‘Hostile?’ said Macharius. There was little chance they would be anything else.
‘We must assume so.’
‘I will need access to command echelon sub-nets of the ship’s vox systems,’ said Macharius. ‘And I will need it now.’
The captain nodded. Macharius strode over to an altar and called up internal schematics of the ship. Being who he was, he had most likely memorised all of them earlier, but he wanted access now. He put a comm-bead into his ear and slipped a microphone under his jaw just as the battle-stations warnings echoed through the ship.
Ignoring them he began to speak commands, gravely, precisely and with a certain relish.
Our ships spiral gracefully out-system towards the contact. I sit at the helm and study the vision crystal. All around ancient power sources hum. The crew perform their duties in the long oval chamber, its ruddy light turning them into bloody phantoms. For a moment, I contemplate the beauty of the intricate mechanisms that keep me alive and move me across the face of the void.
The human ship has not moved, and its energy signature has not changed. It appears to be just sitting there waiting, as if daring us to come closer. I ask myself could this be a trap? Is it merely pretending to be crippled to draw us into combat? Certainly the profile of the ship makes it look powerful enough to provide a challenge were it in a proper state of repair. It is a battleship, massive and armed with multiple batteries of primitive but potent weapons.
I measure the strength of my fleet against it. Even if the vessel were at full power they would be sufficient to ensure our victory. I am certain of it. Nonetheless, I am uneasy. Once again the universe presents me with what looks like a gift. Once again I wonder what lies beneath the mask of reality. I push doubt aside. Even if a human fleet were to emerge from the daemon-haunted wastes they are foolish enough to traverse, we would simply retreat.
There is no real threat here. I give the order to assume attack formation.
‘How many xenos?’ Macharius asked. There was no tension in his voice, no sign of any unease. He was doing something he had been born to do. A sense of calm competence flowed out from him as heat flows from a fire. We had relocated to the bridge of the ship. The whole time we had moved Macharius had kept up a stream of communications with the commanders of his bodyguard regiment, deploying them to critical points around the ship, setting them in readiness for any boarding action. He seemed to have no doubts about his knowledge of where the best positions would be. He was almost certainly right in this.
‘A dozen ships, Lord High Commander,’ said the captain. ‘None of them of more than half our displacement, but that means nothing with xenos. They may each have firepower equal to an Imperial ship of the line, and carry a complement of warriors equal to our own combined force.’
A faint frown flickered over Macharius’s brow. ‘Are our weapon systems back in commission?’
‘Void cannons and main batteries are powered up. If we had another few hours we could simply have made the jump out of this system and avoided any conflict. General repairs are almost complete.’
‘How about your Navigator – has he calculated our position and course?’
‘He is working on it.’
‘Perhaps you could suggest to him that he work a little harder.’
‘Of course, Lord High Commander.’
Drake studied the flickering runes hovering over the altars. ‘The xenos vessels are eldar.’
The captain rapped out an order to one of the crewmen. A partially-translucent image hovered in the air above us, showing a long, shark-like vessel, whose sleek lines bore no resemblance to any human craft. The image shimmered and shifted as other eldar ships sprang into being. All of them were subtly different but were obviously the product of the same alien sensibility. There was something strange about the way they flickered, as if they were not quite present in our space. Sometimes they grew indistinct and vanished entirely, leaving only areas of darkness behind them. Our auspex systems were clearly having difficulty pinning down their position.
‘Tell me about them,’ Macharius said. His tone was conversational.
‘They are most decadent and repulsive creatures, given to enslaving and torturing their victims. They exist outside the Emperor’s Light and are our eternal enemies.’
Macharius’s eyes narrowed. ‘Slavers. We can expect a boarding action, then.’
‘They will try and cripple us first,’ said Drake. ‘Destroy our drives, erode our void shields, silence our weapons.’
‘Then they won’t have much work to do,’ said Macharius, not without a certain sardonic humour.
‘That’s true.’ Drake seemed to hesitate for a moment.
‘And?’ Macharius said.
‘And what?’ Drake replied.
‘You look as though you want to say something else.’
‘It would probably be best not to be taken alive,’ said Drake. ‘These creatures have a reputation for tortures of the most heinous sort. They take pleasure in it.’
There was something in his tone that suggested he was understating the extent of their cruelty, and that just made it all the more frightening.
‘If they want to take us alive, they will need to board the ship,’ said Macharius. ‘If they do, we shall teach them the error of their ways.’
He sounded confident, but then he always did. ‘Let us go to the command deck and see if we can encourage our Navy comrades to more speed.’
We are within range of visual pickup. I order ultimate magnification on the vision crystal and the human vessel leaps into view, a mountain of metal against the velvet backdrop of infinite night. It has the crudity of all human work, and I wonder again at the indifference of a universe that can allow such a species not only to exist but, apparently, to thrive.
Of course, it is not indifference. Long ago the cosmos proved itself to be actively malevolent, but still… The fact that it allows such beings to go on existing is proof positive that it has no taste.
