phantoms.
00:39:02Each one of them was inhumanly large,
00:39:06his face hooded in a desert shawl.
00:39:09Each one carried a bolter and a falx.
00:39:13They moved with a speed that was not human,
00:39:16and struck each blow with a force that was not human.
00:39:19In a matter of minutes, they had carved the heart out of the Ekvernerth attack.
00:39:24Their bolt guns roared and pumped like thunder,
00:39:27blowing pink silk and silver into blood-caked pieces.
00:39:32Astartes, Sonika gasped.
00:39:36Stay with me, Het, stay with me, Lon whispered.
00:39:41There, Astartes, Sonika said.
00:39:45You've lost a lot of blood, don't go to sleep on me.
00:39:50I won't, Sonika promised.
00:39:52Those men, those things, they're Astartes.
00:39:59Lon didn't answer.
00:40:01He was staring at the horizon.
00:40:04Holy terror, he whispered.
00:40:08Tell Yutan had caught fire.
00:40:14Honanmoo watched the city burn from an upper window of the CR23 post.
00:40:19Every once in a while, a building cooked off and blew out in a streamer of fire.
00:40:24Rising smoke hazed the clear night sky.
00:40:29Her aides winced and oohed at every snap of flame.
00:40:33She could feel their responses through her sept.
00:40:37She nodded finally.
00:40:40May I inform the Lord Commander?
00:40:44You may, said the specialist, waiting behind her.
00:40:48I will make a report to him personally, of course,
00:40:52but you should have the pleasure of transmitting this news to him first.
00:40:58Honan turned from the window.
00:41:01Thank you, and thank you for your work.
00:41:05Noth isn't done yet.
00:41:08There is much to do, the specialist told her.
00:41:12I understand.
00:41:13The specialist hesitated, as if he slightly doubted this.
00:41:18Our paths may not cross again, Aksor Honanmoo, the specialist said.
00:41:23There are two things I want to say.
00:41:26The Emperor protects, is one of them.
00:41:30The other is a word of admiration for the Geno V2.
00:41:34You have bred good soldiers in the finest genetic tradition.
00:41:38You ought to know that the old genic legacy of the Chileads
00:41:42was an inspiration the Emperor acknowledged in creating.
00:41:47Us.
00:41:49I didn't know that, said Honan, surprised.
00:41:53Ancient history, pre-unification, said the specialist.
00:41:58There's no reason you should.
00:42:00I must go now.
00:42:02It has been a pleasure making war with you, Aksor Honanmoo.
00:42:08And with you, though I still don't know your name.
00:42:13I am Alpha Legion, lady.
00:42:16Given your septive powers, I think you can guess it.
00:42:22The specialist left the post through the back halls,
00:42:25walking through shadow.
00:42:27He moved silently and quickly.
00:42:30Near the north gate he stopped in his tracks and turned slowly.
00:42:34Hello again, said Hurtado Bronzy,
00:42:38stepping out of the darkness with his carbine aimed at the specialist's chest.
00:42:42Het, my compliments.
00:42:46That was a genuine feat of stealth.
00:42:49Bronzy shrugged.
00:42:51I do what I do.
00:42:54Can I help you?
00:42:57I do hope so, said Bronzy.
00:43:01Does that thing have to be aimed at me?
00:43:04Well, I don't know.
00:43:06I feel a lot more comfortable like this.
00:43:09I want some answers.
00:43:12I have a feeling only Gunpoint is going to get them for me.
00:43:16Gunpoint will simply get you killed, Het.
00:43:20All you need to do is ask.
00:43:24Bronzy bit his lip.
00:43:27You've taken the tell, I see.
00:43:31Yes.
00:43:32Fancy work.
00:43:34Kudos to you.
00:43:36Did it have to cost so many lives?
00:43:39Meaning, asked the specialist.
00:43:43I heard the dancers got cut to ribbons tonight.
00:43:47Was that part of your plan?
00:43:50Yes, it was.
00:43:53Bronzy shook his head.
00:43:55Fug, you admit it.
00:43:58You used my friends as cannon fodder and—
00:44:01No, Het.
00:44:03I used them as bait.
00:44:06What?
00:44:07What?
00:44:08Bronzy's hands shook on the grip of the carbine.
00:44:11His finger tightened on the trigger until it found the biting point.
00:44:16Don't look so shocked.
00:44:18Life is all about secrets, and I'm prepared to share one with you.
00:44:25Honesty is the only really valuable currency.
00:44:29I'll tell you this truth on the understanding that you trust me.
00:44:37I can do that, said Bronzy.
00:44:41The Nerthine are quite toxic in their power.
00:44:45No conventional assault was going to break them.
00:44:48They are possessed by chaos.
00:44:51Though I don't expect you to know what that word really means.
00:44:55My men needed to get into Tellutan, and that meant forcing the Nerthine into a distraction.
00:45:01I regret that your friends the Dancers were the ideal choice, tactically speaking.
00:45:08They drew the main force of the Nerthine aside so we could enter Tellutan.
00:45:13I did ask my men to spare and protect as many of the Dancers as possible.
00:45:20That's honest, I suppose.
00:45:22Brutal.
00:45:23Callous.
00:45:25We live in a brutal, callous galaxy, Het.
00:45:28Like for like is the only way we can deal with it.
00:45:32We must make sacrifices, and no matter what others say, sacrifices always hurt.
00:45:41Bronzy sighed and lowered his weapon a little.
00:45:45Suddenly it wasn't in his hands any more.
00:45:48It was bouncing off the far wall, broken in two.
00:45:51Never aim a weapon at me again, said the Specialist.
00:45:57Suddenly in Bronzy's face, pinning him against the wall.
00:46:00I won't.
00:46:03Good.
00:46:04Are you really, Alpharius?
00:46:07Bronzy gasped, aware that his feet were swinging in the air.
00:46:11With his free hand, the Specialist pulled back his shawl and allowed Bronzy to look upon his face.
00:46:19What do you think?
00:46:21He asked.
00:46:22When Sonika woke up, flocks of Kazakh flyers were dropping into the flame-lit ruin of the Basin,
00:46:29wing-lamps flashing.
00:46:31The whole night was lit up by the burning doom of Tel Yutan.
00:46:37Sonika looked around, blearily.
00:46:40His hand hurt like a bitch.
00:46:43Air crews were bundling the walking wounded and the stretcher casualties up the ramps of the waiting ships.
00:46:48Sonika looked up at Lon.
00:46:53How many? he asked.
00:46:56Too many, said a voice.
00:47:00Three dark figures stood nearby, like a tragic chorus.
00:47:05They were silhouettes in the firelight, their bolters slung across their bodies,
00:47:09their shawls drawn up.
00:47:12Too many, Het, said one.
00:47:14We regret their loss, said the second.
00:47:20War requires sacrifices.
00:47:22A victory has been achieved, but we take no pleasure in your losses, said the third.
00:47:29You—you're Astartes, aren't you?
00:47:33Sonika asked, allowing Lon to help him to his feet.
00:47:37Yes, said one.
00:47:40Do you have names?
00:47:42Sonika asked.
00:47:44I am Alpharius, said the first.
00:47:48Sonika inhaled hard and dropped quickly to one knee, along with Lon and the other genomen.
00:47:55Lord, I—I am Alpharius, said the second figure.
00:48:02We are all Alpharius, said the third.
00:48:06We are Alpha Legion, and we are all one.
00:48:11They turned, and walked away into the billowing smoke.
00:48:18Chapter Two Visages, Nerth, Five Weeks Later
00:48:25They retired and spent the last of the summer at Visages,
00:48:29playing bones and other games, sitting out in the heat.
00:48:34Some of the men rode servitors off into the veld and hunted big game,
00:48:38while others broke the local livestock and raced them up and down in the dust.
00:48:44Visages was simply their name for it, officially called CR-345, or Telkat in the local dialect.
00:48:53It was a cluster of dwellings in a northern wadi, where the ground was littered with broken
00:48:59diorite heads, some were as large as tank-wheels, others as small as beads.
00:49:06No one knew who had carved the faces, or why they had done so, in so many contrasting scales,
00:49:13or why the sculptures had been smashed and the heads alone scattered as spoil.
00:49:19Nor did any one care.
00:49:22There was wine, sent as a reward for their pains by Namatjira,
00:49:26and peck in bountiful quantities, courtesy of the same source.
00:49:31They diced and raced and gambled, played spheristiki, laughed out their pain,
00:49:40and swam in the warm blue pools hidden in the cliff-face caves.
00:49:45Sonica's hand healed.
00:49:48Field-surgeons had cut back the wound and packed it with basal sensors and motor-plugs,
00:49:53so that it could later accept a machine graft.
00:49:57He flexed it every day and sensed fingers that had been, and would be again,
00:50:04interim phantom fingers.
