Sigismund marched through the precisely organised ballet of servitors, loaders and speeding lifters carrying racks of armour and bolters, seeing the elegant form of the fabricator locum directing the work of his menials with calmly efficient waves of freshly-implanted manip arms.
Dust storms billowing in from the wastelands beyond the collapsed caldera of Uranius Patera rendered the gold of Sigismund’s battle plate ochre and stained the black and white of his personal heraldry, yet he was no less impressive a figure for such blemishes.
A host of similarly armoured warriors moved with the methodical precision for which the Imperial Fists were famed, working alongside mobs of Kane’s bulky lifter servitors to secure as much of the armour and weapon supplies as they could.
Sigismund’s companies had descended upon Mondus Occulum not knowing whether they would have to fight to secure the forge, and it was a relief to find that the fabricator locum still held true to the Throne of Terra.
Even Sigismund had been grudgingly impressed by the efforts made by Kane to ensure the smooth transfer of supplies from his forge to the ships anchored at the tops of the Tsiolkovsky towers. As impressive as Kane’s efforts were, Sigismund knew they would be forced to leave the bulk of the materiel produced here behind.
Kane turned at the sound of Sigismund’s footfalls, a weary smile on his smooth face.
‘First captain?’ said Kane. ‘Have you heard from Camba-Diaz? How goes the fighting at Mondus Gamma?’
‘Desperate,’ admitted Sigismund. ‘Camba-Diaz has secured the armour forges and the ammunition silos, but his company is outnumbered a hundred to one. The traitor Chrom’s forces are pushing him back to the landing fields and his losses are grievous. We will not be able to hold the forge, but a great deal of essential supplies have been secured for transit to Terra.’
‘Chrom’s skitarii always were brutal things,’ said Kane, shaking his head in wonder that things had come to this. ‘And the number of his robot maniples is considerable.’
Sigismund felt his gauntlet curl around the grip of his bolter. ‘Aye, and it offends me that such mindless machines spill the blood of Astartes. But enough of Camba-Diaz, how close are you to completing the evacuation of armour and weapons from here?’
‘The work proceeds,’ said Kane. ‘Already we have shipped over twelve thousand suits of Mark IV armour and twice as many weapons.’
‘I will be blunt, Kane,’ said Sigismund. ‘It must go faster. We have little time left to us.’
‘I assure you we are going as fast as we can, first captain.’
‘Yet still it must be faster,’ stated Sigismund. ‘Orbital tracks show a sizeable force of enemy troops moving in from the north-east. They may be upon us any minute.’
Kane’s eyes flickered as he inloaded the feeds from the surveyor systems of the ships in orbit, and his manip arms clenched as he saw the size of the force converging on his forge.
‘Two Legios!’ exclaimed Kane. ‘Over sixty engines!’
‘And the rest,’ said Sigismund.
‘Those banners,’ said Kane, haptically sorting the wealth of feeds from those satellites still in orbit around Mars. ‘They belong to Urtzi Malevolus. Damn, but there’s a lot of them. Can you hold against that many, first captain? We must save Mondus Occulum!’
Sigismund hesitated before answering, his desire to wreak a bloody vengeance on the heads of those who rebelled against the Emperor warring with the mission his primarch had given him of securing the armour and weapons of Kane’s forge.
He sighed. ‘No, we cannot. The forces arrayed against us are too many and my orders do not allow for futile gestures of defiance.’
‘Futile defiance?’ exclaimed Kane. ‘This is my forge we’re talking about. What could be less futile than defending the very place that fabricates the armour that shields you and the weapons you bear?’
Sigismund shook his head. ‘I don’t have time to debate this with you, Kane. Speed up the loading by whatever means you can, but within the hour we must be away or we will not be leaving at all. Do you understand that simple fact?’
‘I understand,’ snapped Kane. ‘But you must understand that if Mondus Occulum and Mondus Gamma fall, you will have no way of replenishing the combat losses you will sustain in any meaningful way.’
Sigismund was about to reply when one of the Tsiolkovsky towers exploded.
The mighty structure spewed fire, and debris fell lazily from the ruptured portion of the tower as metres-thick guys snapped and twanged. Black smoke curled upward from the site of the explosion and a terrible scream of ruptured metal and torn carbon nanotubes rent the air as the tower leaned and bent as though no more substantial than a length of rope.
