Vainglorious, p.11
Vainglorious, page 11
‘Two to three days,’ he said, ‘to be absolutely certain. Two if all goes well, three if we uncover some evidence of the taint among the serfs or the priests of the Omnissiah working here, and they attempt to make a fight of it.’
‘Then we should turn our attention to the Nexus,’ I said. ‘How long will it take to screen the personnel there?’
Norgard looked distinctly unhappy. ‘Too long,’ she said. ‘There are at least ten times as many people permanently assigned to the site as there are here, plus an average of two hundred and seventeen transients arriving and departing each day.’
Vorspung nodded. ‘And the majority of those are logistical support specialists, who visit shrines and manufactoria all over the planet. Any one of whom could spread the taint elsewhere, or bring it back to the Nexus if the genestealer cult is embedded in another installation entirely.’
‘Then that complicates things,’ I said, doing the maths in my head, no doubt a lot more slowly and inaccurately than either of the tech-priests. ‘The best part of a month to be sure the Nexus is clear, assuming no more hybrids or implants arrive in the meantime.’
‘At least we can be sure the Chapter holding will be free of taint,’ Morie said, with a faint air of smugness. ‘We have minimal contact with the rest of Eucopia, apart from the deliveries of raw material. It will be easy enough to insulate the logisticians accompanying those from the interior of the shrine.’
‘If you can do it discreetly,’ I said, uncomfortably aware that discretion wasn’t usually high on the list of requirements for elevation to one of the Emperor’s finest.[79]
‘We’ll cite an outbreak of mirepox among the serfs,’ Morie said. ‘That should persuade most visitors to keep their distance.’
‘Allowing you to coordinate our efforts from here,’ Norgard agreed.
‘Unfortunately a similar subterfuge will be far less easy to perpetrate in the Nexus,’ Vorspung said. ‘Too many of the residents will have access to the primary data, and attempting to falsify it would draw too much unwelcome attention.’ He shuddered, barely perceptibly. ‘Not to mention the ethical and theological issues such a course of action would entail.’
Norgard nodded. ‘Compromises must sometimes be made in the name of expediency,’ she said, ‘but one of this magnitude…’ Her voice trailed away.
I nodded, feigning a sympathy I didn’t feel. In my book you did whatever you needed to do to confound the Emperor’s enemies, and telling a few fibs was the least of it; but to a tech-priest the truth was sacred, and pressing the point wouldn’t help us maintain a united front against them.
‘That wouldn’t help anyway,’ I said, to the visible relief of both tech-priests. ‘If everything is as interlinked as you explained to me in the control chapel, the moment we start general genescans, pretty much everyone on the planet will know. Including the ’stealers.’
‘Then what do you suggest?’ Morie asked.
‘Begin with the skitarii,’ I said, ‘and pray to the Throne none of them are compromised.’ I turned to Norgard. ‘There must be some pretext you can use to isolate them from the rest of the Nexus for as long as it takes to screen them.’
Norgard nodded. ‘I’m sure our honoured allies from the Adeptus Astartes are eager to observe their performance in a live-fire exercise. Which will mean moving all those currently assigned to the Nexus to the proving grounds to prepare.’
‘In small enough groups to test discreetly,’ I added, in tones of approval I didn’t have to cultivate. ‘Once you’ve cleared a squad or two, they can keep an eye on the others while they wait for their turn.’ Because if there were any ’stealer infiltrators among the skitarii, it was inevitable they’d try to shoot their way out the minute they realised we were on to them.
‘We’ll start with the command staff,’ Norgard said, ‘and their close-protection units. Once they’ve been cleared we’ll have enough firepower to contain any little surprises.’
‘As will we,’ Morie put in. ‘The Reclaimers delegation will include an honour guard of Terminators.’ He smiled, in a slightly forced manner, in the praetor’s direction. ‘As protocol demands when dealing with so exalted a host.’