00:50:07There was a rumour that the Nerth War was ending, and they would soon make shift for a new zone.
00:50:13Sonica didn't believe it.
00:50:16He sat around in the visage's billet with Dimitar Shiban,
00:50:20a Trinacrian-born het who had been injured in the same week as Petto.
00:50:25The flesh of Shiban's chest and neck was swollen and knotty with buried shrapnel.
00:50:31Like Sonica, he owned a deep hatred of the Nerthene's weaponised magic.
00:50:38"'I have been dreaming lately,' he said one day,
00:50:42as they sat around on an awning-covered terrace.
00:50:46"'In my dreams I hear a verse.'
00:50:50They had each sniffed a pinch of peck from the gold boxes around their necks,
00:50:54and Sonica was pouring wine from a gombroon-ware ewer.
00:50:59"'A verse, huh?' asked Sonica.
00:51:02"'I'll tell you how it goes, shall I?'
00:51:05"'You remember it, then?'
00:51:07"'Don't you remember your dreams, word for word?' Shiban asked.
00:51:13Sonica thought about it, then shook his head with a smile.
00:51:17"'Never,' he said.
00:51:20Shiban shrugged.
00:51:22"'Fancy that,' he said.
00:51:25"'This verse,' Sonica prompted, sitting back to sip his wine.
00:51:30"'That—oh, it goes—'
00:51:34"'From the hag and hungry goblin that into rags would rend ye,
00:51:40and the spirit that stands by the naked man in the book of moons defend ye.'
00:51:48Shiban broke into laughter as soon as he had finished his rendition.
00:51:52Sonica looked at him.
00:51:54"'I know that,' he said.
00:51:57"'You do?' chuckled Shiban.
00:51:59"'Really?'
00:52:00"'My mother used to sing it to me when I was a boy.
00:52:03She called it the Bedlam Song.
00:52:06There were other verses that I now forget.'
00:52:09"'Really?
00:52:11What does it mean?'
00:52:13Sonica shrugged.
00:52:14"'I have no idea.'
00:52:16Shiban's company was coded the Clowns, and their banner was a howling skull,
00:52:24clad in white and rouge vaudevillian grease-paint.
00:52:28Shiban had been hurt by a nerthine splinter-bomb during a waddy fight east of Tellutan,
00:52:34and he'd been obliged to leave the Clowns under the field command of his head bashoor,
00:52:38a man Sonica came to know as Fugging Strabo.
00:52:42As in,
00:52:43"'I hope that Fugging Strabo is keeping his head,'
00:52:47and
00:52:48"'Beloved terror, let Fugging Strabo not be getting my poor boys killed!'
00:52:54"'You worry too much, Dimmy,' Sonica told him.
00:52:58"'Oh, so you'd be happy leaving your troop in the hands of your bashoors, would you?'
00:53:03Sonica empathised.
00:53:05Due to the bad mauling the dancers had taken,
00:53:08the entire company had been retired to Visages, injured and healthy alike.
00:53:14Shiban, however, had been sent north with thirty or so wounded of his Clowns,
00:53:18the rest of the company deemed intact enough to continue operations.
00:53:23Sonica wondered how he would have felt if he'd been forced to leave the dancers with Lon.
00:53:30He trusted Lon with his life, Char, and Attix, too, all the dancer bashoors.
00:53:36Still he appreciated Shiban's edginess.
00:53:40They were sitting feet up under the awning in the late sun of an endless afternoon.
00:53:45They were playing the Head Game, a pastime of their own devising.
00:53:50A man ran up the dusty slope towards them,
00:53:53a Clown stripped to the waist, red-faced and sweating from too much exertion in the sun.
00:53:58He saluted in front of the two reclining officers.
00:54:02"'Sirs!'
00:54:03"'Hello, Jed,' said Shiban.
00:54:06"'Let's see it!'
00:54:07The Clown, Jed, held out a diorite head.
00:54:11It was chipped and incomplete, about the size of a grapefruit.
00:54:16Sonica really missed grapefruit.
00:54:20Shiban looked at Sonica.
00:54:22Sonica raised a considering eyebrow.
00:54:26"'Put it in place, Jed,' Shiban invited.
00:54:29The Clown walked across the hot sand in front of the awning,
00:54:33panting hard and bent down over the line of heads laid out in the sun.
00:54:38They were arranged in graduating size—seed and pea-sized at one end,
00:54:43fist and apple-sized at the other.
00:54:46The head Jed had brought was clearly the largest.
00:54:49He set it down triumphantly at the end of the row.
00:54:53"'Point, Clowns!' said Shiban.
00:54:57Sonica nodded graciously.
00:55:00"'Get a cup, Jed,' said Shiban, and the Clown ran off eagerly
00:55:03to help himself to the cold wine on the stand behind them.
00:55:07Shiban took a pinch from his gold box, sniffed, and sat back.
00:55:13He sighed.
00:55:15"'The low's good,' he said.
00:55:17"'But I miss the combat fix.'
00:55:21Sonica nodded.
00:55:22"'Shiban had a face like a monkey,
00:55:25with a long brow, a long upper lip, and a button nose.
00:55:29His tanned forehead was high, and his long white hair
00:55:33poured down off the back of his head like a cascade.
00:55:36The shrapnel bumps covering his throat and chest
00:55:39were the sort of thing a man couldn't ignore.
00:55:43The warty mass was quite fascinating.
00:55:47The medics had drained and lanced some of them,
00:55:49but the rest, they had advised, would work out in time.
00:55:54He looked like he had a goiter of blisters.'
00:55:59As he had told it to Sonica, Shiban had surprised
00:56:02a Nerthine war-party in the business of planting bombs.
00:56:06During the fire-fight that had resulted,
00:56:08the Nerthine had set the bombs off,
00:56:10killing themselves and wounding Shiban and his men.
00:56:14Some of that shrapnel was organic.
00:56:18Some of it was Nerthine bone.
00:56:22"'I hear there's fighting at Mon-Lau,' Shiban said.
00:56:26"'I heard that too,' said Sonica.
00:56:30Another man ran up.
00:56:31It was Olmed, a dancer.
00:56:33He held out the head he was carrying.
00:56:37"'Place it,' said Sonica.
00:56:39Olmed took it to the line.
00:56:41His diorite head was bigger than any of them,
00:56:44except the one the clown had just placed.
00:56:47"'Adjudication,' Shiban called.
00:56:52The munitorum aide emerged from the cool gloom of the doorway
00:56:56in the terracotta building behind them,
00:56:58a long-suffering look on his face.
00:57:01The Hetman had been calling him outside all afternoon.
00:57:05This time he brought the digital measure without being told.
00:57:10"'Again with this, sirs?' he asked.
00:57:13Shiban waggled his fingers at the row of heads.
00:57:17"'My dear friend, we value your impartial judgment.'
00:57:22The aide trudged out into the sunlight,
00:57:24and applied the measure to the heads,
00:57:26while Olmed stood, breathing hard,
00:57:28watching, his torso gleaming with sweat.
00:57:32The aide straightened up and turned to face the Hetman,
00:57:35reclining side by side in the shade.
00:57:38"'Oh, don't keep us in suspense,' Sonica said.
00:57:41"'The head is smaller by eight microns than the head at the line end,'
00:57:47the aide sighed.
00:57:48"'But it is larger by two microns than the one behind it.'
00:57:54Olmed punched the air and did a little victory dance.
00:57:58Shiban tutted.
00:58:00Sonica grinned.
00:58:02"'Point dances,' he said.
00:58:05"'Olmed, do the honours.'
00:58:08Olmed nestled his diorite head into position at the head of the line,
00:58:12picked up the head Jed had brought,
00:58:14and threw it, with all his strength, out into the open field below them,
00:58:18where it was immediately lost again amongst millions of its kind.
00:58:24"'Help yourself to a cup,' Sonica told Olmed.
00:58:27He glanced at Shiban.
00:58:30"'Sundown in, what, eighty minutes?'
00:58:33"'Everything still to play for,' Shiban replied confidently.
00:58:38"'I think,' said a voice from behind them,
00:58:42"'you have far too much time on your hands.'
00:58:46Sonica leapt up from his canvas recliner.
00:58:49Her tardo bronzy stood in the shadow of the awning, smiling at him.
00:58:54"'Hurty, you old bastard!' Sonica cried, embracing his friend.
00:58:59"'What the hell are you doing here?'
00:59:01"'A matter of twenty crowns, and interest growing,'
00:59:05bronzy replied, grinning.
00:59:08"'This is Dimmie Shiban,' Sonica laughed,
00:59:10gesturing across at his companion, who was rising to his feet.
00:59:14"'I know Dimmie Shiban,' bronzy said,
00:59:17embracing the clown-het and slapping his back.
