Damocles Read online

  The Space Marines were there quickly, like they knew exactly where they were going.

  The sound of the battle in the enclosed space was terrific. Even with the audio dampers on my helmet my ears were ringing with the rapid triple bangs of bolt-rounds – expulsion, acceleration, explosion. I had Por’el Skilltalker shoved down in cover. By this time, I had no doubt that he was the target. They were going to slaughter us all and spirit him off to Emperor alone knows what torment. I was not going to let that happen. Every time he tried to rise, I shoved him back. In the main, humans are stronger than tau, and the water caste are not the strongest of the castes. It was no trouble for me.

  I looked around. There was a door a quick scramble back from the balcony, leading from the lounge into a service way. Away from the table and the gallery’s enclosing, low wall, there was a clear line of fire up the landing. When I tried to link into the tau tacnet I couldn’t. My helmet displays were full of static snow. I’m pretty sure it was being jammed, and so my understanding of the wider situation was severely limited. I attempted to get a look over the balcony wall down into the lower hall, but I didn’t even get the top of my helmet over the lip before a spray of bolts drove me back. A couple sped overhead, propellant flaring at the rear, two more smacked into the wall in front of me, one blowing a smoking hole out of it on our side. I threw myself onto Skilltalker as shards of composites pattered around us.

  Skilltalker was trying to talk, looking at me beseechingly. I think he was trying to tell me that he was going to surrender. I don’t recall the exact words, but I remember shouting ‘no’ at him several times. I got angry with him, I am sure of that.

  ‘We have to get him out of here before the Space Marines make it up the stairs onto the gallery!’ I called to Goliath and Othelliar. The pair of them were firing down over the edge of the balcony at the Space Marines. Goliath was sniping, ice cold. The fire warrior at his side was flung backwards from the rails, pulse rifle clattering over the edge. He staggered a few steps before being thrown further backwards as the bolt in his chest blew, spraying us with his viscera. Goliath didn’t even flinch as blood ran off his helmet, but carried on calmly shooting. Othelliar was wilder. I couldn’t see his face behind his helmet, but I guessed that he was snarling with hatred at the Emperor’s elite. He was losing it, and turning into a liability.

  Goliath quit firing soon enough, I had to order Othelliar to give it up, and he did so only reluctantly.

  ‘Shas’ui! Shas’ui!’ I called, beckoning to the fire warrior leader. It took me a couple of attempts.

  ‘I am going to get the por’el out of here,’ I said in badly mangled Tau’noh’por. A lot of tau have difficulty understanding human accents, we can’t hit the higher notes, can’t control our pitch vibrato properly, and the multiple glottal stops are murder on our throats. He got my drift. ‘The service door!’ I shouted.

  A missile streaked overhead, tearing a chunk out of the roof. Wiring fell through in a bundle, sparking madly. A large part of the gallery’s lights went out. Fires had taken in various places, I think the Space Marines were spraying promethium around down there. The ship’s life support must have taken a hit too, as the air was filling with poisonous black smoke. Retardant foams sprayed fitfully from the ceiling, but all the systems in the room were taking a pounding, and the fires were winning.

  ‘O’Va’Dem will be here soon,’ he said. Their commander. A new one on me, I didn’t recognise the words that made up his name.

  ‘I’m going now,’ I said. ‘If commander arrives, por’el still in danger. Gue’ron’sha take him. They come up stairs, they kill us all. They take him away. I take him from here, you hold enemy at bay!’

  The shas’ui said nothing. I cursed my human throat. I’d just spewed a garbled mess of noise at him. ‘We go now!’ I said as clearly as I could, pointing at myself and then Skilltalker.

  Bolt-rounds were speeding up the gallery by now. I’d lost a good chance to get out trying to make myself understood. Pulse rounds were being traded on an almost equal basis for the Space Marine’s miniature rockets, making our way out a perilous crossing over a shooting gallery.

  ‘I will give myself over to them!’ said the por’el. ‘There has been enough bloodshed.’

  We both ignored him. ‘Get ready,’ I said. ‘Do you understand?’ I said to the shas’ui.