‘I would say I’m flattered,’ Norgard said, ‘but under the circumstances I’ll just be happy to see them there.’ Which was hardly surprising; I’d seen skitarii in action before, and a few turncoats among them would be guaranteed to make a considerable mess before being subdued. She glanced at me. ‘And the Imperial Guard liaison, of course. It would be unusual not to have you attend the demonstration on behalf of the lord general, would it not?’
I nodded reluctantly. This was a development I’d failed to anticipate, but she was absolutely right; if I wasn’t there, we might just as well hold up a sign saying You’ve been rumbled and this is a trap for any subverted skitarii in her legion. ‘I look forward to seeing your troops show what they’re capable of,’ I said diplomatically, which was sort of true, unless what they were capable of turned out to be treachery and my attempted murder.
‘But won’t that leave the Nexus undefended?’ Vorspung objected.
‘Technically, I suppose so,’ I conceded. ‘Although there doesn’t seem to be any clear and present military threat to it at the moment.’
Norgard nodded. ‘The proving grounds are close enough to respond from if the orks decide to invade while our backs are turned,’ she reassured the magos, who still looked distinctly unconvinced from where I stood. ‘And the probability of that is low in the extreme.’
‘On the order of zero point zero-seven per cent,’ Vorspung agreed, having taken a moment to work it out.
‘For an ork invasion specifically?’ I asked, partly out of genuine curiosity, but mostly from a sense of mischief. Vorspung’s eyes unfocused momentarily again.
‘Specifically,’ he said, as incapable of most of his brethren of recognising sarcasm when he heard it. ‘The probability of an invasion of any kind would be zero point one-five, of which the tyranids would be the most likely aggressor, the chances of an attack by them being zero point–’
‘Low enough,’ I said hastily, regretting the impulse to pull his leg almost at once, and determined to move the conversation in a more productive direction as quickly as possible. I turned back to Norgard. ‘What about the skitarii assigned elsewhere on the planet?’ Or in the rest of the system, come to that. The colonisation effort here might be concentrated primarily on the world we were standing on, but there were bound to be orbitals and void stations in its immediate vicinity, to service the starships transporting the bounty of its manufactories to where it was needed. Whenever it started producing enough to begin attracting more than a handful of starships, of course. In a few more generations there would probably be outposts looting the other planets, moons and asteroids of their own raw materials as well, which would have made our task even more difficult, but for the moment, thank the Throne, we’d be able to concentrate our efforts on Eucopia alone.
Norgard nodded, as though pleased I’d brought the matter up. Perhaps she even was.
‘Spread fairly thinly,’ she said, ‘and only a fraction of the strength of a mature forge world.’ Which could be good or bad news, I supposed, depending on how strong a foothold our shadowy enemies had managed to secure among their ranks. ‘In terms you’re familiar with, one regimental equivalent assigned to the main legion facilities at the Nexus, one primarily concerned with the other shrines and manufactories in this hemisphere, Impi Tertius maintaining security of the other,[80] and a handful of maniples seconded from each of the other three to form the nucleus of a fourth when population, resources and strategic requirements permit. Most of those currently being deployed among the off-world facilities.’
‘And therefore of no immediate concern,’ Vorspung put in, oblivious to the glances exchanged by Norgard, Morie and I, all three of us under no such illusion. In my book, out of sight meant very much in mind, unless you were willing to risk a shot in the back.
‘I would appreciate the details of their disposition,’ Morie said, and I nodded my agreement, certain that the Reclaimers would be drawing up contingency plans to neutralise every skitarii unit on the planet with a higher threat rating than latrine orderly[81] before the day was out.
‘By all means,’ Norgard said, no doubt intending to do precisely the same thing in case, against all likelihood, the Reclaimers turned out to be infested with turncoats after all.
As we were shortly to discover, though, the threat was far more insidious, deeply hidden and dangerous than any genestealer cult could possibly be.
Editorial note:
Since one of the many lacunae in his memoirs during which nothing happened that Cain deems worthy of recording, at least from his singularly self-centred perspective, now occurs, this seems as good a time as any to interpolate another, more dispassionate, assessment.
From In Blackest Night: The Millennial Wars Appraised, by Ayjaepi Clothier, 127.M42.
