‘To send you to fetch me, with no escort.’
‘This is an Astartes battle-barge, John, one of the most fortified and secure warships in human space. Where exactly would you run to?’
‘Good point. They do trust you, though,’ said Grammaticus. ‘Did you ever wonder why they let you do this?’
‘Do what?’
‘Fraternise with me? Eat lunch with me every day?’ Soneka made a sour face. ‘I don’t ask. In almost all respects, I’ve been as much of a prisoner as you.’
‘You must have thought about it,’ Grammaticus pressed.
‘I suppose,’ said Soneka, ‘they believe you’ll relate to me better than to any of them, human to human.’
‘Or whatever it is I am,’ Grammaticus chuckled.
Soneka glanced at him. ‘Actually, I asked their permission. They’re not like me. They don’t even eat, or not that I’ve witnessed. For the first few days, I’d dine alone, and then bring you your food. It seemed stupid not to combine the two events.’
‘And they said yes?’
‘They said yes,’ Soneka agreed. ‘Of course, it quickly occurred to me what they were really after. They wanted me to build a rapport with you, the sort of rapport that none of them could fashion personally.’
‘Didn’t they worry that I might somehow… influence you?’
Soneka looked Grammaticus in the eyes. ‘I think they were actually hoping that might happen.’
‘What do you mean?’ asked Grammaticus.
‘You wouldn’t dare try anything with an Astartes, but with a lowly operative? I believe they were interested in what they might learn about you if you did try something.’
Grammaticus pursed his lips. ‘That’s remarkably perceptive of you, Peto. So, do you think you’ve fallen under my thrall?’
Soneka shrugged. ‘How could I tell? I know you’re a dangerous man, John, and that you can achieve with words what a Lord Commander couldn’t with Titans. My impression has been that we’ve always talked as friends. I doubt you’d admit otherwise.’
Grammaticus nodded. ‘Of course I wouldn’t,’ he said.
A LITTLE FURTHER on, Grammaticus stopped and looked over his shoulder.
‘What’s the matter?’ asked Soneka.
‘I thought,’ Grammaticus began. ‘I thought I heard—’
‘What?’
‘I thought I heard her calling out to me,’ he said. ‘It was your imagination, John,’ Soneka told him.
IN THE LONG walk from the detention block to the briefing chamber, they saw no signs of life, except for a pair of polished arachnoid servitors working at a wall panel and a busy cyberdrone that zipped past high overhead and vanished into the distance of the vast corridor.
The hatch was a huge blast shield, with the emblem of the hydra graven on its oiled surface. Soneka had seen many parts of the barge during his time on board, and all of them had been spare, functional and utilitarian. This was the only piece of decoration he had come across.
As they approached, the hatch opened, lifting a thick, toothed base up out of slots in the deck. It rose like the gate of a portcullis.
The chamber beyond was almost pitch black, but they could both sense how large it was. Twenty metres in front of them, illuminated by a single amber glow-globe, Alpharius sat on a heavy, undecorated steel throne. He was wearing his full armour, and his helm sat on the broad arm of the throne beside his right hand. He stared at them.
‘Approach.’
‘John Grammaticus, lord,’ said Soneka.
‘Thank you, Peto. Stay, please.’
Soneka nodded, and stepped to one side.
‘John,’ said Alpharius.
‘Great lord,’ Grammaticus replied.
‘I believe there will be a reckoning,’ said Alpharius. ‘Your cooperation is expected.’
‘And will be given, to the best of my abilities,’ Grammaticus said.
‘We stand at high anchor above the world you selected,’ the primarch said. ‘The expedition fleet is about nine hours behind us. As soon as it has arrived and recomposed, we will commence surface deployment.’
Grammaticus swallowed briefly. ‘That suggests a war footing, as does your armour.’
Alpharius nodded. ‘I don’t venture into the unknown unarmed, John. You told me that this Cabal of yours asked you to bring me here. You say they wish to talk of weighty matters. I welcome discourse, and enjoy the stimulation of meeting new minds and new ideas, but I am no fool. The Imperial Army and my forces will assemble and make ready. At the slightest sign of disingenuity or betrayal, your Cabal, if it is really here, will face extreme sanction.’
