The Killing Ground

  Blaise pushed open a rusting iron door and beckoned Nisato into a long room with a handful of beds along one wall and a desk on the other. A single window looked out over the city of Barbadus. Mesira Bardhyl was sitting on one of the beds, her knees drawn up to her chest and her arms hugged around her shins. She wore a shapeless, white robe and her arms were bound with bandages.

  Nisato took a seat next to Mesira on the bed and lifted her chin, seeing that her eyes were glassy and far away.

  'Emperor's blood, what happened to her?' he asked.

  'That's pretty much how we found her,' said Pascal Blaise, 'except that she was naked.'

  'Naked?'

  'Like I said, I think her mind's gone.'

  Nisato had seen the same blank look in many a soldier's face, the shattered mind behind the eyes no longer capable of dealing with whatever trauma had broken it open, and was forced to agree.

  'Mesira?' he said. 'Can you hear me? It's Daron Nisato. I'm here to take you home.'

  She rocked back and forth, shaking her head. 'No,' she said. 'Can't go home. No home to go back to. We burned it. We burned it all. He's coming for us. Won't let us go. Must punish us for what we did.'

  'Mesira, what are you talking about?'

  'The Mourner... He's coming for us,' sobbed Mesira, tears spilling down her cheeks, 'for all of us who were there.'

  Nisato looked helplessly at Pascal Blaise. The man was pale and his eyes were wide.

  'Do you know what she's talking about?' demanded Nisato. 'Who's this Mourner?'

  'The Mourner,' said Mesira. 'I see him all the time... He's burnt, black and dead. His eyes though... His eyes are fire and he burns. No! Not with fire, no, not with fire, but with rage.'

  'Damn you, Blaise,' snapped Nisato, rising from the bed and moving towards the leader of the Sons of Salinas. 'Tell me what you know. Who is the Mourner?'

  Pascal Blaise swallowed heavily, looking over at Cawlen Hurq who stood at the doorway.

  'It's what we used to call the old man,' said Blaise, 'Sylvanus Thayer.'

  'The leader of the Sons of Salinas before you?'

  'Yes,' said Blaise, nodding.

  'But he's dead isn't he?' said Nisato. 'He was killed after the Khaturian massacre.'

  Blaise didn't answer immediately and Nisato said, 'Wasn't he?'

  'No,' said Pascal, 'he wasn't.'

  SERGEANT TREMAIN PACED the walls of the Screaming Eagles' compound, nodding and passing a word with the sentries as he went. His rifle hung loosely over his shoulder and his falcata was a reassuring presence at his hip, the sheath slapping against his thigh with every long stride he took. It felt good to be armed like an ordinary soldier, the familiar weight of the weapon he had first been issued with back on the old home world of Achaman. The old home world...

  Tremain could barely remember the world of his birth, save that it was more temperate, more beautiful and more interesting than this ugly rock. His memories were rose-tinted, he knew. Every soldier's memory of home was, but even allowing for that, he still missed the spiced hint in the air and the golden sunsets in the russet skies.

  He smiled at his unusually poetic turn of thought and paused beside a corner turret, a boxy construction of reinforced concrete, further protected by a layer of steel mesh to defeat shaped warheads. The turret scanned across the dead ground before the compound, twin autocannon protruding from the firing slit to cover the roadway that led from the urban sprawl of Barbadus.

  The night was quiet, although the rumble of engines and a teeth-numbing hum of electrics coming from one of the vehicle hangars against the far wall was an unaccustomed disturbance. The two Space Marines they had found, Tremain didn't like to use the word detained, were in there with Colonel Kain. There was something about recharging a suit of armour, although he didn't really understand what was going on.

  All he knew was that he didn't like it. Sergeant Tremain didn't like anything that upset the status quo-and he'd suspected those two warriors were trouble the moment he laid eyes on them within the fenced off area of the Killing Ground.

  He'd known for certain when Uriel Ventris lied to him in the back of the Chimera.

  Tremain shifted the rifle's weight on his shoulder and leaned out over the parapet to look at the smoky outline of Barbadus, squatting like a diseased tumour on the landscape. Of all the worlds they had been given to conquer, why did it have to be this one?