Though Commissar Cain and his allies soon became aware of the presence of a hidden enemy on Eucopia, thanks to a botched assassination attempt, their initial efforts to uncover and eliminate the threat were far from successful. Their plans were meticulous, and followed through with all the efficiency expected from the Adeptus Mechanicus, but no trace of the genestealer infestation they had at first suspected was ever found.
Perhaps emboldened by the lack of an effective response, the true conspirators risked moving more openly against the Imperium – an act which, with hindsight, may well have precipitated their own downfall.
TWELVE
As I’d expected, but never quite dared to hope, everyone at the Reclaimers’ citadel turned out to be completely free of taint, which was the one piece of good news I got that week. Morie’s message was, of course, both cryptic and brief, since there was no telling who among the thousands of tech-priests in the Nexus might be capable of intercepting it,[82] or might be a part of the shadowy cabal working so diligently against us, but it left me comfortably reassured that the Chapter holding was a potentially safe refuge should I require one.
Which, nice as it was, left me no further forward in my commission from Zyvan. Vorspung and I had conferred on a few occasions, as discreetly as we could, but of necessity our discussions were brief, and as casual seeming as we could contrive. Even for someone as habitually paranoid as I am, the possibility that any one of the red-robed acolytes of the Martian deity surrounding us could be eavesdropping, or, rather more pertinently from my point of view, preparing to slip a knife between my ribs, was profoundly disturbing; all the more so the longer it took for the other boot to fail to drop.
So, to put it mildly, I was feeling more than a little wary as Jurgen and I set out for the proving grounds, where the weapons produced by the manufactories of Eucopia were tried out before being shipped to whichever battlefront most desperately needed them.[83] Since they were wide open areas of nothing at all, existing solely for their topography to be rearranged by heavy weapons fire, Norgard’s skitarii maintained a small facility there to which only they had access. Not quite as secure as the Chapter holding, but a great deal more so than the Nexus, which probably accounted for the feeling of relief which swept over me the moment I got word that it was time to set off.
‘Thought you’d rather keep your feet on the ground this time, sir,’ Jurgen said, swinging himself up into the cab of the cargo-8 Ridgehauler he’d evidently found unattended in a loading bay somewhere.
‘You thought right,’ I assured him, with an appreciative glance at the angular cab and the blocky cargo compartment behind it. Dented and rust-streaked by long, hard use, the metal bodywork looked thick and robust enough to shrug off a las-bolt or two, and might even be proof against the odd bolter round; in the absence of a Salamander[84] the vehicle would get us where we needed to go in relative safety. Not that I wouldn’t have appreciated something with a heavy weapon mount as well, but I suppose that might have been a bit of a giveaway if anyone really was watching me for signs that their plot had been rumbled.
Using the tread of a tyre which rose as high as my sash for a foothold I clambered in through the passenger door, which swung closed behind me with the reassuring sigh of an airtight seal, and fastened the crash webbing of the seat nearest to it. There were three in all, the centre one occupied by Jurgen’s personal weapons, and, Jurgen being Jurgen, a large flask of tanna and a scattering of ration packs, the contents of one of which had already been converted into a scattering of crumbs adhering to his facial hair.[85] Everything had been lashed into place by the seat restraints, although his lasgun was, as always, close enough to the driving seat for him to lay a hand on in a heartbeat. Which left the butt of the melta he’d neglected to return to stores several decades ago nudging me rather uncomfortably in the ribs, until I unclipped and restowed it with the stock resting in the footwell next to my leg. As I did so, I raised an enquiring eyebrow.
‘Do you really think you’ll need this?’
Jurgen shrugged. ‘If there are ’stealers about,’ he said, ‘it’d be just our luck to run into the bloody patriarch.’ Sure I was settled, he fired up the engine, and started us rolling towards the massive doors of the Titan-sized airlock[86]ahead of us. ‘And I’m not leaving it lying around where some cogboy might decide he needs some spare parts.’