‘You must do as you see fit, lord,’ said Grammaticus. ‘In the spirit of cooperation, I would say that the Cabal does not find threat postures especially endearing. It would prefer to undertake its dealings with you without the duress of a military presence. However, I believe the Cabal will make allowances. They appreciate that you are a warlord, and that you will behave according to your nature. It is, after all, precisely your nature that interests them.’
Alpharius nodded again. ‘Then we have a first measure of understanding.’ He raised his left gauntlet.
There was a series of deep, mechanical thumps, and light began to shaft into the chamber, as the entire starboard wall began to retract into the roof. Soneka realised that a row of immense blast shutters was gradually opening to reveal a vast stellar observation port. The light, soft yellow but bright, like a summer’s haze, poured under the opening shutters, and slowly flooded the chamber.
The briefing chamber was as large as he had expected, with a black grille floor, heavy bulkheads of bare metal, and a vaulted roof. Everything in it was bathed in the smoky golden radiance that streamed in from outside. Along the inner wall, behind Alpharius’s spare, cyclopean throne, thirty-five fully plated Alpha Legion Astartes stood like monumental statues. They had been there all along, silent in the darkness.
They were all captains or squad leaders. Soneka recognised Pech and Herzog by their company marks, Omegon in his almost black armour, and Ranko in the monstrous plate of the Terminators. They were illuminated, in the golden light, like some elysian vision.
Grammaticus had seen them too. Soneka saw the pang of undisguised fear in his eyes.
Alpharius rose to his feet. The shutters ground to a halt, fully open. The view through the giant observation port was as impressive as the revealed post-human warriors. The vault of space, more profoundly deep than Soneka had ever seen it, was thick with distant stars that shone like motes of dust in sunlight. Radiant streamers of gas, as delicate and multicoloured as moth wings, lay across the star field like veils, causing some stars to glitter like faceted jewels, and others to fog and blur like uncut stones.
Nearby, perhaps only a hundred and fifty million kilometres away, lay a pale red sun, the local star and the source of the bathing yellow sunlight that made both the view and the chamber seem as if they were set in amber. Closer still, looming below them, was the night-side of a planet.
Alpharius pointed at the star. Hololithic graphics immediately lit up across the observation port, outlined the star, and contoured it. Numerical columns rapidly scrolled up the port, followed by block statistical data.
‘Freeze there. Dim radiance and magnify by six,’ said Alpharius. The hololithic projection blinked, and centred a glare-adjusted magnification of the star on the port display.
‘42 Hydra,’ said Alpharius. ‘It’s an old, population II star with poor metallicity. Its life is reaching an end. 42 Hydra, would you care to comment, John?’
Grammaticus looked lost for words.
‘Lord?’ said Soneka.
‘Speak, Peto.’
‘As I understand it, 42 Hydra was selected as a mark of homage to the Legion. An inside joke, if you will. I believe that, in hindsight, John possibly regrets the flippancy of the gesture.’
Alpharius nodded.
‘That,’ Grammaticus said, coughing but recovering some composure, ‘that is t
he case, lord. No disrespect or mockery was intended. 42 Hydra was chosen because of your emblem.’
‘Is this typical of the symbolism and nuance we can expect from the Cabal?’ asked Pech.
‘No,’ said Grammaticus.
‘Good,’ said Omegon, ‘because it’s childish.’
‘42 Hydra has six planets,’ Alpharius continued. ‘The third one, designated 42 Alpha Tertius, being the one you directed us to, John. We sit in orbit above it.’
‘Above Eolith,’ said Grammaticus.
‘Repeat?’
‘Eolith,’ said Grammaticus. ‘The Cabal’s name for this world, 42 Hydra Tertius, is Eolith.’
‘So noted. Isolate and enlarge.’
The graphics returned the star to its original position, and then surrounded the dark globe below them, sectioned it, and brought it up into the centre of the port. More graphics spooled across the projection.
‘Small and unremarkable,’ said Alpharius, ‘it is wracked by pestilential weather and acid precipitation. Uninhabited, according to our vital sweeps, auto-probes detect only basic xenofauna.’ He paused. ‘Distinguish,’ he ordered.