More explosions boomed skyward on the crater’s edge and the echoes of their detonations rolled over the landing fields.
‘No more time, Kane,’ snarled Sigismund. ‘They have range on us already.’
The distant tower came down in a rippling series of crashing detonations, trailing a city’s worth of rubble and twisted metal in its wake. Huge manufactories, acres of industrial landscape and forests of towering coolant towers were smashed to pulverised dust as entire worker districts vanished, flattened in an instant by the monstrous weight of debris.
A massive cloud of dust and ash billowed outward from the collapsed tower like the blast wave of an atomic explosion. The ground shook with the force of the impacts, and Sigismund heard secondary detonations as enemy fire began to pound the outlying segments of the forge to destruction.
A thunderous, booming horn-blast echoed across the landing fields, and Sigismund looked up in time to see a host of towering silhouettes emerge from the red-lit smoke of the tower’s destruction. Six Warlord Titans, their hulls blackened and scarified, roared in triumph, their weapon arms blazing with apocalyptic fire that reduced towering structures to rubble and entire swathes of infrastructure to little more than vaporised metal.
‘Get to your ship, Kane,’ ordered Sigismund. ‘Now!’
‘My forge!’ cried Kane. ‘We can’t just abandon it!’
Sigismund grabbed Kane’s arm and said, ‘Your forge is already lost! Now get to your damned ship. Your skills will be needed in the days ahead.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean that with Kelbor-Hal’s treachery, you are now the Fabricator General.’
‘But what about Zeth? Maximal?’ shouted Kane over the deafening crescendo of the advancing Titans and the destruction of his forge. ‘What of them?’
‘We can do nothing for them!’ shouted Sigismund. ‘They must stand or fall on their own.’
DALIA STOOD OPEN-MOUTHED, staring numbly at the empty space where, not a moment before, Severine had been standing. She couldn’t comprehend what had just happened and her brain fought to process the knowledge that her friend was dead.
She took a horrified lurch towards the edge of the promontory, but a powerful hand seized her arm. Rho-mu 31 held her firm and said, ‘Don’t.’
‘Severine!’ wailed Dalia, her legs turning to the consistency of wet paper and giving way beneath her. Rho-mu 31 bore her gently to the ground as aching sobs burst from her. She held him tightly, burying her face in the fabric of his cloak as she wept for her lost friend.
‘Why did she do it?’ asked Dalia, looking up at Rho-mu 31 when her sobs had subsided.
‘I do not know,’ admitted Rho-mu 31, as Zouche came up behind Dalia and placed his hand upon her shoulder in an awkward gesture of comfort.
‘I think our Severine was a girl who depended on certainties,’ mused Zouche. ‘This place… well, it strips away the illusions that allow us to function and shows you that there’s no such thing as certainties in this universe. Some minds can’t handle that kind of truth.’
‘She’s gone,’ whispered Dalia.
‘Yes, Dalia-girl, she’s gone,’ said Zouche, his voice choked with emotion. ‘With all that’s happened, I’m surprised any of us are still here.’
‘Caxto
n!’ cried Dalia, suddenly remembering that when she had last seen him, he had been insensible on the ground.
‘I think he’ll be fine,’ said Rho-mu 31 as Dalia disentangled herself from him and stood on unsteady legs. ‘He blacked out when everything went… strange.’
‘Like a fuse or a circuit breaker,’ elaborated Zouche, making his way over to the lectern, upon which sat Semyon’s book. ‘He should be fine when he wakes up.’
Dalia saw Caxton lying in the recovery position, his chest rising and falling with rhythmic breaths. He was alive and she could sense the bruised insides of his mind already beginning to heal. She wondered at how she could see such things, and then remembered the power that had flowed into her at Semyon’s dissolution.
‘Good,’ she said. ‘I can’t bear to think of this place claiming any more lives.’
Zouche lifted a handful of golden dust that was all that remained of Adept Semyon and his battle servitor. ‘What happened here?’ he asked. ‘They aged a thousand years in an instant.’
‘More, I think,’ said Dalia. ‘I think Semyon had been a Guardian for a long, long time.’