Consider the human warship. The least gifted eldar child could create a vessel far more beautiful. This is a slab of metal covered in gargoyles, bristling with weapons. The lines are blunt as a gulbak’s club. It is as if the humans are so afraid of the cosmos that they feel the need to present what they consider a frightening face to it. It is a vessel designed to intimidate children. It shows no understanding that the truly dangerous creature has no need to show how dangerous it is.
It appears damaged. The thick armour looks pitted and damaged as though the claws of some gigantic beast have swept along its length scraping away ribbons of metal. There are flickers of light where primitive chemical flame welding devices are used to patch the incisions.
‘It does not look like a trap,’ I say. Sileria glances up at me.
‘It looks like an idiot’s attempt at sculpture,’ she says. We both laugh.
‘Nonetheless, it is armed,’ I say at last.
‘What is it doing here?’ she asks. ‘It shows the markings of the human Imperium. They are not supposed to be within a hundred light years of this system.’
‘Some new migration, no doubt,’ I say. ‘The barbarians are on the move once more, looking for new worlds to conquer.’
‘Why here, why now?’ Her words echo submerged thoughts floating through the under-consciousness of my own mind. She is wondering if the ship’s presence has anything to do with our own or is mere coincidence. It is a weakness all of the eldar have, this solipsism. We believe the universe rotates around us. The more intelligent of us are aware of it, of course.
‘We shall, no doubt, find out soon enough,’ I say. ‘Once we have taken a few new slaves and feasted on their agony.’
‘I look forward to it,’ she says, looking up at me and licking her lips.
There was a faint vibration as the ship’s engines flared, and once again we were under way. The crew had laboured mightily over the past few hours and it seemed that their efforts had been rewarded.
The astronavig
ator looked up from his charts, set aside his astrolabe and glanced around as if noticing all of the activity surrounding him for the first time.
‘I believe we can make the jump, captain, now that the ship’s generators are capable of powering us.’
‘How long and how far until the insertion point?’
‘Roughly half an Imperial astronomical unit,’ said the astronavigator. ‘It should not take more than two hours, but it places us on a convergent course with the xenos.’
The captain was obviously making some calculations of his own. ‘The eldar will be upon us before then. We will still have to fight.’
‘Shall I begin pre-jump preparations?’ said the Navigator. The captain did not look at Macharius. ‘Yes,’ he said.
‘Now all we need do is survive the next couple of hours,’ said Drake. ‘And hope the ship takes no more damage before we can make the jump.’
Macharius looked at the enemy ship on the screen, staring at it as if he were looking on the face of an enemy.
‘Xenos,’ he said. ‘Have we come so far from Imperial space?’
The Navigator looked at him. ‘We are within one hundred light years of the boundaries of the Segmentum Pacificus.’
‘They are very close to the crusade,’ Drake said, obviously following the line of Macharius’s thoughts.
‘Scouts, perhaps, come to observe us,’ Macharius said.
‘Who can tell how xenos think,’ said Drake. ‘They may just be raiding here, or combining their raiding with scouting.’
‘They will need to be dealt with,’ said Macharius.
‘Most assuredly,’ said Drake. Neither of them seemed to have any doubt that they would survive to see that done. For myself I was not so sure. I did not like the sleek, cruel and confident lines of those oncoming alien ships.
I study the vision crystal. The human ship is moving now, drive power apparently restored. It still appears just huge, ugly and ungainly amid the darkness of space, but in movement it has taken on an aspect of menace. Gargoyles clutch the durasteel of its hull as if prepared to fly into battle. The scarred maws of primitive destructive engines emerge from its weapon bays. They pulse with energy, clearly being made ready for battle.
Sileria looks at me, awaiting my decision. Eagerness is obvious in every line of her body. She looks like a lash-hound straining at the leash to begin pursuing its prey. She runs her tongue over her pouting lips. Her pupils are expanded. Her breathing shallow. She is contemplating the banquet of pain that will present itself when we board the vessel and use its crew for our pleasure. If I decide that we should do so.
Command decisions are rarely so simple. Primitive as the human vessel is, both the divinations and its harsh lines speak of destructive power. It is no longer crippled and immobile. I do not doubt for a moment we can overcome it, but we may ourselves take damage in the attempt. Is it worth risking ourselves when we are so close to my ultimate goal? In a few more days the gate will be open…
‘Lord Ashterioth, the human vessel is changing course. It is positioning itself for an attack run,’ says the helm. I smile, astounded and oddly pleased by the arrogance of the humans, that they would dare attack us rather than flee in terror when they had the chance. It is this more than anything else that makes up my mind. We do not flee from our inferiors, not unless the odds against us are overwhelming.
‘Order the fleet to attack,’ I say. ‘Let us teach these apes a lesson. Prepare the Impalers! We shall board them and take some slaves for the Dark Feast.’
The ship shuddered again as the eldar weapons slammed into it. Somewhere in the distance a generator whined and threatened to overload. Was it just my imagination or was there a tang of ozone in the air? All around us the bridge seethed with activity. Officers shouted commands into vox-communicators and relayed reports from weapons batteries and turrets. Ships engineers bellowed incomprehensible catechisms of technical chant. The captain listened tensely and occasionally gave an order that sent crewmen scurrying.