  It was foolish to expose himself like this, but it enhanced his reputation amongst the men as a man who didn't care overmuch for the threat posed by the Sons of Salinas.

  'Better watch out, sergeant,' said one of the wall sentries. 'You don't want to get your head shot off by a sniper.'

  Tremain shook his head. 'Don't you worry about me, lad,' he said. 'The Sons of Salinas might be hard fighters, but they're not soldiers and they don't have a marksman worthy of the name to worry about.'

  The sentry smiled and continued on his rounds, and once Tremain was satisfied that he had waited long enough, he leaned back. It was all very well being blase about the Sons of Salinas, but fate had a strange sense of humour when it came to hubris, and it would be just his luck to make a crack like that and have a sniper blow his head off.

  Tremain continued his rounds, finding that his gaze was continually drawn to the mountains that were little more than a jagged dark line on the horizon. He remembered the same mountains lit by the flames of Khaturian and shivered. He hadn't thought of the Killing Ground in many years. He tried to keep his thoughts away from that day as far as possible, but there was a strange sense of unease in the air tonight, an unease that made him think of past shames and which had driven him from the warmth of the barracks to wander the walls of the compound.

  Perhaps it was simply the presence of the Space Marines that was unnerving him, for there could be no doubt that Sons of Salinas informers would have passed word of their arrival to enemy combatants, but something told him that whatever he was feeling had more to do with the past than what was transpiring here tonight.

  Tremain paused on his rounds, looking up at the flag that billowed and snapped high above the walls, the golden screaming eagle, resplendent against a crimson field. The sight of the fiery eagle used to fill Tremain with pride, but every time he looked at it now, he felt a curious mix of sadness and regret.

  The turret at the north corner of the compound wheezed as its hydraulics moved it around and Tremain slung his rifle about and quickly checked the charge. He set off at a casual pace, not wanting to seem too concerned, but anxious to know what had alerted the gunners.

  The back of the turret was supposed to be sealed, but parts had been cannibalised to repair a damaged Leman Russ and thus Tremain was able to lean inside. Two gunners sat in uncomfortable metal seats before a chunky fire-control console and flickering pict screen. Waves of static rippled over the screen, intermittently spiking with a juddering image of the weapons' killing zone.

  'What have you got?' he asked. 'Something moving?'

  One gunner remained hunched over the screen, while the other turned to face him, a look of confusion plastered across his features.

  'We're not sure, sergeant,' said the gunner. 'It looked like there was a crowd gathering at the edge of our range, but then...'

  The man's words trailed off and when he didn't continue Tremain said, 'But then what?'

  'Then they vanished,' said the gunner helplessly. 'One minute they seemed to be there, the next they were gone, and then the targeters went to hell.'

  That was certainly true. The pict screen was a hash of grainy nonsense, the speakers buzzing with static howls that sounded like a wounded animal.

  'Probably a surveyor malfunction,' said the other gunner. 'They're getting worse every day.'

  The soldier's sense for danger that had kept Tremain alive all these years was yelling in his ear that this was not some equipment malfunction, but something far, far worse.

  'Keep at it,' he said, 'and sing out the moment you get a solid return.'
/>
  The gunner nodded and Tremain ducked back out of the turret and waved over a number of wall sentries. He toyed with ordering an alert, but Colonel Kain would have his balls in a sling if he took such drastic action without proof that something was really wrong.

  Half a dozen soldiers joined him, their weapons at the ready, and bolstered by their presence, Tremain leaned over the wall again, sliding down his helmet's visor and allowing the optical augmetics to adjust to the darkness.

  The lurid green of the night vision made everything blurry and ghost-like, and at first he wasn't sure what he was seeing, for it seemed too ridiculous to be true.

  The ground before the walls was filled with people, thousands of shining, glowing people that drifted like wisps of wind-blown cloud. They fled in and out of focus, as though they weren't really there, but were simply impressions on the surface of the world.

  There were things moving amongst them, though, horribly fast things that used the shifting, glowing mass as a shroud by which to approach. Tremain blinked as he caught a glimpse of one of the things moving below him, the breath catching in his throat at the horror of it.