‘Good points,’ I agreed, unable to fault his logic on either count. I leant forward a little as the inner doors ground closed behind us and the outer ones began to part, revealing a slowly growing sliver of the outside world. ‘Let’s hope this trip’s a bit less eventful than the last one.’
Jurgen shrugged again. ‘It’ll take a bit longer,’ he said, ‘but I can live with that.’
As could I. Vorspung had, naturally, offered me the use of another aircar, which I’d politely declined, as my aide and I had both had more than enough of that particular mode of transportation to be going on with – though possibly for different reasons. The Ridgehauler would be slower, but I trusted Jurgen to handle its controls a good deal more competently than I could pilot an aircar, and the simple, robust promethium engine was operated entirely by mechanical linkages – nothing a hidden cultist could exploit remotely to blow us to pieces or divert us off the edge of a cliff. The unexpected detonation of our old flyer was still being officially treated as a regrettable accident, despite none of its putative passengers believing that for a moment. Norgard’s diligent enquiries had failed to find a shred of evidence as to who might have been responsible for an act of sabotage – or, for that matter, how they might have gone about it. I made the mistake of asking only once, finding not a syllable of the answer intelligible.
So, as the harsh sunlight of Eucopia fell on us through the windscreen, I found my spirits lifting, despite the prospect of some time to come in a pressurised cabin in close proximity to Jurgen. The Nexus still loomed over us, but at least I was no longer surrounded by augmetically enhanced potential assassins, quite possibly capable of whistling up a concealed genestealer or two into the bargain. As we edged out of the shadow of the gargantuan building, it dawned on me that this was the first time I’d seen the barren landscape of Eucopia from ground level, and I found myself scanning it as much from simple curiosity as wary anticipation of a potential threat.
The transitway we joined was broad and relatively smooth, although several decades of use had eroded the rockcrete surface in places – not enough to impede our progress, but sufficient to send an occasional jolt through the suspension and the worn seat I occupied. Our elevated position in the cab afforded us an impressive view of our surroundings, and the other traffic sharing the road with us: utility haulers like ours, for the most part, crewed by relatively unaugmented lay brethren or indentured artisans, who glanced at us with varying expressions of indifference, surprise or hostility (in a few cases all three as Jurgen overtook slower-moving vehicles with his usual disdain for anything in the immediate vicinity which might technically have had the right of way). Occasionally larger vehicles, laden with prefabricated components for something under construction elsewhere, or cargoes shrouded in tarpaulins which somehow managed to look both quotidian and vaguely threatening, loomed up out of the dust clouds raised by every passing conveyance only to vanish again as quickly as they’d appeared.
The dust, I soon realised, was ubiquitous. Though too tenuous to breathe, the atmosphere was thick enough for winds to blow, and with no rain to wash them out of the air the fine particulates abraded from the mountains by aeons of erosion drifted everywhere, raised from wherever they’d settled by the passage of every passing lorry. As Jurgen swung us off the main road, however, onto the less travelled one leading to our eventual destination, the haze began to clear. The only dust plume now visible was the one we were raising ourselves. Trying not to reflect that this would make us a sitting target for anyone intent on ambush, I turned my head to look directly out of the passenger side window.[87]
The landscape was just as barren as it had appeared from our descending shuttle, the narrow road we followed threading its way through a broken panorama of jutting outcrops and steep ravines, the plains we’d flown over proving to be riven with fissures and scattered boulders. I was put in mind of a sun-baked lake bed, though this world had never seen open water, and likely never would; however successful the terraforming effort eventually became, the Adeptus Mechanicus would be loath to render any of its resources more difficult to extract by inundating them. On several occasions we crossed surprisingly deep canyons on bridges barely wide enough to accommodate our vehicle. True to form, Jurgen never slowed, steering us between uncomfortably fragile-seeming guard rails centimetres from our wheels with his usual insouciance. Knowing better than to show any signs of concern, which would only leave him feeling aggrieved at the implied slur on his competence, I glanced down into their shadowed depths, where dust, driven by the winds channelled through them, flowed like arid streams, obscuring whatever lay beneath.