  The shas’ui nodded, and beckoned three of his warriors over.

  ‘Cover the gallery so that Por’el Skilltalker may make his escape,’ he told them. The door opened to receive us.

  ‘Cease fire!’ the shas’ui ordered. Immediately, pulse fire dropped off. The three fire warriors ran into the corridor, between the bolter fire and our escape door. We followed right behind, keeping low. The fire warriors were dropped in short order, spun around by the impact of the bolts and their secondary explosions, selling themselves to shield the por’el and us.

  ‘Tau’va!’ one cried as he died. Othelliar shrieked. He stumbled into the service corridor.

  We were through the door. Me, Krix, Othelliar and Skilltaker.

  Othelliar was frantic, clawing at his helmet. There was a crack in it.

  ‘Let me look! Let me look!’ I said, pushing his hands out of the way. I reached around and snapped off the seals. The moment it came away, Othelliar calmed. The round had not penetrated, but the impact had shivered the material, and a sliver of the composites that made up the helmet had pierced his scalp. The source of the pain removed, he calmed down, although blood was running down his face.

  ‘You okay?’ I said. I had to shout over the racket outside. ‘We need to get out of here!’

  ‘Where’s Goliath?’ he gasped.

  Goliath. I spun around, still in a crouch.

  In the corridor, Goliath was on the floor, hand outstretched. A red chunk the size of both my fists clasped had been taken out of his side.

  He stared at me for a moment, then fell dead. You’d think there’d be something in a look like that. Wondering, or pain, or anger, but there was nothing there, nothing at all.

  Heavier weapons fire sounded from the gallery below. The shriek of tau plasma weapons and the puffy explosions they made, the soft but dangerous burr of a burst cannon. I caught sight of a battlesuit, a design I’d never seen before, rise over the edge of the balcony wall, and then it was gone, diving hard onto the Space Marines below, the barrels of its plasma rifles glowing blue as it spat the stuff of stars at the warriors of the Imperium.

  The door slid shut, cutting us off from the sounds of the battle.

  Chapter Thirteen

  My brother Kaaw reports that they have made the bridge with no casualties and minimal contact with the enemy. The pilots have been slain, they say. I order them to scour the area around the bridge, kill all they find, then fall back to the boarding torpedo.

  Minimal contact. The same cannot be said for here. We have come out into some kind of refectory, an eating area that is decadently appointed. It is a large place, as much museum or demonstration area as refectory. It curves around with the ship, and I cannot see the far end.

  Sculptures and displays shatter under bolter fire. The enemy’s returning volleys, the high-energy particles they fire, score the walls around us.

  There are many of them. Fifty or so of their fire warriors to begin with, although many are dead. Positioned around the refectory, in its galleries and behind its barbarous alien artworks, they have the advantage of numbers, cover and height. But we are the Space Marines of the Emperor, the Raven Guard. We are the mightiest warriors of the galaxy, and they are dying.

  Three of my brothers have worked their way up to the gallery where they have caught sight of the diplomat. He is pinned in place with his treacherous human guardians. In a short time we shall have him, and we will depart this ship.

  Pulse fire whistles through the air all around us. Six of us hold the entrance to the refectory.
The other three work their way forwards, awaiting bursts of covering fire from us as they run from cover to cover. Brother Huk of Squad Silent Talon carries a flamer, with him go his battle-brothers Colot and Cruk. A grenade arcs in from above, tossed by one of my brethren there. A small group of fire warriors are slain, slumping down when shrapnel pierces them. Under the cover of the explosion, Huk and his companions dash forward again. In the gallery, my brothers slay three of the enemy, take position in one of the protrusions that decorate the gallery’s length, and open fire from above. The fire warriors below are driven to hide, those that seek to dislodge my warriors from their new vantage are slain, for there is only a long corridor by which each of the small eating areas are accessed, and they are quickly cut down as they approach.

  This time Huk, Colot and Cruk do not seek cover.

  A whumph of igniting promethium, and flame spreads all over the lower part of the refectory. Aliens scream shrilly. The volume of fire coming from their part of the hall falls off dramatically, then so does our own as our potential targets are laid low.

