Chapter Two Hundred and Seventy-Two
I follow Champion Verlin in his custom Mark Ⅰ Geist Pattern Dreadnaught as he cuts through the airlock with his four metre Power Sword. 120 Barghest Auxillia, all in Rogue Pattern Power armour, stream around his iron legs and into a small security station brimming with traitor guardsmen.
The security station has a small mustering area in front of a thick wall of ferrocrete and ceramite composite armour. Two casemates jut from the wall on either side of a vault-like door. Dozens of autoguns and lasguns poke through embrasures scattered across the wall.
Barghest Auxilia storm the fortification, their Luminen Bucklers and Barriers shimmering with faint golden light. Wielding a mix of Bolt and Plasma Guns, the Auxilia pick off the enemy weapons, barely acknowledging the enemy barrage. The only weapon that causes them trouble are the auto-cannons embedded in the casemates.
These rapid fire heavy weapons spew six thousand rounds per minute at the Auxilia, more than enough to punch through their protections, taking a couple of seconds or so to reduce each Auxilia to mist and shrapnel.
Four Auxillia perish before the autocannons are melted by a barrage of plasma fire and a couple of krak grenades. Thirty seconds later, the Auxilia have slagged the fortress and Verlin follows them in, commando crawling in through the airlock like a mechanical Jack ‘Jonny’ Torrance. Two Castraferrum Dreadnought sized cyber mastiffs follow after him.
These Barghest Pattern Cyber Mastiffs are the largest I was willing to make as designing one big enough for their Dreadnoughts to ride is wholly unnecessary, despite Verlin trying to tempt me with arcanotech relics to do so.
The bigger the dog the smarter it has to be as they have more systems to run. The normal gun dogs could already understand complex commands, let alone the pony sized ones that my Mastiff Riders use. These Barghest Pattern cyber mastiffs are bright enough to talk, much like a Janus Pattern Servitor or Servo-Skull. They’re a new cybernetic life form and near heretical construct.
The Barghest Pattern mastiffs are rather playful, if you're a Geist Pattern Dreadnought. For Red Knoll’s crew, they are death. Even for the Barghest Marines, with the special link they have with each other and most Cyber Mastiffs, the Barghest mastiffs are incredibly dangerous, even when they don’t mean to be.
Abbisine has tried to have the mastiffs destroyed twice already and they’ve only existed for a single month. JK-404 has some way of controlling them that she’s not sharing and the cybernetic doggos love her. I suspect she is using her gland speciality and borrowed some technology from the Tau database. Abbisine investigated in the hope of censuring her, but failed to work out how JK-404 was controlling the Cyber Mastiffs.
Taliel-Iota-5 won’t go anywhere near the Barghest Pattern mastiffs as they maimed one of his terminally curious apprentices, of which he still seems to have an unending stream of, despite the discussion we had when we first met. I’m starting to think he keeps them around as a form of automated self-preservation mechanism, rather than students.
Examining the dead, I notice that the Auxilia are predominantly full body cyborgs like my Warforged. No longer are their bodies restricted by low compatibility geneseed organs. With their identical armour and Servo-Harnesses, the only obvious difference between the two is their choice in weapons, with Warforged preferring energy weapons like Ark Rifles, and Marwolv Pattern Lasguns, with bolt pistols for secondaries.
The Barghest Auxilia and the Space Marines are the other way around, preferring physical projectile weapons for their primaries and energy weapons for their secondaries. Unlike the Warforged and Barghest Auxilia though, the Space Marines have their armour warded, rather than their skin, and they’re a little taller.
While Verlin carves through another thick door with the enthusiasm of a starving marine hacking at a particularly stubborn block of ship’s biscuit, I read up on JK-404 and the Barghest Apothecaries' modifications to the Space Marines. Their trial results state that they have encountered interference problems between Warding Electoos and the Black Carapace. The integrated wards are a decent compromise. While more vulnerable to damage, the wards do allow for a much higher power level than those printed on to Void Skin.
Now that I am aware of the issue, I am greatly amused that there is a practical reason behind the Grey Knights looking so cool. These incorruptible, psychic demonslayers are not showing off their vital protections against sorcerous threats for no reason. The Barghests don’t have Aegis Armour like the Grey Knights, I doubt the Barghests know such a thing even exists, but they do have a pretty good copy of it thanks to the efforts of my people.