00:59:20"'Xantium, eh?'
00:59:22"'I seem to recall you being there,' said Shiban.
00:59:26"'How you do, you fat fugger!'
00:59:29"'Well, well!'
00:59:31"'Have some wine,' Sonica offered.
00:59:34"'Oh, all right,' bronzy replied.
00:59:37His armour was caked in dust.
00:59:39He yanked off his cape and his webbing, and sat down.
00:59:43"'So, this game, it has rules?'
00:59:47"'Many, many rules,' said Shiban.
00:59:50"'And there's money at stake?'
00:59:53"'Money and wine,' said Sonica, pouring a glass for his old friend.
00:59:58"'Two teams,' said Shiban.
01:00:00"'Clowns and dancers, five men each side.
01:00:03They scour the fields and bring back heads.
01:00:06The heads go in a line by size.
01:00:09Retrievers win a cup of wine for each head.
01:00:12Incentive, you see.
01:00:14Sundown ends the game.
01:00:17Team with the largest head in the row wins.'
01:00:21"'So just get your boys to roll in one of those big buggers,'
01:00:25bronzy said, pointing at the boulder-sized heads resting in the sand a hundred metres away.
01:00:30"'Game over!'
01:00:32"'Ah, but this is a game of finesse,' Sonica said.
01:00:37"'Really?' bronzy smiled, sipping from his wine-cup.
01:00:41Shiban nodded.
01:00:43"'If a team brings in a head that is demonstrably smaller than the largest, but
01:00:48larger than the next in line, the larger head gets thrown out.
01:00:54A very broad grin spread across bronzy's face.
01:00:57"'A game of finesse, indeed.
01:01:01Who's winning?'
01:01:02"'I am,' said Sonica.
01:01:05Bronzy took out his purse.
01:01:07"'Four crowns on Shiban by sundown,' he said."
01:01:13Sonica won that day's head-game in the very last minutes before dark, when Bashor Lon
01:01:19casually wandered in with a head that displaced the clown's latest triumph.
01:01:25Lon bent his back and cast the clown's usurped head back out into the field,
01:01:30where it had been found.
01:01:32Bronzy lost his four crowns.
01:01:35According to the rules of the game, Shiban bought wine for both teams.
01:01:41"'So what are you really doing here, Hurt?' Sonica asked later on.
01:01:45"'Let me see that hand of yours,' Bronzy replied, and studied Sonica's wound as it was displayed.
01:01:52"'H'm. You'll be good.
01:01:56"'Hurtado, I asked you a question.'
01:01:59"'I got a furlough,' Bronzy said, sitting back in the still of the evening.
01:02:04The air went cold very suddenly after dark, on earth closing in like lapping black water.
01:02:11They huddled in around the lamps and the peat-fired heaters.
01:02:17"'Five-day pass, signed by Uxor Honan herself. Just wanted to come check on you.'
01:02:24"'That's not it,' said Sonica.
01:02:26"'Why's that not it?'
01:02:29Sonica smiled, and waved to Lon to bring them a fresh bottle.
01:02:33"'Since when did Hurtado Bronzy not have a secret agenda, huh?'
01:02:38"'You wound me, Pettoe, you wound me. Can't I come here selflessly to look up an old friend
01:02:46and enquire of his welfare?'
01:02:49Sonica stared at him, a wry smile on his face, waiting for the punch-line.
01:02:54"'All right,' Bronzy admitted.
01:02:57"'There was something else.'
01:03:00"'Excuse me, Het,' a voice cut in.
01:03:03"'They looked up. A munitorum aide, the very same aide whose time and patience they had abused
01:03:10so thoroughly during the afternoon's game, was standing beside them.'
01:03:14"'Yes?' asked Sonica.
01:03:16"'The staff-medicay apologises for this interruption, sir.
01:03:20There is a dead dancer she would like you to identify.'
01:03:25"'Kazovac had brought the corpse to the cold-store at the far end of the visage's camp.
01:03:31The cold-store was a long mud-brick building throbbing with refrigeration units.
01:03:37Sonica and Bronzy wandered up in the chilly dark,
01:03:40aware of the stars draping overhead like dust on a desert shawl.
01:03:46The frozen stiff bodies of Geno Dead were piled up inside like firewood.
01:03:52Each one was wrapped in a plastic shroud.
01:03:55Pairs of bare, pallid feet stuck out of the ends of the stacked shrouds,
01:04:01decorated with tow-tag labels.
01:04:04The Hets walked in past them, ignoring the gross stink of embalming chemicals.
01:04:10The corpse in question was waiting for them in the next room.
01:04:14Not yet preserved, it was laid out on a stainless-steel gurney,
01:04:18with drip-trays slotted in to catch the noxious seep.
01:04:22It had been dead in the desert for several weeks, and it had bloated.
01:04:27The face was lost in one raw black graze.
01:04:32The uniform frayed and faded,
01:04:34the torso limp and slack where gut gas had previously bloated it.
01:04:40Sonica and Bronzy stood in the chilly light, and shivered as they regarded it.
01:04:47That's no dancer I know, said Sonica.
01:04:50His words made smoke in the sub-zero air.
01:04:54Oh, but he's certainly one of yours, Het, the staffed Medicae insisted.
01:04:59Medicae Ida was a tall woman, wearing a long surgical gown,
01:05:03the apron front of which was smeared with stains.
01:05:07She'd been a combat Uxor in her youth,
01:05:10but age and experience had seen her graduate to the Medicae branch
01:05:14as her perceptive skills dulled.
01:05:17Bronzy wondered if Ida missed her Uxorhood,
01:05:20missed her command of geno-men.
01:05:24It seemed so, from her tone.
01:05:28He's not, Sonica insisted, peering down at the corpse.
01:05:32Well, I don't know how you can tell that, sir, Ida said.
01:05:36His face is missing.
01:05:39He'd know, said Bronzy.
01:05:43Where was he found, Sonica asked,
01:05:45placing a hand on the corpse's wax-cold shoulder.
01:05:49A surgical cloth had been spread over the abdomen
01:05:51to obscure the ravages of the autopsy.
01:05:55The tell-you-tan waddy, Medicae Ida replied.
01:06:00Sonica shook his head.
01:06:02He's not one of mine.
01:06:03I'm not missing anyone.
01:06:05The lists were in weeks ago.
01:06:08But he is wearing dancer insignia, Ida insisted.
01:06:12Here, the collar-pins, and here, the brooch, she pointed.
01:06:17He is dressed as a dancer.
01:06:20Have you tissue-mapped him?
01:06:21Sonica asked.
01:06:23Not yet, Ida admitted.
01:06:26Then you'll see the truth.
01:06:28This isn't one of my men.
01:06:31Senior Medicae Ida sighed.
01:06:34I know that, Het.
01:06:36I just wanted to confirm it before I—
01:06:39Before you what?
01:06:41Bronzy demanded.
01:06:43Before I alert the Chiliad Uxors.
01:06:46Hetman Sonica, is there any reason you can think of why one of your men would have
01:06:51no heart?
01:06:53What?
01:06:55No heart, Ida repeated emphatically.
01:06:59What the fuck did he have in there, then?
01:07:02Bronzy asked, nodding at the corpse's covered chest.
01:07:06Acadmium centrifuge, replied Senior Medicae Ida gently.
01:07:11The subject has undergone some extreme and non-standard organ modification.
01:07:15His liver was—well, I've never seen anything like it.
01:07:21What is going on here? asked Sonica.
01:07:25I don't know, Ida replied.
01:07:28I was hoping you might.
01:07:30There's something else, she added.
01:07:33She pulled back the surgical cloth.
01:07:36For a moment all they could see was the scissor-snapped sternum and the
01:07:41splayed ribs caked black with blood.
01:07:44Here, she said, pointing.
01:07:47On the dead flesh of the corpse's hip there was a small brand partially
01:07:52obliterated by a shrapnel puncture.
01:07:55What is that? asked Sonica, squinting at it.
01:07:59Is that a snake?
01:08:02Maybe, said Bronzy, bending down to look for himself.
01:08:05A snake or some kind of reptile?
01:08:10Sonica told the Medicae to place a guard on the corpse and send someone
01:08:16to wake up the post-commander.
01:08:18He went back outside with Bronzy.
01:08:21Insurgent? Sonica asked.
01:08:24Bronzy nodded.
01:08:26Has to be. That mark.
01:08:29Sonica didn't reply.
01:08:32Crocodilia and other forms of aggressive reptile were the most
01:08:36persistently recurring of all nerthine emblems.
01:08:41Have they the art to change a man inside like that?
01:08:45Bronzy asked.
01:08:47I don't know, Sonica replied, but since that night outside Tellutan,
01:08:51I could believe them capable of anything.