‘So now what do we do?’ asked Zouche, his eyes scanning over the pages of Semyon’s book. ‘We found the Dragon, so do we free it?’
‘No, absolutely not,’ said Dalia. ‘You were right after all, Zouche. Some things are meant to be left in darkness forever. We were never meant to come here to release it.’
‘Then why did you have to come at all?’ asked Rho-mu 31.
‘I think you know,’ said Dalia, turning away from Zouche and facing Rho-mu 31 as flecks of golden light simmered in her eyes. ‘To make sure it stayed entombed. Semyon is dead, but there needs to be a Guardian of the Dragon.’
‘And that’s you?’ asked Rho-mu 31.
‘Yes.’
‘No, Dalia!’ said Zouche. ‘Say that it’s not so! You?’
‘Yes,’ said Dalia. ‘It was always me, but I won’t be alone. Will I, Rho-mu 31?’
Rho-mu 31 stood tall and planted his weapon stave in the ground. He knelt before Dalia and said, ‘For as long as I remain functional I will protect you.’
‘With the power I have now, that may be a very long time, my friend.’
‘So be it,’ said Rho-mu 31.
ZOUCHE AND RHO-MU 31 carried Caxton between them as they made their way back through the twisting maze of the Dragon’s caves. Dalia led the way, guiding them unerringly along the path they had followed to get here. Their mood was subdued, for the death of Severine was heavy in their thoughts, and no one spoke as they passed through Semyon’s abandoned laboratory. Once again they trudged through the glittering tunnels that led to the dark, shadow-cloaked grabens of the Noctis Labyrinthus, before finally emerging into the chill air.
‘I think I hate this place,’ said Zouche, as Rho-mu 31 took the unconscious Caxton from him. The Protector shrugged Caxton onto his shoulder.
‘I wouldn’t blame you,’ said Dalia. ‘It’s a place of despair. It always has been and I think it’s that more than the Dragon that’s kept people away.’
‘And you’re sure you have to stay?’ asked Zouche, his eyes brimming with tears.
‘I’m sure,’ said Dalia, leaning down to embrace him. He put his arms around her and held her tightly, letting the tears fall without shame.
‘I’ll never see you again, will I?’ asked Zouche when she released him.
She shook her head. ‘No, you won’t. And you can’t ever tell anyone about me or this place. If anyone asks, tell them I died when the Kaban Machine attacked us in the tunnel.’
‘And what about Caxton?’ asked Zouche, wiping his eyes with the sleeve of his robe.
Dalia choked back a sob and said, ‘Tell him… tell him I think I could have loved him. And tell him I’m sorry I never got the chance to find out.’
‘I’ll tell him that, right enough,’ nodded Zouche, turning to Rho-mu 31. ‘And you’re staying too?’
‘I am,’ agreed Rho-mu 31. ‘It seems every Guardian must have a protector.’
Zouche shook hands with Rho-mu 31 and looked over his shoulder at the lonely shape of the Cargo-5, which sat where they had left it beyond the cave mouth.
‘Ah… a thought occurs,’ he said. ‘How are we supposed to get home? Wasn’t the 5’s battery dead?’
Dalia smiled and the golden energy passed to her by Adept Semyon flashed in her eyes.
‘I think I can make sure it has enough power for you to get back to the Magma City.’
Zouche shrugged as they set off towards the abandoned Cargo-5. ‘I’m not even sure I want to know how you’ll manage that, but I’m never one to question my good fortune. Not that I’ve ever had any to question, you understand.’
The Cargo-5 exploded with a thunderous, booming detonation that echoed from the sheer sides of the Noctis Labyrinthus. The blast wave hurled them to the ground as twisted metal wreckage fell in a burning rain.
Dalia looked up, blinking away bright afterimages of the explosion.
‘What happened?’ gasped Zouche.
Dalia groaned as she saw their attacker rolling forward on its heavy-gauge track unit.
‘Oh, no,’ she said. ‘Oh, Emperor protect us, no!’
It was the Kaban Machine.
HIGH IN THE Chamber of Vesta, Adept Koriel Zeth watched the images playing out over the burnished screens of her forge with a sense of utter disbelief and horror.
