Another of the Savage Morticians assisted its fellow surgeon with the ovariotomy procedure and Uriel bellowed in anger as he felt a blunt needle punch through the ossified bone shield that protected the organs within his chest cavity.
His struggles grew weaker as the powerful soporific sped around his body and overcame his fearsomely resistant metabolism. He felt rough hands laying him within the soft, wet embrace of the daemonculaba's womb and warmth enfolded him as he felt his limbs sutured into its bloody interior.
He felt pulsing organs around him and the rapid tattoo of a heart beating too fast above his head.
'You die now,' said the Savage Mortician. 'Too old to become Iron Warrior. Gene-seed will foster new growths to rupture your flesh. Mutant growths and unknown results ensue. You will be in pieces soon. In jars.'
'No…' slurred Uriel, struggling feebly against the incapacitating drug. 'Kill you…'
But the swathes of the daemonculaba's blubbery flesh were already being folded over his supine body to leave him trapped in darkness. Moist, blood-rich flesh smothered his face and he fought to free his hands, but a warm numbness suffused his body.
The last thing Uriel heard before he slipped into unconsciousness was the sound of the daemon womb's thick, leathery skin being stitched shut above him.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Ardaric Vaanes fought the Savage Mortician all the way, though it did little good. It had a firm a grip of him in its bronze claws, his limbs held immobile and only his head able to move. The monstrous surgeon loped through the screaming chamber on long, stilt like legs, its stride smooth and long, despite the unevenness of the ground. It towered over the abominable hybrid creations that toiled at blood-slick experimentation tables, making its way towards some hideous destination of its own. 'Pasanius!' he shouted. 'Can you hear me?' The Ultramarines sergeant nodded dumbly, his head rolling slackly on numbed muscles, and Vaanes knew there would be no help from him until the drug he had been given wore off. With the exception of Ventris, he could see that the black-robed monsters were taking all of them to the same place, a procession of the grotesque creatures bearing them towards their doom. Pasanius was near as damn unconscious behind him, closely followed by Seraphys, the Blood Raven and the two Guardsmen. The remaining nine members of their warrior band were there as well.
Not for the first time since they'd begun the journey to Khalan-Ghol, Vaanes cursed Ventris for deluding them into believing they could pull this suicide mission off. But more than that, he cursed himself for falling for his fine words of courage. Vaanes was under no illusions as to his lack of honour, and should have known better than to believe the same tired old lie.
Honsou had been right when he talked of where honour got you. Vaanes had given up believing in such things long ago and all it had earned him were decades of wandering the stars as a rootless mercenary until he had ended up on this miserable hellhole of a world.
He had dared to believe that Ventris represented his final opportunity for redemption, that by taking this one, last chance, he would be redeemed and renewed in the sight of the Emperor. Now he knew better, as that promise turned to bitter ashes.
He shut out the cries and moans of those poor unfortunates who suffered in the Savage Morticians' lust for knowledge, their piteous cries unable to penetrate his bitter heart of stone. They were weak, allowing themselves to feel. To feel pain, remorse, anguish and pity. Vaanes had long ago shut himself off to those emotions and knew that it made him stronger.
'The strong are strongest alone,' he whispered, remembering those words when he first heard them from the mouth of one of his former paymasters.
At last their hellish journey came to an end as they entered a wide, circular arena with a dozen, rusted steel mortuary tables around its circumference, deep blood gutters running down the length of each one. An arrangement of iron poles, like the framework for some great gazebo, encompassed the anatomist's theatre, supporting a heavy block and tackle arrangement of meat hooks above each table. Large tubs and barrels for blood and waste trimmings were placed at convenient intervals, together with a long trough of dark water. A soiled workbench sat in the centre of the theatre, strewn with an assortment of short and long-bladed knives, cleavers, hatchets and hacksaws.
Swiftly, the Savage Morticians deposited each of the warrior band on one of the tables, securing their limbs with thick bands of iron and heavy bolts. Vaanes kicked out as the beast carrying him hacked off his jump pack with one blow and slammed him down on the table. A bronze claw slashed out, and Vaanes blinked away blood as the blade laid his face open to the bone.
The creature's dead features leaned in close to his own, hissing its crackling, unintelligible language in anger, and he spat blood in its eye. Its claw drew back to strike him again, but another of the Savage Morticians angrily hissed something and the blow never landed. Instead, it secured him to the table, ensuring that his hands were bound such that he could not unsheathe his lightning claws.
Vaanes watched as a robed monster on spiked tracks carried their weapons to an examination table and a pair of the Morticians began cataloguing them with studied interest. He tugged at the bindings on the table, looking to free himself and kill his enemies.
He didn't expect to escape alive, but perhaps he could take a few of these bastards with him before he died. Pasanius was bolted onto another table: his silver arm bound above the junction of metal and flesh, his forearm dangling over the sharp-edged sides. Their charges secured, most of the Savage Morticians departed, each of them eager to be about their own particular macabre experimentation.
Only two remained and Vaanes knew that if there was ever going to be a time to try and escape, this was it. The mutant creature their daemonic captor had called Sabatier limped into the theatre, nodding in satisfaction as he saw that the Space Marines were securely restrained.
'Not so defiant now,' it said to Vaanes, its malformed head still resting on its shoulder.
'When I get loose, I'm going to tear that head clean off and see if you still get back up, you damn freak!' shouted Vaanes.
Sabatier laughed his gurgling laugh. 'No. I going to watch you hoisted up on hooks and butchered. You and all your fellows.'
'Damn, you. I'll kill you!' screamed Vaanes, thrashing ineffectually at his bonds.
Sabatier leaned closer, its snapped neck causing its head to lurch and sway. 'I will enjoy watching you die. Watch you weep and soil yourself as they open you up and your innards spill out in front of you.'
Vaanes heard Leonid's familiar hacking cough, and twisted his head, his frustrations spilling out in an exclamation of rage. 'Will you shut up!' he yelled. 'Shut up or just die and stop making such a pathetic noise!'
But Leonid's cough was soon obscured as he heard the sharp whine of a sawblade powering up. Vaanes twisted his head to watch as the Savage Morticians bent over Pasanius, one extending steel clamps to hold his arm firm, while the other lowered a shrieking saw towards the flesh just above the sergeant's elbow.
Horrified, but morbidly fascinated, Vaanes watched as the saw bit into the meat of Pasanius's arm, sending arcing sprays of blood across the mortuary theatre. Pasanius yelled as the, Savage Mortician worked the blade deep into his convulsing arm, the pain cutting through the fog of the sedative. The pitch of the slicing saw changed and Vaanes smelled the burning tang of seared bone as the blade cut into the humerus.
Blood flooded from the wound onto the floor, draining through a partially clogged sinkhole in the centre of the theatre with a horrid gurgling. Vaanes heard the two Guardsmen weep in terror at what was happening, but pushed them from his mind as he continued to watch the grisly amputation.