01:08:55Bronzy wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
01:08:58Listen, Pettoe, the reason I came here today, it's about that night.
01:09:04I wanted you to know that I didn't hang you out to dry.
01:09:08I never thought you did hurt.
01:09:11Really, though, I was all for taking a force out to support you.
01:09:15I was warned off.
01:09:17I can imagine, said Sonica.
01:09:20Bronzy looked at him strangely.
01:09:23What does that mean?
01:09:25Sonica walked a few steps away and stared out into the great bowl of
01:09:29the moonlit desert.
01:09:32Sky and land alike, both dark, had a sheen across them, a haze
01:09:38produced by airborne dust.
01:09:40My men were used as a tactical sacrifice to break Tellutan open.
01:09:47Lon and a few others know, but I've told them to stay tight-lipped.
01:09:51I've kept the information quiet for reasons of morale.
01:09:55How do you know this? asked Bronzy.
01:09:58Because the men who sacrificed us told me to my face, said Sonica.
01:10:04And me? Bronzy replied.
01:10:07You saw them, then?
01:10:09The specialists.
01:10:12The Alpha Legion, said Sonica.
01:10:15He looked at Bronzy.
01:10:17So many stories over the years, and then to meet them, the most
01:10:23secret and cunning of all the Astartes.
01:10:27I was this close to him, Bronzy said, as close as I am to you.
01:10:32He warned me off and told me why, and then told me to keep my
01:10:35mouth shut about the whole thing.
01:10:37Who?
01:10:39Alpharius.
01:10:41Sonica smiled.
01:10:43They were all called Alpharius Hurt.
01:10:46Bronzy shook his head.
01:10:48This was the Primarch, Pettoe.
01:10:50I swear it.
01:10:51I saw his face.
01:10:54I believe you, said Sonica.
01:10:56Terror!
01:10:57But what kind of war are we fighting here?
01:11:01A war of lies and disguise and dissembling, Bronzy answered.
01:11:06Why else would that Legion be involved?
01:11:11I'm not entirely sure of the significance, said Kozlov, the
01:11:16post-commander.
01:11:17He was a brigadier in one of the Crimean support regiments,
01:11:21charged with running the campaign's rear party operations.
01:11:25Neither are we, said Bronzy.
01:11:27But the fact remains that we have the body of an unidentified
01:11:30combatant showing signs of non-standard anatomical work,
01:11:34and a brand mark like a reptile.
01:11:37We know that subversive and covert tactics are being
01:11:40employed in this zone, said Sonica.
01:11:43How do you know that?
01:11:45asked Kozlov.
01:11:46That's classified, Bronzy said carefully.
01:11:51If the Nerthene have infiltrated our companies, High Command
01:11:55needs to know about it, Sonica went on.
01:11:57The body needs to be examined so that others like it can be
01:12:01identified.
01:12:02This could break the war man.
01:12:04This could be one of the key reasons those devils have us on
01:12:07the back foot all the time.
01:12:09Kozlov took a deep breath and stood up behind his camp desk.
01:12:14The habitant was sparsely equipped and lit only by a pair of
01:12:17lumen packs.
01:12:20Far be it from me to argue with two front-line heads, he said.
01:12:25What do we do?
01:12:28Sonica and Bronzy agreed that Honan Mu was the first point of
01:12:32contact.
01:12:33If infiltration was widespread, they had to tread carefully.
01:12:37They had to start with someone they knew they could trust.
01:12:40Someone, as Bronzy pointed out, who had dealt with the
01:12:43specialists and therefore understood the gravity of the
01:12:46matter.
01:12:48Kozlov granted them access to the Visage's post's main box
01:12:51transmitter and personally activated the command-grade
01:12:55cryptogrammics using a biometric key he carried around his
01:12:58wrist.
01:12:59The channel is secure, he told them, and left the chamber.
01:13:04Bronzy picked up the speaker horn and threw the transmit
01:13:07switch.
01:13:09CR-23, CR-23, this is Joker Lord broadcasting in encrypt.
01:13:16Stop.
01:13:17The vox speaker emitted a series of dull metallic clicks and
01:13:21then settled into a deep background hiss.
01:13:25Bronzy repeated his signal.
01:13:26Ten seconds passed, and then the answer came.
01:13:30Joker Lord, Joker Lord, this is CR-23 reading you encrypted.
01:13:35Stop.
01:13:36The voice was cold and clear, as if the speaker was standing in
01:13:39the next room.
01:13:41Apart from a slight trebly quality caused by the
01:13:44cryptogrammic coding, they couldn't have asked for a stronger,
01:13:47purer link.
01:13:50CR-23, I need to speak to Uxor Mu urgently.
01:13:55Code Jannebeg 5.
01:13:58Stop.
01:13:59Confirm code, please.
01:14:01Stop.
01:14:02The vox answered him.
01:14:04The connection was so clean the words sounded as if they were
01:14:07polished.
01:14:09Confirm code Jannebeg 5.
01:14:13Stop.
01:14:14One moment, Joker Lord.
01:14:16Stop.
01:14:18Another wait.
01:14:20Two minutes of liquid hiss this time.
01:14:24Bronzy glanced at Sonica.
01:14:27Joker Lord, Joker Lord, this is Honan.
01:14:30Bronzy, this had better not be one of your entertainments.
01:14:34Stop.
01:14:35The tone was sharpened by the digital overlay of the
01:14:38cryptogrammics, but there was no mistaking Honan Mu's spiky
01:14:41attitude.
01:14:43It's not Uxor.
01:14:44Trust me and listen.
01:14:46I've got a body here.
01:14:48I'm pretty convinced it's a nerthene infiltrator, surgically
01:14:52altered.
01:14:53I think we've been compromised.
01:14:56Requesting your advice.
01:14:57Stop.
01:14:59A pause.
01:15:01Give me more information to work with, Bronzy.
01:15:03Stop.
01:15:05Uxor, I think this stiff needs to be examined by tech
01:15:08adepts, a full workup.
01:15:11We could be looking at a huge security breach.
01:15:15I'm thinking maybe to scare up a lifter to my position and
01:15:18I'll babysit the specimen up to the fleet.
01:15:21Stop.
01:15:23Stand by, Joker Lord.
01:15:24Stop.
01:15:26Bronzy lowered the speaker horn.
01:15:28She's wary, he said.
01:15:31Can you blame a hurt, Sonica asked, the number of pranks
01:15:35you've pulled over the years?
01:15:37They were both beginning to sweat despite the night chill.
01:15:41The massive voxcastle rig kicked out a fog of heat
01:15:45exhaust and the air in the chamber was close.
01:15:49They waited for over five minutes, so long that Sonica
01:15:52began to pace.
01:15:54Then the vox cycled up again.
01:15:57Joker Lord?
01:15:58Joker Lord, this is CR23.
01:16:00Respond.
01:16:01Stop.
01:16:02Bronzy picked up the horn and waited until all five
01:16:06green lights on the console had relit, indicating
01:16:09full-strength cryptogrammics.
01:16:12CR23, this is Joker Lord.
01:16:14Stop.
01:16:16What is your position, Bronzy?
01:16:18Stop.
01:16:19CR345, Uxor.
01:16:22Stop.
01:16:23Listen to me, Bronzy.
01:16:25I can't risk an air extraction from where you are.
01:16:28There are some details I can't go into, even via
01:16:31Encrypt.
01:16:32Suggest you get transport and move fast and light.
01:16:36I'm checking the charts now.
01:16:38Yes, leave Tel Kat and head west along the Sarmac Trail.
01:16:44If you don't mess around, you should be able to get
01:16:46to CR8291 by dawn.
01:16:49I'll divert a cavalry squadron to pick you up there
01:16:52and escort you in.
01:16:54Did you get all that?
01:16:55Stop.
01:16:57Bronzy nodded, even though she couldn't see him.
01:17:00Understood, Uxor.
01:17:01Stop.
01:17:03Is this workable, Bronzy?
01:17:05Stop.
01:17:07Absolutely.
01:17:08Stop, Bronzy replied.
01:17:11The link leaked out an ambient hiss for a moment.
01:17:15CR23, Bronzy, I need you to tell me who knows about this.
01:17:23Stop.
01:17:25Say again.
01:17:25Stop.
01:17:27Who knows the details of this incident, Het?
01:17:31Stop.
01:17:32Bronzy frowned.
01:17:34Me, the post commander, the duty medicay, maybe a
01:17:38couple of staffers.
01:17:40Stop.
01:17:41Understood.
01:17:43Thank you.
01:17:44I'm sorry, Bronzy, but we need to keep this close for now.
01:17:49Are you ready to move?
01:17:50Stop.
01:17:51Yes, Uxor.
01:17:53Joker Lord, out.