The display revealed the surface of the planet in terms of mottled topographic imaging, and then overlaid that with a graphic of striated weather patterns. The world looked like a grey, flecked iris.
‘A backwater, in other words,’ said Alpharius, ‘and utterly hostile to human life. And yet…’ He paused again. ‘Enlarge.’
The display rapidly magnified a small section of the world and outlined it: a circular whorl of white vapour like an island in the streaked grey cloud mass.
‘In the southern hemisphere,’ Alpharius continued, ‘we read a zone three hundred kilometres in diameter that possesses a rudimentary human bearable atmosphere. What are the chances of that?’
‘What, indeed?’ Grammaticus replied.
‘Would you care to explain?’ asked Alpharius.
Grammaticus took another breath to steady himself and remain calm. ‘That is the venue. Elemental processors were activated there about five years ago, to prepare the area for your visit. They’ve barely had time to manufacture a decent micro-climate, but it’s sustainable enough.’
‘Atmospheric engineering?’ asked Herzog.
‘Yes, sir,’ Grammaticus replied.
‘Magnify specific,’ Alpharius instructed. The boxed image of the white vapour blinked half a dozen times as the scale enlarged, resolving details of cloud masses, and then individual formations, until the view looked down through wisps of trailing white cloud at surface details. Soneka peered hard. He wasn’t sure what he was supposed to be seeing: a range of hills, mountains perhaps, cold and grey, seen from directly above, and deep pockets of valley shadow. In the middle of the frame, nestled amongst the higher peaks, lay some sort of indistinct pattern, the outline of some structure.
‘I find this particularly interesting,’ said Alpharius. ‘This structure reminded me of something.’ He looked back at the port and raised his hand. ‘Display and compare archive record N6371.’
A second graphic box appeared beside the first, showing another orbital image, taken under different conditions. It was clearly another world. A network of graphic lines rapidly linked areas on both boxes, until it was evident that hundreds of contextual similarities had been identified. The boxes then shuffled and overlaid. The surface structures matched with an unnerving precision.
‘Archive N6371,’ said Alpharius, ‘is an orbital view of Mon Lo Harbour.’
There was a long silence.
‘A structure of that type was the epicentre of an atmospheric deluge that almost annihilated us,’ said Alpharius, ‘and you take us to its twin on a world where atmospheric manipulation is already underway.’
‘I can see how that looks bad,’ Grammaticus admitted.
‘John!’ Soneka hissed.
Grammaticus glanced at Alpharius, and bowed his head respectfully. ‘Forgive me, lord.’ He walked across to the port and stopped when he was close enough to point out individual details.
‘They are the same, because both worlds are halting sites,’ he said.
‘Define the term,’ demanded Pech.
‘Of course,’ said Grammaticus. ‘The Cabal is extremely old, and composed of various… what you would term xenosbreeds. They have no shared origin or homeworld. Since the earliest days, the time of their formation, they have been nomadic, moving from one world to the next, like the court circuits of the old kings of Terra.’
‘How long do they stay in one place?’ asked Omegon.
‘However long they want, sir,’ Grammaticus replied, ‘however long they need. Over the ages, they constructed halting sites on the many worlds that formed their long, orthotenic routes. Landing zones, you see? On some worlds, Nurth being a good example, local populations later inhabited the sites in ignorance of their original purpose.’
‘That implies a significant span of time,’ said Pech.
Grammaticus nodded sadly. ‘I need you to appreciate the duration and extent of the Cabal’s activities. The halting site at Mon Lo was constructed nearly twelve thousand years ago. The one here on Eolith is considerably older, about ninety thousand years. It was the Cabal’s previous visits to Nurth, and their understanding of the culture developing there, that caused them to select it as a place to demonstrate to you the—’
‘Wait,’ said Alpharius. ‘Did you just say ninety thousand years?’
‘Yes, lord primarch.’
Alpharius seemed to consider this for a moment. ‘Continue.’