I looked at Anton and Ivan; we were standing close to the commanders on the bridge along with the rest of the green-tunicked bodyguards, but we were not within earshot. Macharius, Drake and the others seemed to be too involved in preparing for a possible boarding action to pay any attention to us.
‘They are hitting us pretty hard for creatures who supposedly want to take us alive,’ said Anton.
‘What would you know about it?’ I said. ‘For all you know they could be hitting our shield generators.’
‘Hark at the expert on ship to ship combat,’ said Anton. ‘When did you join the Imperial Navy?’
‘About the time your brain shrunk to the size of a nut.’
‘Looks like we’re going to find a new sort of xenos to kill,’ said Ivan. The servo-motors in his fingers whined as he flexed them.
‘Can’t wait,’ said Anton in a voice heavily laced with irony. ‘Just as I was looking forward to some rest on Emperor’s Glory, this had to happen. Trust these Navy boys to get even something so simple as a jump wrong. And they did not manage to just get us to the wrong place, no! They managed to drop us right into a proper little wasp’s nest of decadent slavers with a liking for torture. I must congratulate them on that, sometime – with a bayonet.’
‘Don’t worry,’ said Ivan. ‘I’ll make sure you don’t suffer a fate worse than death.’
‘Who’s going to save you,’ Anton replied.
‘Leo will,’ Ivan said. I glanced up at the image of the eldar ship. It was at once sinister and strange. I wondered at the sensibility of a people who could build something like that. I had been told that in space, the size, shape and structure of a vessel do not matter all that much as long as its basic framework is able to endure acceleration. That being the case, the predatory lines of those eldar ships did not say anything good about their builders, or the creatures within them.
Drake was studying the ship just as closely. His eyes were narrowed. A look of concentration was on his face. I wondered what was going on inside his mind. I doubted he was afraid, but he did not look entirely happy either.
Macharius continued to receive reports and calmly give orders. Occasionally he too would glance up at the image of the ships closing with us, as though he were trying to divine the exact nature of his opponent from that visual manifestation. Sometimes he asked a question of the captain and was given a terse response.
He steepled his fingers and closed his eyes. In his mind the whole ship had become a battlefield and he was laying out his forces according to the plan he had formulated.
‘One hour until jump,’ said the astronavigator.
Even I could see that it was taking too long. We were never going to get away.
The human ship comes closer. The vision crystal stays focused on it, so the distance appears to be the same. Only the vectors on the augury arrays have altered, lengthening to show the vessel’s increased speed, darkening to show it is preparing its energies for warfare.
Dots on the board indicate our own ships, accelerating into attack positions, preparing to strafe the warship, to soften it up for boarding.
In the crystal I see the glint of energies in the enemy’s weapon bays as its armaments power up. I feel a faint flicker of excitement. It is always possible that a lucky shot might destroy my command ship, or even simply kill me, allowing my vessel to survive. What of it? It would not be the first time I have died. The haemonculi can always rebuild me if even the faintest fragment survives. But then, for that to happen they need to be able to find the fragment and, even if they do, who willingly gives themselves into the hands of the masters of pain?
Reports begin to pour in over our communication channels. Our ships are opening fire, carefully, calculatingly, aiming for weapons and void shield generators. They seek not to destroy our enemy but to neutralise its weapons and defences. That ship and its crew represent a prize to us so they are careful not to do too much damage to their future property.
The enemy feels no such
compunction. They unleash their potent, primitive weapons. Blades of energy stab across the void; lines of fire, brighter than the stars, seek our ships, which even now slide into evasive positions, the dark ripple of their shadowfields concealing their position from the foe.
There are certain small pleasures to be had in witnessing a battle in the airless deeps of space. There is the swift-moving beauty of the vectors on the table, the eerie glow of plasma contrails in the infinite darkness, the slowly spinning stars that glare down on the battle with the cold eyes of eternity.
That said, the combat is too distant and impersonal to be truly pleasurable. It lacks the ecstatic communion of predator and prey, the heady, intoxicating agony of the victim as they fall to the blade. No eldar can truly enjoy such battles as they do the swirl of melee.
I give the order to take us in close. I want to board this arrogant interloper’s vessel and make its crew suffer. I want to look in the face of my kill as it dies writhing.
I order Jalmek to take the helm as I prepare to lead the boarding party. I smile with anticipation as I make my way to the Impaler.
Chapter Five
I stand on the boarding ramp of the Impaler, surrounded by my personal guard. They grin and smile, readying themselves for the hot joy of battle. I keep my face cold and distant as a leader must, but in my heart I know what they are all feeling, for I feel it too.
In my mind I picture the ebb and flow of the ship to ship combat. I see our vessels whirl and spin and feint, a cloud of fire-wasps stinging at a running sabre-tiger. Some aim for the weapons, some for the sensor eyes, others dive and swirl and spin, seeking only to distract the humans, to keep them from guessing where the killing thrust will come. All of this concentrated action exists only to prepare the way for this boarding action, for the swift joyous launch of the Impalers as they race to make contact with the enemy vessel.
I picture our assault craft racing towards the enemy ship, a swift, sleek sliver of crystal, hurtling on a contact trajectory that will lead to inevitable victory.