01:17:56The lights went out and the hissing died away.
01:17:59Bronzy threw the voxcasters' power-down switches and got up.
01:18:04All right, then, he said.
01:18:07Why didn't you mention me?
01:18:08Sonika asked.
01:18:10What?
01:18:12When she asked who knew.
01:18:14Why didn't you mention my name?
01:18:17Because you're staying here, Bronzy told him.
01:18:23Bronzy had a few words with Kozlov, and a pair of Crimean
01:18:26noncombatants were sent to bring a transport up from the
01:18:29hard-standing behind the main dwelling cluster of visages.
01:18:33Then Bronzy strode off to the billet he'd been given.
01:18:37Sonika followed him.
01:18:39What do you mean I'm staying here?
01:18:41Sonika asked, as Bronzy quickly repacked his haversack.
01:18:45Don't start.
01:18:47Bronzy—
01:18:49There was a warning tone in Sonika's inflection.
01:18:52Bronzy stopped what he was doing and looked around at his old friend.
01:18:57Was it just me, or did Moo sound seriously weird?
01:19:03She was just being wary.
01:19:05I said that.
01:19:07Bronzy shook his head.
01:19:09Something's up.
01:19:11I need you to be my joker, Pettoe.
01:19:15What?
01:19:16My ace in the hole.
01:19:18If anything goes wrong, you'll still know what I know.
01:19:23That's why you're staying here.
01:19:26Nothing's going to go wrong, said Sonika.
01:19:29Bronzy laughed.
01:19:31How many years have we been soldiers, Pettoe?
01:19:35Enough to know that covering your arse is never a waste of time,
01:19:39Sonika replied.
01:19:40He shook his head.
01:19:42We're worrying about nothing.
01:19:44No, said Bronzy.
01:19:46We've found ourselves in a war of lies, disguise, and dissembling.
01:19:51We're worrying about everything.
01:19:54Sonika didn't look convinced.
01:19:57Come on, Bronzy rumbled.
01:19:59That's why the Geno V2 has survived this long.
01:20:03We fight smart.
01:20:05We always have.
01:20:06Brains have got us out of more scrapes than balls.
01:20:10In your case, I'd hardly trust either, Bronzy winked.
01:20:15He wasn't going to rise to the bait.
01:20:17He lashed up his haversack and swung it onto his shoulder.
01:20:21Don't go alone, Sonika said.
01:20:24I won't.
01:20:25I'll take Dimmy Shiban with me.
01:20:27I can trust him, and he knows how to handle himself if there's an outbreak of stupid.
01:20:33Good.
01:20:33All right.
01:20:35Let's be off then, said Bronzy.
01:20:39The transport Kozlov provided was a scarab-pattern carrier,
01:20:43a medium-sized armoured speeder with a troop hold for stowage and a stern-mounted auto-turret.
01:20:50Its long, gently curved hull had been sprayed in a desert tan,
01:20:55but as it slid towards them out of the night on its powerful suspension fields,
01:20:59it looked like a desert phantom, cold and moonlight blue.
01:21:05The delivery crew dismounted, leaving the engines running.
01:21:08Medicaid Ida loaded the wrapped body into the hold and made it secure.
01:21:14I can provide a driver, Kozlov offered.
01:21:17No need, Bronzy replied, tossing his haversack in through the open-hold hatch.
01:21:23I can handle one of these babies.
01:21:26You're infantry, Kozlov said.
01:21:28I'm a Renaissance man, Bronzy replied.
01:21:32There are few things in this galaxy I can't turn my hand to.
01:21:36And entirely mess up, Sonica said.
01:21:40Shivan ran up to join them out of the cold darkness.
01:21:43He was lugging a pack and a twin-barrelled LAZ carbine.
01:21:48What's this about? he asked.
01:21:51I'll tell you once we're moving, Bronzy said.
01:21:53All secure, Doc?
01:21:55Medicaid Ida jumped down from the hold and sealed the hatch behind her.
01:22:00I've secured it in ice blocks, but it will deteriorate.
01:22:04Get it into stasis as quickly as you can.
01:22:07The organs?
01:22:08Individually packed in vacuum-sealed bags in the hopper under the gurney.
01:22:14Thanks, Doc, Bronzy smiled.
01:22:16Shivan was already climbing aboard through the cabin hatch.
01:22:20Bronzy looked back at Sonica.
01:22:22I hate goodbyes, he said.
01:22:25So, fug off!
01:22:28Sonica laughed.
01:22:29Bronzy turned away and then swung back round to face Sonica.
01:22:32His face was solemn.
01:22:34Look, Petto, there is one thing.
01:22:37One thing I just want to say.
01:22:41What is it, Hurt?
01:22:42Bronzy looked him in the eyes, all seriousness.
01:22:46Petto, have you got that money you owe me?
01:22:52The speeder kicked up dust like a gauzy bridle train
01:22:56and slipped away into the cold desert night.
01:22:59Kozlov, Ida and the noncombatants turned away and walked back into the post.
01:23:05Sonica stood out in the chilly darkness under the enveloping cloak of the sky
01:23:10and watched until all traces of the speeder had vanished into the endless black.
01:23:16They ran the Scarab into the west, along the old trail,
01:23:19using only Auspex and the low-light viewers wired to the dashboard.
01:23:24The viewers showed the world like a green moonscape,
01:23:28but they had only a 110-degree forward spread,
01:23:32so when Bronzy or Shivan turned their heads too far left or right,
01:23:36the ghostly view vanished in a wash of fizzle and telemetry junk.
01:23:41The Scarab coasted well and made 80 kilometres per hour over the clearest terrain.
01:23:47Bronzy loved grav-effect transports and always tried to secure them
01:23:51for his jokers when dismount assaults were on the cards.
01:23:55He let Shivan drive for the first three hours through the tipping point of midnight.
01:24:02The stars came out over the desert rim with a rare magnificence
01:24:07heightened by their viewers.
01:24:13"'You ever going to tell me what this is about?' Shivan asked.
01:24:17"'No,' said Bronzy."
01:24:20Three hours before sunrise, Bronzy took the stick.
01:24:23The world ahead of him was a jumbled, fast-moving path of lime-cast furrows,
01:24:29with the occasional emerald crag looming for a moment before it was lost behind them.
01:24:35Shivan sat back, reclining in the shotgun seat, and took a pinch from his box.
01:24:41Then he played with the auto-turret controls,
01:24:44impelling the sense-net to target the stern guns at passing rocks and crumbling slopes of sand-rock.
01:24:52"'Set it on auto, sir, and get some kip, Dimmy,' Bronzy suggested.
01:24:57Shivan yawned and promptly fell asleep, rocking in his leather cradle.
01:25:03Bronzy envied him.
01:25:05It had been years since he'd been able to manage the old geno-trick of crash-sleep,
01:25:09the hypno-suggestive shutdown that allowed a man to catch a wink under any circumstances.
01:25:15Bronzy had been trained that way, but the knack had left him.
01:25:21He kept his hand closed around the bucking-stick and watched the ghost-green world outside flash by.
01:25:28The sun came up, a slow, terrible fire-storm rising from the south.
01:25:34All of the landscape's shadows stretched out, long and painful, and Bronzy took off the viewer.
01:25:41White light filtered in through the cabin's chipped and crazed windows,
01:25:45and he decided to rely on Auspex alone.
01:25:49Twenty kilometres now, the cursor on the cab's light-map display moved slowly towards it.
01:25:56Sonica woke with a start. Nothing special there. The dull afterglow of pain in his hand
01:26:10had woken him that way every morning since he'd arrived at Visage's.
01:26:14He sat up on his bunk. Dawn light, already hot and bright,
01:26:19speared in through the gaps around his rattan blind.
01:26:23He'd been having the strangest dream. He'd been playing the head game with Dimmy,
01:26:29and Lon had brought him a good piece. He'd taken the diorite head out of Lon's calloused hands,
01:26:36and looked down at it to judge it. The carved face had been Hurtado's. It had grinned up at him.
01:26:45Tell me this, Beto, the head had said. All these broken heads, are any two faces alike,
01:26:54or are they all different?
01:26:57I don't know, Hurt. Get out of my dream.
01:27:01It's important. Do they all look the same? Are they all different? Doesn't that matter? Doesn't it?
01:27:10Doesn't it?
01:27:12Sonika had lobbed the head away into the wide scree field of broken heads.
01:27:17He'd done it with his left hand. His left hand had had fingers and a thumb.
01:27:24Fug, Sonika said, coughing. He had dust in his throat. That was par for the course at Visage's.
01:27:32He looked down at his incomplete hand, and felt the missing fingers waggle.