  [Fire. He remembers fire. Another fleeting intrusion. The fires of polluting refineries belching poisons at the night. The fires of the sky warriors’ ships as they descend that fateful day. The fires of a hundred burning worlds. Earth caste machines at 98%. Secondary nagi collective down to 29% living membership.]

  Fire.

  Then, ill news. ‘Brother-Sergeant Cornix, the diplomat has escaped into the ship.’

  I curse this ill luck. ‘Alone?’ I ask.

  ‘No, brother-sergeant. Two of the human traitors and the avian xenos went with him.’

  I check my signifier. The steady pulse of the beacon implant beats true yet. It appears that we must rely on Gallius’s gambit.

  ‘All is not lost,’ I say. My brother does not reply, but I sense the confusion in his hesitation. ‘We are the masters of secrets,’ I say. ‘We keep what we need to keep close by our breast, for no other to know.’ It is explanation enough for him; this is the way of our Chapter.

  ‘Brother-sergeant!’ Huk has time to cry out before he is cut down. His fire tipped the balance towards us, but the smoke and flames have allowed the foe’s elites to approach unobserved. Now comes the true test.

  They come in through the choking broil of the fire, weapons spitting. Five of them, their armour painted in the same blues and blacks as the fire warriors. One levels a plasma gun at Huk’s remaining companions. A bolt of incandescent gas bursts through the chest of Cruk. Fire leaps from his eye lenses as he is consumed. They are led by one larger. His armour is of different design entirely, and coloured a bright crimson. He attacks with terrible ferocity, and Colot goes down to join his dead brothers. We honour their sacrifice for now and forevermore.

  The fire warriors, so close to breaking moments ago, rally around their leader and his bodyguard. One of these armoured knights falls to concentrated bolter fire from my group, but the others shrug it off, the bolts ricocheting from the suits’ angled planes, or exploding on the surface. The weapons they possess are far more effective against us than those carried by their infantry.

  ‘Withdraw!’ I shout. ‘Fall back to the torpedo!’

  ‘We have failed!’ The cry comes from Roak. He is angry, and his anger is laced with shame.

  ‘No. We are successful. There are ways to win other than slaughter.’ This is true, I think. But if I depart now, then attention will fall upon the diplomat. Needs dictate a diversion, a sacrifice. There is no need for more than one more of us to die here.

  A duty I accept unflinchingly. In this way do we serve the Emperor, and through him all mankind.

  ‘Fall back. I will hold them here!’ My brothers obey instantly. They cover each other as they retreat from the room. The xenos’ armour makes them strong, but they are cautious in the face of such as we.

  This is my oath; to serve the Emperor. We strike from the shadows where we can, and reap the glorious harvest of confusion and panic our actions engender. Not today. Not every war can be prosecuted in secret, not every battle won from the darkness. I stand firm, in full view, my bolter raised and shouting out mankind’s superiority over the xenos that would usurp our position as masters of the stars. Now, revealed to my foe in full, I sing the quiet songs of my Chapter.

  The xenos do not approach. They cannot draw adequate fire angles on me. I hold them.

  I am gratified to witness the departure of my command. They communicate that they are aboard the torpedo, and tell me to join them. I would if I could. I adjudge the diversion sufficient, and that our final plan to be a success.

  But I cannot fall back. I am surrounded. They are trying to come at me from behind while they pin me down to the front. From the gallery, increasing numbers of weapons are being brought to bear on me.

  I cast a grenade at the lesser warriors advancing from my rear. My bolter is almost spent. I throw it down, pull free my axe and bolt pistol and charge at the battlesuited elite in the gallery space, hewing at them. Their armoured suits offer much protection, but against the energised edge of my axe, it avails them of little.

  Before they take me, two die by my hand, and I am satisfied.

  Chapter Fourteen

  We ran.