With some amusement, I realise that to everyone else, not only will this attack look like an Imperial Heavy Transport has been boarded by 160 Barghest Marines and a near indestructible Dreadnought, the whole station appears to have been invaded by an entire legion of Tech-Marines and their supporting forces. Even during the Great Crusade, I doubt there was a battle that looked quite like this one.
For a moment I glow with pride, knowing that I’ve brought back a small portion of Humanity’s Golden Age. Cid Myers would be proud, I’m sure.
Falling slabs of plasteel and adamantium clang against the deck, shaking me from my self-aggrandisement. Again, it is the Auxilia who charge through the gap, followed by forty Space Marines and a swarm of Servo-Skulls. Odhran is doing far more to preserve his best forces than Verlin ever did.
Verlin brings up the rear with his oversized doggos. This time, he pulls himself into a main thoroughfare, fifteen metres by ten metres and can manoeuvre his massive frame with far fewer restrictions.
Servo-Skulls scatter through the vessel, mapping its interior. My Rapid Decision Engine points out that each Servo-Skull comes from one of the Astartes that died to Gibbering Moon’s Chaos Knight. Seeing how Force Commander Odhran is honouring the dead makes me glad that I didn’t go ahead with my first idea for punishing the Penitents.
A Servo-Skull pings Odhran that it has discovered a high concentration of cultist crew, traitor guardsmen, and mutants. I switch to its feed.
My eyebrows shoot up as I witness the single largest open space on a void ship that I have ever seen save for Iron Crane’s shipyard and I’m not entirely sure that counts because it opens to the void and is rarely pressurised.
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The colossal cylinders built into either side of the Imperial Heavy Transport are not partitioned into decks and filled with warehouses as I assumed. Instead, they are hollow structures with a volume of approximately 0.09km3. Normally they would be filled with ore, grain, or perhaps ice.
This one has been turned into a vertical city. Four large central pillars hold huge staircases and multiple bridges that connect to each other and the walls of the cylinder. The architecture is striking, with slim, sweeping arches, delicate statues, and near maddening mosaics of scattered colours that one cannot quite determine what they are intended to depict.
Multiple thoroughfares have been cut through the walls of the cylinder to adjacent cylinders, also filled with more hab blocks, warehouses, and many other supporting facilities. Thousands of buildings cling to the sides of the cylinders and bridges. Everything is unimaginably opulent, faced with black marble, or painted with royal purple and luminescent gold.
Bright flowers fill the air with intoxicants and mutagens. Cages hang from the bridges, stuffed with corpses, dressed in fine silks. Their bodies appear fresh and healthy, as if at any moment they could breathe again and return to life; a faint touch of dust upon their shoulders and eyelashes suggests they have been hanging there for months, perhaps years.
The inhabitants swan about, drinking, laughing, even copulating with each other against the walls. Despite their relaxed attitude and luxurious clothing, all of the Cultists are armed with knives, pistols, and other weapons.
Even if each person was allotted a thousand cubic metres, there would be enough space for 88,357 people in a single cylinder. From the Servo-Skull’s cursory scans I would estimate that there are bunks for at least five times as many and this vessel has eight cylinders on each side.
Assuming all the cylinders have been converted into habitation, that’s over seven million inhabitants. The other two traitor void ships are smaller, but even then, I would estimate that Karrad Vall must have invaded Footfall with at least 12 million infantry to call upon, not including voidsmen or menials.
For a brief moment, Commodore Emil Astoris’ struggles suddenly seem a lot more reasonable, even if I assume he had a full crew. On the other hand, with this vertical city still packed with people, I doubt Karrad Vall outnumbered Emil by over five to one like he could have. Neither should the Black Brotherhood have had much impact either with their disorganised cell structure and internal, conflicting interests.
The more immediate puzzle however is that there are no alarms, no sign that the vessel has been invaded, despite the blatant assault by Astartes. The mystery does not deter the Barghests though as they split up and spread through the vessel, capturing crew.
Once they have over a hundred prisoners, multiple Astartes bite the prisoners, turning them into Worgen. They toss the Worgen into the vertical city, then lock down as many doors to the city as they can find and weld them shut, simultaneously repeating the tactic on the other side of the vessel with other squads.