‘I… I’ve rather lost my thread, sir,’ said Grammaticus. ‘There is little left that I can explain. The Cabal has prepared the venue, and you have come to meet with them. I suggest…’ He cleared his dry throat again, ‘I suggest you get on with it. I’m your key, sir. You must take me to the surface and—’
‘A moment,’ said Omegon. He broke from the rank of watching Astartes, and walked over to the observation port. For a moment, Soneka feared that the warrior was intent on doing some harm to Grammaticus, but instead, he stared pensively down at the dark world below them. He uncoupled his helm and removed it.
‘You’ve enticed us here, John Grammaticus,’ he said, ‘with vague stories of an impending cataclysm that threatens to engulf mankind and the cosmos, and the role we might take in preventing it. I would like to know a little more before this Legion commits to even a landing.’
Grammaticus laughed out loud.
Omegon looked down at him sharply.
‘I’m sorry, Lord Omegon,’ Grammaticus said, failing to stifle his giggles, ‘but you have brought an entire, militarised expedition fleet across parsecs on the basis of my “vague stories”. As I see it, you’re committed fairly comprehensively already. Stop prevaricating.’
Omegon glared down at the human. ‘First Captain Pech said you described the impending cataclysm as a war against Chaos.’
‘I did, sir,’ said Grammaticus, ‘though the war against Chaos has been raging since the galaxy’s infancy. However, the human species has now become the focus of the war, and the Imperium its chosen battlefield. The Cabal has farseen that what happens in the next few years will be pivotal to the destiny of all races.’
Omegon turned and looked back at the planet. ‘Pech related something else you said, back in heathen Mon Lo. He said you called what was coming “a great war against yourselves”. That would seem to describe a civil war, John Grammaticus.’
‘Yes, it would,’ said Grammaticus, still staring up at the giant.
‘Civil war in the Imperium is an impossibility,’ said Alpharius, walking forwards to join them. ‘It simply could not happen. The Emperor’s plan is—’
‘Utopian,’ Grammaticus cut in and finished boldly, ‘and therefore predicated to fall short of its goals. Please. The Alpha Legion is the most pragmatic and subtle of all the Legions. You are not blinded by Imperial dogma like the others. You are not hidebound by Guilliman’s ideals of conduct, or rooted in f
renzied tribal tradition like Russ’s warriors, nor are you stalwart lapdogs like Dorn’s famous men, or berserk automatons like Angron’s monsters. You think for yourselves!’
‘That is the closest thing to heresy that has ever been spoken in my presence,’ said Alpharius quietly.
‘And that’s why you’re listening to me,’ said Grammaticus, with a grin. ‘You recognise the truth when you hear it. You only recruit the cleverest and brightest. You think for yourselves.’
He stood between the giants, rising to his scheme. Soneka smiled as he saw John Grammaticus’s confidence return.
‘The Emperor chases a Utopian ideal,’ Grammaticus announced, ‘which is fine as far as it goes. It ignites and drives the masses, it gives a soldier something to focus on, but perfection is only ever an ideal.’
‘We have considered these issues,’ said Pech quietly.
‘And?’ asked Grammaticus.
‘We have come to appreciate that Utopian goals are ultimately counter-intuitive to species survival,’ Pech replied.
‘No power can engender, or force to be engendered, a state of perfection,’ said another captain, ‘because perfection is an absolute that cannot be attained by an imperfect species.’
‘It is better to manage and maintain the flaws of man on an ongoing basis,’ said Pech.
Grammaticus bowed. ‘Thank you for that appraisal. I applaud you for your insight.’ He looked up at Alpharius. ‘Sir, the Imperium is about to implode. At the halting site on Eolith, the Cabal awaits to show you how best, as the first captain so eloquently put it, to manage and maintain the flaws of man.’
Alpharius let out a deep sigh. He gazed down at Grammaticus. ‘I wonder, years from now, will I regret not executing you at this moment?’
‘Civil war, sir,’ Grammaticus cautioned, ‘think of it.’
Alpharius shook his head. ‘I am. John, my brother primarchs have their feuds and rivalries, they bicker at times, and fall out with one another, the way any close kinsmen might. I’ve come to that family only lately, and already I know the fashion of it. Roboute, for example, despises me, and I ignore him. It may lead to bruises at some stage, but not blood. For a civil war to ignite, primarch would have to be drawn against primarch in blood. That would never happen, John. It is simply inconceivable. Now that the Warmaster leads us, we—’