The main screens displayed her own forge, a city on the verge of collapse. The outer hives and manufactories were in ruins and everything she had built over the centuries had been flattened by the savage, unrelenting bombardment of the Dark Mechanicum.
Ipluvien Maximal fared no better, his promised relief pulling back in the face of unbreakable resistance from Kelbor-Hal’s freakish creations. Maximal’s outer walls were breached in a dozen places and the fighting surged from weapon shop to ore refinery to librarium as the hordes of mutated servitors and abominable war machines poured in.
Both Mondus Occulum and Mondus Gamma were burning, vast swathes of machinery and manufacturing capacity destroyed in barely a few hours worth of fighting. The loss of such irreplaceable technology and knowledge was like a knife in the guts, but worse than that, far worse than that, was the image on the central glass panel.
Like comets launched from the surface of Mars, the Imperial ships were fleeing for the heavens. Astartes and Army vessels jostled in the sky in their haste to depart the red planet.
When her surveyor systems had first registered their launch, Zeth had assumed they would arc over and swoop south towards the Magma City, but their fiery ascent had continued until it was obvious they were accelerating to escape velocity.
Confirmation, if confirmation were needed, came in the form of a terse, encrypted data squirt from the fabricator locum, who, it seemed, was also leaving Mars.
+++Imperial forces withdrawing from Mars+++Save what you can+++Destroy the rest+++
The human part of her screamed at this betrayal, but the dominant, analytical, part of her brain could see the sense in this retreat. The Astartes had no doubt secured a great deal of the new marks of armour in preparation for the campaign against the Legions of Horus Lupercal, and to lose them all in a futile last stand made no logical sense.
Knowing that didn’t make it any easier to swallow.
Zeth opened up her noospheric link to Ipluvien Maximal, Princeps Cavalerio of Legio Tempestus and Lords Caturix and Verticorda of the Knights of Taranis.
‘I presume you have all seen this?’ she said as their holographic images appeared on the glass panels above her.
‘I have,’ said Cavalerio, projecting the image of the man he had been before his interment in the amniotic casket.
‘Yes,’ confirmed Maximal. ‘I cannot believe it. The knowledge that will be lost…’
Lord Caturix shook his head. ‘That it should come to this, abandoned by Terra.’
Lord Verticorda shook his head. ‘Never,’ he said. ‘The Em
peror would never abandon us.’
‘Maybe not,’ said Zeth, ‘but it appears we can expect no more help from the Legions.’
‘So what are your orders, Adept Zeth?’ asked Princeps Cavalerio.
‘You heard Kane’s transmission?’
Their grim silence was all the answer she needed.
‘I won’t let Kelbor-Hal have my reactors,’ declared Maximal at last.
‘Nor will he have the Akashic reader,’ said Zeth sadly. ‘I had such high hopes for Dalia being able to make it work, but maybe it’s for the best. Perhaps no one should ever know everything. After all, when there is nothing left to discover, what is the point in life?’
‘Then there is only one order left to give,’ said Lord Verticorda.
DALIA SAW THE lethal machine roll towards them, crashing boulders beneath its weight, its weapon arms locking up ready to shoot. The barrels on an enormous rotary cannon whirred as they spooled up to fire once more and hissing gases vented from the plasma cannon mounted at its shoulder.
She could feel its anger towards her in the seething yellow glow of its sensor orbs, and with a swift flick of her mind, Dalia knew she wouldn’t be able to fool it again.
‘How did it find us?’ shouted Zouche.
‘It must have read our biometrics in the tunnel,’ she cried. ‘It realised its mistake eventually and it followed us here.’
‘Who cares how it found us?’ shouted Rho-mu 31, firing up his weapon stave and hauling Dalia back the way they had come. ‘Run! Get back to the cave! It won’t be able to follow us in!’
Dalia nodded, taking Zouche’s hand and sprinting for the cave mouth.
‘Do what you did before!’ cried Zouche. ‘Make it think we’re not here!’
‘I can’t,’ gasped Dalia as they ran. ‘It’s learned what I did and its mental architecture has evolved to stop me doing it again.’
Dalia looked over her shoulder and saw the metallic tentacles on its back whip up.
‘Get down!’ yelled Rho-mu 31, dragging her and Zouche to the ground.