While the Worgen cause trouble, Servo-Skulls move around the vertical city, interacting with the local control panels for the Environmental Sustainer and tweak the air mix to have 40% oxygen. After changing the mix, they disable the safety features and lock down the panels.
Within minutes of the Worgen assault beginning, fires break out. With the Environmental Sustainer sabotaged and no other automatic systems installed, the elegant city gradually fills with thick black smoke. Flames spread fierce and fast while the inhabitants try to fight off the ever increasing tide of fur, teeth, and claws, too distracted to focus on the growing inferno consuming their vessel.
Two squads of Astartes secure the bridge, stopping the crew from potentially overriding the marine’s sabotage, though that turns out to be unnecessary as the Imperial Heavy Transport does not have sophisticated central controls. They abandon the bridge, locking and welding all the doors before they leave.
Odhran really doesn’t play fair. His style is completely different to Verlin.
The scouting, mapping and sabotage continues. The other boarded enemy vessels suffer similar tactics.
Two hours after the Bargests unleashed the Wargen, they discover a desecrated Auto-Temple in the centre of the vessel. A Servo-Skull sends back a brief image of a ritual site filled with Daemonettes and a squad of Traitor Marines decked out in purple and gold. Four of the marines hold odd looking bolters and the fifth is enthusiastically waving a bone white force staff, guttural incantations flowing from his bloody lips. The Traitor Marine Chaos Sorcerer raises his bolt pistol and destroys the Servo-Skull.
With their hated foe located and their scheme discovered, the Barghest Marines thunder through the Imperial Heavy Transport, converging on the Auto-Temple.
I scoff at the Traitor Marines’ weakness. Every time something goes wrong, they always turn to their perverse gods with a ritual, demanding attention like spoiled children. They do not pray with their hearts full of faith and face their death with determination and grace. They scream and curse, determined to wriggle from their fate, uncaring of how many, or who they kill with their petty struggles.
Worthless hypocrites every last one.
The Barghests storm the temple from three doors. One force, led by Verlin, cuts through the main doors and charges down the nave. The other two teams enter through the transepts and focus fire on the main altar, pouring bolt and plasma fire at the Chaos Sorcerer. Despite the incoming barrage the Sorcerer continues to chant over a bone white runic circle, lit with candles and filled with bowls of xeno flora, warp infused minerals, and other reagents.
Lightning scatters over an invisible bubble with each munition that strikes at the ritual. The munitions turn to dust that swirls and billows over the protections. Even the plasma turns to dust, which is utterly bizarre.
Daemonettes step out of shadows and flames, then dance among the marines, caressing their power armour with sharp claws and flesh twisting blades. Their gentle touches spark across Luminen Barriers with no effect and their faces twist from loving gazes to incandescent fury.
The Barghests’ wards glow bright as their mechadendrites dice the Daemonettes and their Servo-Harnesses unleash bright blasts from their Volkite Incinerators and Marwolv laspistols even as they continue to lay down fire, filling the Auto-Temple with devastating bolts.
Utterly unprepared for Astartes that can fire three weapons at once while fending off melee strikes, the Daemonettes are sent screaming back to the Warp, their bodies igniting with golden flames as they weaken, then disperse under Alpia’s presence in the system.
Four Traitor Marines move up to the edge of the ritual’s protective barrier, point their weapons at the closest Barghests, and fire. An unholy noise fills the Auto-Temple for a brief moment, then the audio feed cuts out as every microphone is overloaded.
Even with all their protections, the Barghests tremble from the onslaught. Their mighty strength fails them and their bolters fall from their hands. Power Armour sparks, wards fail, and Luminen protections flicker and die.
Spirits flicker around the barrels of the Noise Marines’ strange weapons, tearing chunks off the tortured souls, launching psychic shards alongside a torrent of destructive sounds.
My whole body tenses as I realise those aren’t just Noise Marines. They’re something new. Not only that, those weapons are clearly designed to strip away the enhanced protections that the Stellar Fleet and Barghests use. Somehow, these Slaaneshi Marines have a counter on the first outing of our new equipment.
Are the Traitor Marines lucky, or does the Stellar Fleet have its first traitor?
The vile vibrations cease and four marines fall to their knees, their brains pulped inside their own skulls. There is a brief pause in the action and wild, mechanical laughter fills the Auto-Temple.
The Chaos Sorcerer screams at the top of his voice, “Behold, my creations!”