  Through the ship, away from the noise of fighting, along a transverse corridor that connected the reception chamber to the kitchens and servants’ quarters behind it. A tau in the livery of the earth caste diplomatic support group popped his face round the door and I snarled to him to get back into his cabin. There was a minimal number of earth caste servers aboard. A lucky happenstance, I thought at the time. They’d have been slaughtered.

  Everything’s calculated though, isn’t it? My time with Skilltalker should have taught me that.

  ‘We’ll get him to the other side,’ I said. ‘We’ll hold there until the threat is confined.’

  ‘You lead. I’ll take the rear,’ Othelliar said. ‘Give me another chance to take a crack at those whoresons.’ He was really angry. He looked wild, all that blood on his face.

  It was eerily silent here away from the fight. The Space Marines ship was no longer firing on us, not wanting to kill their own, I guess. We reached the other side of the vessel, and turned toward the rear.

  ‘This way!’ I said. I was panting. The air on tau ships is too thin. ‘There’s a strongpoint just down here. We can take station there and wait this mess out. I counted twenty Space Marines or so. That’s a lot, but there’s no way they can fight their way out of that.’

  ‘Jathen, stop.’ Othelliar said.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because we just ran past the lifeboat bay.’

  ‘What’s that got to…’

  There was the building hum of a pulse gun, the whip-crack discharge. I whipped around to see Krix go down. Smoke poured out his thin chest. His beak clacked once, and his eyes dulled. He was dead.

  I stopped. Shock almost got me, but I had my gun up, pointing it without thinking at the kroot’s assassin: Othelliar.

  ‘Stand down, Jathen!’ he said. All the anger had gone out of him. He was calm, and that made me very worried. ‘This is where you’re staying. Me and the por’el are going on alone from here.’

  ‘What? Drop your gun now!’ It took a moment for me to figure out what was going on. I was confused. There was no warning of Othelliar’s treachery. One moment we were running away from the battle, intent on getting Skilltalker to safety, and now this?

  And then it all clicked.

  ‘This has been planned, all along. Skilltalker’s the target. The attack is a diversion.’

  ‘Almost, Jathen, I’m the back-up plan.’ Blood was still trickling down his face. ‘You always were a sharp one,’ he said. ‘Only this time, not sharp enough.’

  Perhaps I should have shot him there and then. Maybe if he’d still been wearing his helmet, I would have. But I was looking into his
face, wounded in a battle we’d fought together in. We were comrades, for the Emperor’s sake. I just couldn’t do it. I’d fought with him for nine months. All this time, he’d been waiting for his moment? It didn’t make any sense. Othelliar? There was no triumph in what he said. I figured he wasn’t acting of his own accord. He couldn’t be.

  ‘You’re a plant?’

  He nodded reluctantly.

  ‘How long?’

  ‘From the beginning. Does it matter? There are plenty of us. The Inquisition’s been trying to infiltrate the gue’vesa since the last war. They kept me on stand-by. I guess they didn’t want to reveal their trump card,’ he swung his gun barrel away from me then, pointing at Skilltalker’s head. ‘I should kill you too, Jathen.’

  ‘Why? You had us all convinced you hated the Imperium!’

  ‘I still do. It was my poor luck my world got caught up in all this. We’d been minding our own business for the last ten millennia when the first crusade comes crashing into the sector. You know this part of space is alive with “lost” human worlds? I mean, I say lost, we know where we are. The Imperium’d know about more of them, if it gave a damn for this part of the galaxy. Some of them have never even heard of the Imperium. We had, and wanted no part of it. Unfortunately for us, the Imperium didn’t agree. At least I’m still alive, unlike just about everybody else I ever knew. Now, drop your gun or I swear I’ll kill the por’el before I die.’

  That did it. I’d have sold my own life for Skilltalker’s, I think. In the great calculations of who was worth more alive you tau doubtless rated him much higher. But it was more than blind loyalty; I cared about him. He was the first damned friend I’d had in a long, long time.

  I lowered my gun. He jabbed his carbine muzzle toward the lifeboat bay. I put my hands up and backed slowly toward it. The circular door spun and opened at my approach, and we entered the bay, a semicircular room with five lifeboat hatches at equal intervals around the wall.