01:27:38He had slept naked. He pulled on his breeches, socks, and boots, and went out into the early
01:27:44light, bare-chested. A hard rind of sun was cresting the edge of the crags. The sky was
01:27:53off-white, like old ivory, and the landscape was a pink wash, broken by hard black shadows
01:28:01bending to evade the sun. It was going to be a hot one. He could already feel the air baking.
01:28:10The local livestock, some of them still saddled from the previous day's racing,
01:28:15wandered free, grazing the patchy grasses.
01:28:18Sonika walked towards the well, rubbing his face with his good hand. He needed a shave.
01:28:25A shave and a grapefruit.
01:28:28The livestock all looked up at the same time. They stared in the same direction,
01:28:34some of them still chewing, and then broke and scattered.
01:28:39Geno Instinct pulled Sonika back into the cold shadows of one of the terracotta huts.
01:28:44He looked around, suddenly very alert. Where were the sentries? The perimeter guard? The
01:28:51overnight patrols?
01:28:54The pink wash of the landscape moved. Semi-visible figures scurried forwards out of the desert rim.
01:29:01Sonika swallowed hard. He turned and ran back through the shaded maze of dwellings towards
01:29:06the post commander's habitant. He wanted to raise the alarm, but he didn't want the enemy to know
01:29:11he'd raised the alarm. Kozlov had a silent signal device that trembled every post resident's wrist
01:29:18cuff. Sonika slipped into the hot darkness of the habitant. Kozlov sat at his camp desk,
01:29:25staring at Sonika in surprise.
01:29:28Commander, Sonika whispered, emergency alert now.
01:29:33Kozlov didn't move. He continued to stare back at Sonika with the same look of mild surprise.
01:29:40Commander Kozlov.
01:29:42Kozlov's eyes did not follow Sonika as he moved forwards.
01:29:46They continued to stare at the tent flap where Sonika had entered. Kozlov didn't move at all.
01:29:54Sonika threw himself sideways. The falx swung by the ekvernurth, concealed behind the inner
01:30:00tent flap, missed the hetman by a matter of centimetres. The blade chocked through the
01:30:05ground sheet into the dirt beneath. Sonika rolled and came up on his feet. The nurthene
01:30:10yanked his long blade free and charged him.
01:30:14Alarm! Alarm! Sonika began to shout. Enemy in the camp! He dived headlong over the desk
01:30:20to avoid the lunging blade and fell into Kozlov. Kozlov toppled backwards off his seat, his
01:30:26camp table collapsing under Sonika's weight. Blood ebbed slackly out of Kozlov's nose and
01:30:32mouth. He continued to stare in mild surprise at the roof of the tent. Sonika rolled off
01:30:38the still-warm corpse and fumbled frantically to release Kozlov's service pistol from its
01:30:43holster. The nurthene whirled his falx so high it ripped a slit in the tent roof. He swung it
01:30:49down. Sonika threw himself to one side, the descending blade cut clean through Kozlov's
01:30:54left shoulder.
01:30:56Alarm! Sonika yelled again, diving away. Outside he heard shouting and the sudden sporadic
01:31:02bark of las-weapons. Sonika threw a saddlebag at the advancing nurthene and the whispering
01:31:08falx struck it aside. He scrambled backwards, hurling a writing case. The falx splintered it
01:31:14and a shower of pens, nibs and blotting patches spilled out. Sonika ducked again and the falx
01:31:19tore a wide gash in the tent wall.
01:31:23Geno training took over. As he landed, Sonika groped for a weapon, any weapon, and found
01:31:29a writing quill that had fallen out of the writing case. Sonika seized it, tested its
01:31:34weight automatically, and threw it like a dart underhand. It embedded itself, nib first,
01:31:40in the Ekvernirth's left cheek. The nurthene yelped and lurched backwards. Sonika leapt
01:31:46up and grabbed the haft of the falx. He kneed the nurthene in the groin. Now the bastard
01:31:51really staggered. He howled. His grip on the falx weakened.
01:31:56Sonika tore the weapon out of the Ekvernirth's hands and swung it. The Ekvernirth's head
01:32:01rolled clean off his shoulders in a puff of blood. The body folded up and the head
01:32:08bounced off the groundsheet beside it. Gripping the falx, Sonika strode across the
01:32:13heavy tent to the master alarm control. He smacked it and sirens began to wail all across
01:32:19the visage's post. He walked back to Kozlov's body, staked the falx blade down in the ground,
01:32:26and pulled out the service pistol, a heavy laz model.
01:32:30Two nurthene raiders burst in through the heavy tent mouth, and Sonika shot them both
01:32:34in the face. They walloped over on their backs, their silver plates dotted with droplets of
01:32:40blood. Pandemonium had erupted outside the command
01:32:45tent. The waking Imperial troops, roused by his shots and the blaring sirens, were scrambling
01:32:51to fight off the nurthene intruders. The dawn air whizzed with gunfire and the swuck of
01:32:57impacting blades. Sonika heard awful wails of pain.
01:33:02With the pistol in his good hand, he went outside into the baking air. A nurthene ran
01:33:08at him, falx raised. Sonika blew the man's throat out with a single shot and dropped
01:33:13him on the sand. All around him laz carbines rattled on auto. The shouts and yells were
01:33:19deafening. He ran towards the cold store. Bodies littered the ground outside the mud-brick
01:33:24building. Imperial soldiers, mostly half-dressed, sliced into pieces. He went inside and shot
01:33:31down the two nurthene he found there. One fell forwards against the stacked, frozen
01:33:37bodies in their shrouds and wrenched off his breastplate as he slid down. The breastplate
01:33:42landed in front of Sonika, rattling to a stop. He saw the engraved reed emblems and the snapping
01:33:49crocodilia.
01:33:52Get out, a voice gasped. Run, he turned. Medike Ida stood behind him. She clutched at the
01:34:01falx that stapled her through the chest to the cold store wall. Her gown was soaked in
01:34:06blood, her own for the first time.
01:34:10Medike, Sonika yelled.
01:34:13Too late for me, she wheezed and died.
01:34:19A nurthene raider burst in behind them, and Sonika spun around, firing a shot that silenced
01:34:24the man forever. More followed. Falxes raised. Sonika began to shoot. By his weapon's digital
01:34:30display he had twenty shots left. Nineteen. Eighteen. Seventeen.
01:34:40Bronzy brought the scarab to rest and hit the dampers. The sun was up, fierce and bold.
01:34:46Wake up, he told Shiban as he unstrapped his harness.
01:34:52Shiban groaned.
01:34:54Bronzy jumped down out of the speeder and looked around. His stomach was grumbling. Where
01:34:59the hell was Honan's promised cavalry? The cratered desert spread out all around him in
01:35:05the burning light of the rising sun.
01:35:09He saw a figure toiling up the trail towards him. A tall figure, wobbled by the heat haze.
01:35:17Bronzy waited. Two minutes. Three. The figure came closer, becoming properly visible.
01:35:26It was a space marine, in full battle plate. The armour was purple, trimmed in silver,
01:35:33with green markings on the immense shoulder plates.
01:35:38Great God, Bronzy murmured.
01:35:40The towering Astartes came to a halt ten paces from Bronzy and the speeder. Soft red light
01:35:48glowed like embers in its eye-slits as it read and targeted him.
01:35:54Bronzy.
01:35:56We meet again, the helmet-speaker crackled.
01:36:00Sir?
01:36:02The Astartes held its massive bolt-gun close against its armoured chest.
01:36:06I warned you. You really do know how to stir up trouble, don't you, Hurtado?
01:36:16Bronzy blinked.
01:36:18I don't understand. This is important. This is—
01:36:22None of your business. But you've made it your business, which is a colossal mistake,
01:36:27and a shame, because you're a decent fellow. There's only one option.
01:36:33What the fuck are you talking about?
01:36:36Bronzy cried, wishing very suddenly he'd brought a weapon with him.
01:36:40Back right off, you son of a bitch, Shiban declared, moving out from behind the cover
01:36:45of the hovering tank, his double carbine raised to his shoulder and aimed squarely at the
01:36:50armoured figure.
01:36:52Jimmy, don't! Bronzy yelled.
01:36:55No one threatens my friends, Shiban growled back. He edged forwards, his weapon fixed
01:37:01steadily on the figure in purple armour.
01:37:04The Astartes turned its visor slowly to regard Shiban.
01:37:08The soft red emberlight flickered in its eye-slits.
01:37:13Far too fast for Bronzy to follow, the Astartes wheeled and fired its bolter.
01:37:18Dimitar Shiban, who remembered his dreams word for word, left the ground and exploded
01:37:25as he travelled backwards, showering blood and meat in all directions.
01:37:31His twisted carcass hit the ground and lay still.
01:37:35Oh, God! Oh, Territ, no! Bronzy yelled.
