‘We have wiped out their sentries, brothers – now we will descend upon them like the Emperor’s Wrath. To your posts.’
The knot of sergeants broke up at once, and the huge armoured figures trooped down the deck to the waiting lines of Dark Hunters, shouting commands, the ordinary humans of the fleet scattering before them like lambs before wolves. The next wave of Thunderhawks was already being prepped, gunships as well as troop-transports this time. But it was the drop pods which would strike first.
‘Fornix, walk with me. I go to the command dais.’ They marched off without a further word, and it was only when they were ascending on one of the great cargo elevators that Jonah Kerne said:
‘First sergeant, where are my Chaplain and Librarian?’
Fornix scratched the side of his head. ‘The moment they came back, they went off somewhere together. I believe Malchai wanted a quiet word with our young epistolary. Elijah looked as though he was about to puke bullets. I think his first encounter with the Great Enemy scrambled his wits a little.’
‘Find them,’ Kerne snapped. ‘I do not have time to track down my command squad through the guts of the ship.’
‘Yes, brother-captain,’ Fornix said, watching his friend closely. Then he added: ‘Jonah, it was not your place to be at the head of a boarding party – you know that. You command Mortai.’
‘And you are my second, and yet you charged in there like some glory-hunting recruit fresh out of the Haradai.’
‘Ah, that’s me – ’twas ever thus.’
Jonah Kerne stared at his old friend. ‘Mortai needs its first sergeant as much as it needs its captain, Fornix. You should have let Finn March lead the way onto the enemy bridge.’
‘Well, you know me–’
‘Enough. You hear what I have said. Apply it. I will not say it again.’
Fornix’s face went carefully blank. ‘Yes, brother-captain.’
For the first time, Jonah Kerne’s arrival in the command centre of the Ogadai caused no comment or reaction. The crew were all too busy, and the red lumens of battle stations were still glowing like sullen coals around the command dais.
Kerne climbed the stone steps of the dais with his helm cradled in one arm, and waited, knowing better than to interfere with Massaron and his work.
‘Fire one,’ the shipmaster said, and there was the long slow shake under their feet as the massive Voidsunder in the bow erupted. It was three kilometres away from where they stood, and yet the power of that salvo echoed through the entire ship like a far-off earth-tremor.
‘Direct hit amidships,’ the flag lieutenant said. ‘Sir, she’s breaking up.’
A hum of satisfaction ran through the servitors on the dais, though they did not pause in their work for a second.
‘Enemy is breaking formation,’ Enginseer Miranich ticked out in that metallic grate of his.
‘Arm torpedoes, notify broadside batteries,’ Massaron said. He stood with his arms folded, seemingly imperturbable. ‘Fire two when firing resolution is locked.’
‘They’re running for it, sir,’ the lieutenant said.
‘I see that, Gershon. Configure torpedoes for that other Dauntless cruiser. I don’t want it to get away.’
‘Torpedoes launched, wide spread,’ a servitor said tonelessly, the binaric data-speak underlying his words like a secondary mutter. ‘On target.’
‘He’s evading, coming round to port at one three five mark twelve,’ the lieutenant barked, excitement raising his voice. ‘Sir, he’s turning right into–’
‘I see it. Fire two.’
A moment’s pause. Out in the emptiness of space, the Ogadai had just launched a vast spearhead of immense energy.
‘He’s hit–’
Jonah Kerne looked up. In the viewports high above his head there was a momentary flash of white light.
‘Target destroyed,’ Miranich reported without emotion. ‘Five torpedoes have gone wide. Three have made hits. Two more enemy ships are now out of command.’
‘Come to starboard ninety degrees,’ Massaron said. He unfolded his arms and his hands were now clenched into fists at his side. Under their feet, the hundreds of thousands of tons that were his ship wheeled in the void.
‘Now, port batteries, open fire as they bear.’
Kerne could hear the rumble and hiss of the lasburner batteries that lined the ship’s sides open up. It was too faint for the hearing of a normal human, but to the ears of an Adeptus Astartes, the sound was like carbonated liquid fizzing out of an opened bottle.
‘Targets destroyed,’ the flag lieutenant said, triumph lighting up his voice. ‘The rest of the enemy fleet is powering out of high orbit at maximum speed. Sir, shall I signal Arbion and Beynish to pursue?’
‘Negative. Signal them to remain astern. I want no more surprises.’ Here, for the first time, Massaron looked at Kerne, and there was something like shame in his face.
Then he turned back to the banks of monitors that towered above him.
‘Resume course for low orbit. I want continuous augur-sweeps of the planet, and scan for all vox-emissions. Recharge all weapons and stand by.’
A murmur of assent across the dais.
‘Lieutenant Gershon, you have the con. Captain Kerne, I expect you would like a full report.’
Kerne nodded curtly.
‘I have a ready room below. Please join me there.’
Kerne’s silence seemed to unnerve the shipmaster slightly. He poured water from a metal flask and drank off a tankard of it.
The Space Marine captain dominated the small room, and a faint smell of ozone rose off his armour. A shining dust speckled him: the residue of vacuum combat.
‘The enemy picket-line of destroyers was led with some skill,’ Massaron said, looking at the empty flagon he held in one fist. ‘There were six of them, light destroyers reconfigured for use against capital targets. Four, we obliterated – two more were taken out by your warriors.’ He paused. ‘I was distracted by the fate of the Caracalla, and let two of them slip past us into an ideal firing position, at our stern. It will not happen again. I apologise.’
‘What of the Caracalla?’ Kerne demanded harshly.
‘Gone. Some two thousand of the crew took to lifeboats and were picked up. The rest perished when the drives overheated and exploded.’ He poured himself more water. ‘Seven thousand men and women.’
He held the flagon up, and looked at it as though it were an artefact from an unknown world.
‘Shipmaster Miraneis was a fine officer. She did her duty.’ He drank deep, as though the water were something stronger.
‘She was my daughter.’
Grief gnarled his face. He faced the tall Space Marine squarely. ‘I made a mistake, distracted by sentiment. It will not happen again.’
‘See that it does not,’ Jonah Kerne told him coldly. ‘The boarding action should not have been necessary, and it has forced me to modify my plans for the planetary assault scant hours before it is due to begin. We do not have the resources or the time to permit such mistakes, shipmaster.’
‘Agreed, captain. I will submit a report on my error to Mors Angnar, and am ready to accept whatever sanction the Chapter Master sees fit to inflict.’
Kerne shook his head. ‘Belay that. We do not have the time for it, and there is no one else to whom the Ogadai can be trusted – you know that as well as I. Tell me of the situation as it now stands.’
Massaron blinked, and a low breath escaped him, as though he had been holding it in all this time.
‘We are two hours out from low orbit. The Punisher fleet has been scattered and is fleeing. We have destroyed two Dauntless class light cruisers and a total of eleven destroyers, plus at least six transport vessels. The way is clear for the ground phase of the operation to begin.’