  He reeled back from the wall, tripping and falling on his backside as it leapt upwards.

  Something slashed past Tremain. He heard a muffled grunt and his visor suddenly flared with brightness as something hot and wet splashed his face. Blinded, he staggered against the wall and wrenched the visor up in time to see a hulking monster squatting on the wall. It held the head of one his soldiers in its hands. The body this trophy had once belonged to was on its knees, jetting a vigourous fountain of arterial blood into the air.

  The killer glistened in the reflected light of the compound, its flesh the hideous, slick blue and pink of a stillborn child. Its head was an elongated, twisted mass of molten flesh and bone, the eyes like hot coals placed in two wounds gouged in the meat of its face. Chisellike teeth unsheathed from its jaws and Tremain scrambled back on his rump, desperate to be away from this abomination.

  More were joining it, half a dozen and more, their elastic limbs hauling their vile bulks easily onto the walls. Tremain's terror soared and threatened to unman him as he saw their unnatural bodies, the nightmarish creations of a demented anatomist, all knotted masses of bone, flesh and muscle combined in unreasoning, lethal forms.

  Shots were fired, bright in the half-light, and screams soon followed them.

  Claws and teeth flashed. Blood squirted and men died.

  Tremain scrambled for his rifle, but it was already too late.

  The Lord of the Unfleshed reached down and tore him in two before his finger even slid through the trigger guard.

  THIRTEEN

  THE ARMOUR WAS coming alive before him. Uriel could feel the power coursing around its ancient machinery as surely as he could feel the blood in his veins. The subtle vibration of life was returning to the armour and the sense of approbation he felt from this rebirth was palpable.

  Uriel could almost see the lighting running through the armour, strength returning to the long-dormant muscles that would give the wearer the power to smite his enemies and the protection to suffer their violence. To wear such armour was an honour few were worthy of and one Uriel knew he would have to earn.

  Pasanius had joined him standing before the armour, and Uriel was again thankful for the loyalty and friendship his comrade offered him.

  'How long now, Enginseer Imerian?' called Uriel, raising his voice to be heard over the threatening roar of the Leman Russ's engines and the throb of power.

  Imerian risked sticking his head out from behind the sandbag barrier. 'I have the correct frequency, Captain Ventris, so it should only take another few hours for the backpack to become fully charged.'

  Uriel did not reply, for he had seen the mask of battle drop over Pasanius's face. A second later, he knew why. Over the rumble of tank engines, his enhanced hearing picked out the sounds of gunfire.

  'Colonel Kain!' he shouted, pinpointing the sound. 'Weapons fire! At your perimeter.'

  Verena Kain emerged from the sandbagged barrier and placed her hand to the side of her head. Uriel saw her expression transform from one of irritation to one of cold, hard anger.

  'Shut this down,' she ordered Imerian, before turning to draw her pistol and falcata, which she pointed at the Leman Russ, 'and fire up those tanks.'

  'Let's go,' said Uriel, drawing his sword from its sheath.

  Pasanius followed him, the borrowed boltgun clutched in his left fist, as a detachment of soldiers formed up on Colonel Kain. The commander of the Falcatas jogged over to the main doors of the hangar as they began to rumble open.

  Uriel reached the doors at the same time and Kain favoured him with a withering expression of scorn.

  'If this has something to do with you...' She left the threat unfinished.

  'Then you can berate me for it later,' said Uriel.

  The doors opened wide enough to allow egress from the hangar and Colonel Kain slipped through, her soldiers swiftly following her outside. Uriel let her go first; this was her command after all, but he made sure he caught up to her quickly.

  No sooner had he emerged onto the open ground in the centre of the compound than a screaming siren split the night open. With a snap and an actinic clash of circuits, blinding arc lights flared to life, dispelling the night's darkness and bathing everything in bleaching brightness.

  'Oh no,' said Uriel as he saw the carnage at the walls.

  Monsters were loose in the compound.