01:37:41The Astartes switched its aim back to Bronzy. Bronzy sank to his knees in the dust.
01:37:47Please, he murmured.
01:37:50As I said, the Space Marine remarked, stepping forwards, its bolter aimed.
01:37:56There is only one option.
01:37:59Why are you doing this? Bronzy pleaded.
01:38:03For the Emperor, the Astartes replied.
01:38:10Chapter 3 Monlo Harbour, Nerth, Two Days Later
01:38:17Though John Grammaticus was over a thousand years old, he had only been Connick Hennecker
01:38:23for eight months, and he was still getting used to the idea.
01:38:27According to his file, and as far as any imperial methods of scrutiny were concerned,
01:38:32Connick Hennecker was a fifty-two-year-old man from the region of Terra known as the Caucasus,
01:38:39and he served in the Imperial Army as an intelligence officer, attached to the Gino 5-2 Chilliad.
01:38:46Grammaticus still thought of himself as essentially human.
01:38:51He had been born human, raised as a human, and he had been human when,
01:38:58to all intents and purposes, he had died for the first time.
01:39:03Definitions became a little more complicated after that.
01:39:07One thing was certain. At some non-specific point, after his first death, probably as the
01:39:13result of a slow process rather than a sudden change of heart, he had stopped being quite so
01:39:19steadfast in his devotion to the interests of his birth-species.
01:39:25He was still unashamedly fond of the human race, and was a stout apologist for its less edifying
01:39:31qualities, but he had been with the Cabal for a long time, and they had shared the acuity with
01:39:38him at least in part. These days he saw what his birth-race had once been wont to call
01:39:45the Long View.
01:39:48Grammaticus was one of the last few humans still working as an agent of the Cabal.
01:39:54Over the centuries the Cabal had recruited a good many human go-betweens,
01:39:59but most of them were long dead, forgotten, or disavowed.
01:40:04The Cabal had been recruiting human agents for as long as there had been humans to recruit—a
01:40:10fact Grammaticus always found particularly hard to reconcile. At the very start of human history,
01:40:18before writing, before Ur and Cattle Hayek, before Mohenjo-Daro and Thebes, before the
01:40:25construction of the Lost Monuments, the Cabal had visited Terra and encountered a breed of
01:40:31unprepossessing, unpromising mammalian hominids, busy making its first axe-marks on the trunks of
01:40:39ancient woodland trees to mark out its first boundaries. The Cabal had seen some particular
01:40:46quality in those mammalian hominids. They had recognised that the hominids would one day rise,
01:40:52inexorably, to play a pivotal role in the scheme of all things. Mankind would become the greatest
01:40:59weapon against the primordial Annihilator, or it would become the primordial Annihilator's
01:41:06greatest weapon. Either way, the Cabal decided that the unprepossessing mammalian hominids,
01:41:13developing on that backwater world, were not a species to be dismissed.
01:41:20Grammaticus knew that this fact frustrated most of the Cabal's inner circle. They were old kinds,
01:41:28every damn one of them, and regarded all the upstart species of the galaxy as inferior ephemera.
01:41:36It pained them to accept that their destiny—all destinies—lay in the purview of creatures that had
01:41:42been simple single-cell protocytes, when the old kind cultures were already mature.
01:41:50Gahet had once told Grammaticus that the Cabal had made its first subtle advances towards the
01:41:56human species long before the advent of the Age of Terror. Gahet had said this bitterly,
01:42:04and more bitterly still had admitted the Cabal's repeated failure
01:42:08to apply influence on human development.
01:42:13You've always been feral, stubborn brutes, Gahet had said, shockingly dogmatic in your
01:42:19self-worth. We tried to direct you and influence your course. It was like—
01:42:27Gahet had paused, allowing his mind to select an appropriately humanocentric simile.
01:42:33It was like commanding a tide to turn back. He finished.
01:42:40Grammaticus had smiled.
01:42:42We are a headstrong people, aren't we? he had replied, with no little pride.
01:42:49Did you not think it might have been easier to cull us before we grew teeth?
01:42:54Gahet had nodded, or at least he had flexed his secondary nostrils in a mannerism that
01:43:00equated to a nod. That was not our way, then. We all deem such notions as gross barbarism,
01:43:08all of us except Slouda, of course.
01:43:12Of course. And now?
01:43:16Now I regret we did not abort you when we had the chance.
01:43:20Destruction has become our only tool in latter days. I miss the subtle methods.
01:43:27Almost all of the humans recruited down the years had proved to be unviable or flawed.
01:43:34Most had been disposed of. Grammaticus believed that he had succeeded where so many others had
01:43:40failed, because of his gift. John Grammaticus was a high-function psycho.
01:43:49The Uxor will see you, Head Henneker, the subaltern in the fur shacko announced.
01:43:54Thank you, John Grammaticus replied, and got up off the wooden chair at the end of the corridor.
01:43:59He walked down the hall towards the briefing-room door, straightening his double-breasted jacket
01:44:05and cape. He undid the collar-buttons of his shirt. It was almost noon, and the Terracotta
01:44:11Palace was sweltering. Situated fifteen kilometres outside Monleau Harbour, the palace had been
01:44:17commandeered as a control-station for the advance. Its ancient walls held the day's heat like an
01:44:27oven. Breed-screens soaked in water had been fixed over the windows to keep the palace interiors
01:44:33cool and fresh, but they were beginning to dry out. John Grammaticus had no physiological need
01:44:41to perspire, but he permitted his body to do so. Every other human around was sweating freely,
01:44:49and he didn't want them to notice that he wasn't like them.
01:44:53He knocked at the door.
01:44:56Come, he went in. The chamber was long and broad, with pillars flanking the walls to support the
01:45:02tiled ceiling. The tops of the pillars had been carved to resemble the fronds of reeds
01:45:08or snapping crocodilia, both common features in Nerthine architecture. A folding steel table had
01:45:15been set up in the centre of the room, and Uxor Ruxana stood at the head of it. Her four aides
01:45:22ranged on either side of the table beside her.
01:45:26Uxor, Grammaticus said.
01:45:29Good to see you, he tapped his throat. I apologise for the unbuttoning, but this objectionable heat—
01:45:37Quite all right, Connick, she replied.
01:45:39Her aides all nodded accordingly.
01:45:42They were all female, all aged between thirteen and sixteen, Uxors in waiting. Their ovaries had
01:45:50already been harvested for the Geno V2 Chiliad stock-banks. They were now honing their sept
01:45:56powers, and acting as a support buffer for their assigned Uxor.
01:46:01Grammaticus found the operational structure of the Geno V2 Chiliad quite fascinating. Formed
01:46:08during the savage continental wars that had engulfed Terra at the end of the Age of Strife,
01:46:13the Geno had proved to be a most effective and adaptable force. No wonder the Emperor had
01:46:19permitted them to endure after unification. No wonder he had looked upon their system and stolen
01:46:27from it.
01:46:29The Geno practised genic mustering. Grammaticus had been thoroughly briefed on this. Genic
01:46:36mustering had been an essential tool during those caustic years of atomic hurricanes and drifting
01:46:42rad-clouds. The core of the regiment was the Uxors, a bloodline of latent, psychically sensitive
01:46:50females. The females had their eggs harvested at puberty, and from them the heavy-built uterine
01:46:57soldiery of the unit were vat-grown, using the genetic codes of several proven robust
01:47:03agnate gene pools, notorious for their martial merit.
01:47:09The Geno grew tough warriors, but they complemented their brute strength and kept the pool clean
01:47:15by importing smart, proven field commanders from other forces. The Hetmen were always
01:47:22non-stock individuals who excelled at tactics and strategy.
01:47:28The Uxors at the top of the Chiliad's command tree were no longer capable of carrying children
01:47:34of their own to term. This, in ways not entirely understood, freed their minds and allowed them
01:47:41to operate as perceptives, operational coordinators, who could appreciate, as Garhet had
01:47:47put it during the briefing, the behaviour of their children.
01:47:53At best, the Uxors were weak psychers. Each one was capable of a rudimentary talent known as
01:48:01the Sept, enough to enable their forces in the field and supply them with some insight.
01:48:07They burned out quickly. By twenty-six, twenty-seven, they were done as Uxors,
01:48:14and restricted to other duties. During their active phase as perceptives, they were always
01:48:20accompanied by aides, Uxors in training, whose raw psychic talent bolstered the septive power
01:48:27of their Uxor even as they learned from her. None of the females in the chamber possessed
01:48:33a fraction of John Grammaticus's talent. As he sat down at the end of the table,
01:48:40opposite Uxor Ruxana, he reached out. Instantly he tasted feeble, immature septs,
01:48:48chitter-chatter minds, the moist, unwholesome mental architecture of the pubescent aides.
01:48:55The technical inability to conceive made most Uxor aides gruesomely promiscuous.
01:49:02Grammaticus was repelled by the lurid, shallow thoughts that washed towards him.
01:49:07The aides were all thinking about the next soldier-boy they'd hump,
01:49:11or how fabulous it was going to be to become an Uxor.
01:49:16Ruxana was different. Grammaticus looked down the table towards her.
01:49:22For a start, she was a woman, not a girl—a startlingly appealing woman. Her lips were full,
01:49:31her long, straight, blonde hair centre-parted, her eyes heavily lashed and exotically grey.
01:49:38A master sculptor could not have improved upon her cheekbones. She was also twenty-eight,
01:49:44and at the end of her Uxor service. He could feel that she hated this fact. She was broken by the
01:49:52thought that she would soon be something else—a medicae, a munitorum commander, a cartomancer,
01:49:59an Uxor emeritus. Her powers were ebbing, her sept was waning and weakening.
01:50:09What do you have for me, sir? she asked.
01:50:13Quite a voice. Even the aides took notice.
01:50:16Husky—no, silky, like honey. Grammaticus knew he was a little in love with her,
01:50:25and allowed himself to relish the fact. It had been a long time.
01:50:29Seven hundred years, give or take, since he had permitted himself to respond to a human
01:50:34female in any way other than physical need.
01:50:39Well, I have plenty, Uxor, he replied, taking out the document-case from under his arm and
01:50:45opening it.
01:50:47You've actually been in Monleau Harbour? asked one of the aides, looking right at him.
01:50:54Grammaticus felt a wash of admiring lust.
01:50:57Yes? What's your name?
01:51:00Toovey, sir, the girl said. She was the most mature of Ruxanna's aides, about nineteen.
01:51:07Toovey clearly found the idea of a daring intelligence officer quite intoxicating.
01:51:13Yes, Toovey, I made cover as a merchant called De Salle Hulta, and spent the last four days
01:51:20gathering evidence in the inner quarters of the town.
01:51:23Amongst other things, he thought.
01:51:28Wasn't that terribly dangerous? asked another of the aides.
01:51:33Yes, it was, said Grammaticus.
01:51:37How were you not unmasked by the infidel enemy? asked Toovey.
01:51:43Be quiet, Ruxanna told her girls. Intelligence operatives are hardly required to give away
01:51:50their tricks.
01:51:51It's all right, Oxor, Grammaticus smiled. He looked at Toovey and said,
01:51:57El t'etanache el et che t'anae.
01:52:01What? Toovey replied.
01:52:04It means, Grammaticus told her, I speak the local language as a native does, in Nerthine.
01:52:11But, Toovey began, my dear, I'm not going to tell you how, so please don't ask. If I
01:52:18might continue?
01:52:20Toovey looked as if he was going to say something else.
01:52:23Let the man speak, Toovey, Ruxanna snapped.
01:52:26Henica?
01:52:28Oh, of course. Well, the location itself. As we know, the Nerthine have no orbital or
01:52:36interplanetary technology, nor have ever possessed such means. However, the area known as
01:52:42Mon Low Harbour, though flooded and used for maritime shipping, was originally constructed
01:52:48as a setting-down point for starships.
01:52:52Oxor Ruxanna blinked.
01:52:54For starships? she echoed.
01:52:58He was taking a slight risk in sharing this information, but John Grammaticus's mind was
01:53:03finally trained to sort and appraise data. He knew exactly what he could give up and
01:53:10what he couldn't. He believed it mattered very little if the Imperials found out that
01:53:14Mon Low had once been an extraplanetary set-down. It was a halting site, in fact.
01:53:22The Cabal used to visit here long ago. That's why they knew about the Nerthine culture.
01:53:28For starships, Oxor?
01:53:31Are you sure? Oxor Ruxanna asked.
01:53:35Absolutely, Grammaticus replied. I have excellent sources.
01:53:40And when you say originally, Connick, what does originally mean?
01:53:47It means something between eight and twelve thousand years ago—enough time for sea
01:53:52levels to change, for floodplains to rise, and for a massive stone-cut extraplanetary
01:53:58harbour to fill with water and become a harbour of a more traditional nature.
01:54:04It was eleven thousand eight hundred and twenty-six years, in fact, and the construction
01:54:09work had taken eighteen months. Grammaticus felt it wise to fudge the precision of his
01:54:16knowledge. The aides started speaking all at once.
01:54:20That would place construction during the second age of technology, said one. Around the time
01:54:27of the first contact event and the first alien wars, said another.
01:54:32Is there any evidence as to which Xenoform might have been responsible? asked another.
01:54:37Do the Nerthine know of its provenance? asked Toovey.
01:54:42Toovey frames the best question, said Grammaticus, shutting down the chatter.
01:54:47Do they know? Well, I don't believe they do. They possess myths and legends, as all
01:54:53cultures do, and some of them contain elements that might be interpreted as containing some
01:54:59race-memory of Xeno-contact or intervention, but until the six-hundred-and-seventieth expedition
01:55:06came along, the Nerthine believed they were alone in the galaxy. Remember, the Nerthine
01:55:12don't even realise they were originally colonists from Terra.
01:55:17That is the true misery of this war, Roxana nodded. They do not recognise us as kin.
01:55:24Grammaticus felt her discomfort. Kinship meant so much to the Xeno-Uxors. Indeed,
01:55:31he found this aspect of the Emperor's great crusade especially troubling. In its youth,
01:55:37mankind had spilled out across the stars, colonising thousands of worlds, forming the
01:55:44first human stellar community. Then the age of strife had come down, like the blade of
01:55:52a guillotine, and for the better part of five thousand years, warp-storms had rendered
01:55:57interstellar travel impossible. The outreaches of man had become cut off, beleaguered, isolated.
01:56:05In that turmoil, many offshoots had entirely forgotten who they were or where they had
01:56:10come from. Such was the case with Nerth. When the Emperor, a figure long foreseen by
01:56:18the Cabal, had finally unified the anarchic fragments of Terra, he had undertaken a great
01:56:25crusade. Oh, how telling was that title! To seek out and reconnect with the lost outposts
01:56:33of the human race. It was astonishing how often the lost worlds resisted those overtures
01:56:40of reconnection. It was unconscionable how many times the roving expedition fleets had
01:56:45been forced to go to war with the very cultures they had set out to rescue and embrace,
01:56:50just to bring them to what the Emperor had euphemistically called
01:56:55compliance. It was always so the official line went, for their own good.
01:57:03John Grammaticus had met the Emperor once, close on a thousand years before. The Emperor
01:57:11had been just another feudal warlord then, leading his thunder-armoured troops in an
01:57:16effort to consolidate his early strife-age victories, and pave the way to eventual
01:57:22unification. Grammaticus had been a line officer in the Caucasian levies, a significant force
01:57:28inveigled by truce and pact to support the Emperor's assault on the territorial holdings
01:57:35of the Pan-Pacific tyrant Duma. After a bloody conquest at Bactria, Grammaticus had been one of
01:57:43a hundred Caucasian officers invited to a triumph at Pash, hosted by the retinues of the Thunderbolt
01:57:49and Lightning Army. During the festivities, the Emperor—even then he had been known only by that
01:57:56objectionable epithet—had grandly toured the tables to personally thank his foreign allies
01:58:02and the leaders of the mercenary clans. Grammaticus had been one of hundreds present to receive his
01:58:09grateful handshake. In that moment of contact, he had seen why the Emperor was a force to be
01:58:16reckoned with. A psyche of towering, unimaginable strength, not really human at all by any
01:58:24contemporary measure of the fact, Grammaticus, who had never met anyone else like himself,
01:58:31had shuddered, and felt like a drone insect in the presence of its hive king. The Emperor
01:58:39had felt Grammaticus in the same passing second of contact. He had smiled.
01:58:46"'You have a fine mind, John,' he had said, without having to ask Grammaticus his name.
01:58:53"'We should talk, and consider the options available to beings like us.'
01:59:02Before any such conversation could happen, Grammaticus had died that painful, stupid first
01:59:09death. Looking back, Grammaticus wondered if he would ever have been able to influence the
01:59:15Emperor's course if he had lived. He doubted it. Even then, in that tiny moment of connection,
01:59:23it had been clear that the Emperor was never going to turn away from the road of
01:59:27catastrophic bloodshed he was set upon. One day he would unleash upon the galaxy
01:59:33the most dreadful killing-machines of all—the Astartes.
01:59:39How ironic it was that Grammaticus's current task was to broker co-operation with one of those
01:59:45fearsome Astartes legions. Garhet had once remarked to Grammaticus that the Emperor was
01:59:52the only human who would ever have made a viable addition to the Cabal's inner circle.
01:59:58He still had not yet been able to do so.