  The Unfleshed ran rampant through the soldiers of the Screaming Eagles, tearing limbs from torsos and undoing human forms with crushing blows or snapping bites. Their forms were huge and swollen, their previously exposed organs and meat now sheathed in slimy layers of new skin.

  The Lord of the Unfleshed roared as the lights came on, towering, magnificent and unspeakable, as though his veins ran with light instead of blood. His tribe poured into the compound like an army, although less than a dozen of them remained alive. Men fled before them, only to be plucked into the air and casually dismembered. Las-bolts flashed and burned the air, but the flesh of these monsters was impervious to such inconsequential energies.

  'What are they doing?' hissed Uriel.

  'Killing,' replied Pasanius, reproach heavy in his voice.

  Colonel Kain and the Falcatas that surrounded her watched in dumbfounded horror at the bloodshed being unleashed within their sanctum. Soldiers were beginning to emerge from one of the barracks, but a grotesque beast with reverse jointed legs and a hideously curved spine of knotted cartilage, hacked them down as they emerged. A sandbagged gun position opened up on the walls, the gunners knowing that killing their own men would be a kindness. Heavy calibre rounds hammered the inner face of the concrete walls, tore through the bloodied flesh of the dead soldiers and smacked wetly into the bodies of the Unfleshed.

  The Lord of the Unfleshed leapt from the wall, his strength and power carrying him through the air to land on the roof of the second barracks building. His enormous weight smashed through the corrugated tin roof and he vanished from view, although his bellows of rage could still be heard.

  Uriel ran towards the violated building, Pasanius hot on his heels as Colonel Kain fought to impose some kind of order upon her command. Screams and roars filled the air, the Unfleshed bludgeoning their way through the Screaming Eagles without mercy.

  A beast with two fused heads and elongated arms that ended in stump-like claws sawed its way through the red-armoured soldiers, its flesh peppered with bullets and scorched by las-bolts.

  One with a monstrous twin bulging from its flesh, slaughtered men and women and fed them to the ravenous growth, its lunatic hunger uncaring whether the meat was alive or dead.

  Uriel tried to ignore the horrors around him, vaulting a metal girder fallen from the roof of the barracks. Inside, he could hear frantic screams, random bursts of las-fire and a terrible roar of pure hatred. He kicked aside the buckled door and pushed his way inside.
/>
  The interior of the barracks was an abattoir, worse than anything Uriel had dreamed while in the depths of the Omphalos Daemonium. Blood sprays coated every wall, broken bodies and shredded limbs lay scattered like debris from an explosion in a mortuary, and it seemed impossible that so many men could have died in so short a time.

  'Emperor's blood!' he swore as he saw the Lord of the Unfleshed bend a man in half until his spine snapped and jagged bone erupted from his belly. Blood sprayed the giant creature and Uriel felt an almost physical hurt at this betrayal.

  'Stop!' he shouted, raising his sword before him. He knew the weapon was scant defence against so colossal a creature. Had this weapon not been wrested from his hands in the belly of a lesser member of the tribe than its master?

  'What in the Emperor's name are you doing?' demanded Uriel.

  The Lord of the Unfleshed's head swung towards him, ponderous and dripping with blood. Scraps of meat and cloth hung from his jaws and Uriel saw a dull light in his eyes, a light that spoke of a thousand minds behind it.

  'These men deserve to die,' said the Lord of the Unfleshed. 'They were there.'

  Uriel knew something of the history of the world and of the regiment that had claimed it, but how could the Lord of the Unfleshed?

  'That is not for you to decide,' he yelled. 'Why are you doing this?'

  'Because someone must,' said the Lord of the Unfleshed. 'The dead must be avenged.'

  Screams and the rattling bark of gunfire sounded from beyond the walls of the barracks, although a curious peace reigned within.

  'Put that man down,' ordered Uriel. 'The Emperor will be angry if you hurt him.'

  The Lord of the Unfleshed threw his head back and let loose a terrifying roar that encompassed a lifetime's worth of anger, hurt and self-loathing.

  'The Emperor does not care for him,' said the Lord of the Unfleshed, displaying an eloquence that belied his previous utterances. 'He forsook this vessel a long time ago, just as he forsook us.'