Fire Warrior

III 08.51 HRS (SYS. LOCAL — DOLUMAR IV, Ultima Seg. #4356/E)

A call to arms klaxon trilled, oscillating whoops that made the ears ring and the head pound. Footsteps and shouting voices hurtled along the iron lattice corridor, adding to the clamour of the grumbling generarium and the hissing, gurgling duct innards riddling every wall.

Governor Severus lurked in his plush cabin aboard the flagship Enduring Blade and forced himself to focus, biting his lip until he tasted blood. The ceaseless uproar of the warship was far from conducive to contemplation.

The journey from the surface had been comfortable, he supposed. The nobilite shuttle he’d acquired and furnished years before had provided ample room, despite his companions comprising a hulking retinue of Space Marines.

Severus had first contacted the Enduring Blade a week previously. It was an irregular convention, he’d discovered, for companies of Space Marines to be seconded aboard navy warships, spending their time in isolated training and meditation away from the crew. He dimly suspected it was all part of a goodwill scheme to minimise enmity between the characteristically arrogant Adeptus Astartes and the abundant personnel of the Battlefleet Ultima. It made little difference to him why they were aboard; the admiral had boasted in communication that full companies from the Raptors and Ultramarines Chapters had honoured his flagship with their presence, and Severus had wasted little time in formulating his petition.

The Raptors’ reputation for risk-taking and tenacity — often taken to an almost reckless degree — immediately endeared them to him. He could allow nothing, be it hesitation or pragmatism in the face of overwhelming odds, to stand in the way of his goal. Besides, the Ultramarines were famous for their application of righteousness and morality, characteristics that, in Severus’s experience, bred a proclivity towards asking awkward questions.

He’d contacted Captain Mito, commander of the Raptors’ fifth company, aboard the Enduring Blade, requesting his Chapter’s aid with a politeness he struggled to maintain. He cited the Administratum documentation he held, expansively glorifying his plans to capture and study a tau ethereal, highlighting the tactical value that such a coup might hold. He played upon the captain’s piety, stressing the holy importance of purging xenogen life wherever it was found, assuring him that in understanding the Emperor’s enemies, His glorious will could best be served. All this and more he communicated, hungry for the Marines’ involvement, and in the end he was rewarded with the pledged assistance of a tactical squad of Raptors. They arrived two days later, colossal warriors cut directly from the myths and legends of history, and he’d presided joyfully over their secret reception at his mansion in Lettica, immensely pleased at his own machinations.

The tip-off he’d been expecting arrived two days later. Beyond the abyssal gulf surrounding the Dolumar system, the tau empire’s outermost fringes were rich in colony worlds. There, left behind by the collapse of the Damocles Crusade, waged by the Imperium two hundred years previously, Severus had long ago discovered several scattered populations of humans, living peacefully beneath the patronage of the tau. He’d been fostering contacts amongst the dispossessed communities ever since. In the end, greed had overcome any sentiments of loyalty to their new masters: he’d learned of the impending arrival of an ethereal upon the colony world of Kuu’lan from one fortune-seeking fool, and had dispatched the Raptors immediately.

They’d performed admirably, despite the immense collateral damage they’d inflicted. And now the next phase of the plan was progressing equally as pleasingly: the tau response had been swift and devastating and, even better, Battlefleet Ultima had come running at his call. It was, he supposed, a minor annoyance that the tau ethereal had escaped, but he’d rectify the problem one way or another. There were so many possibilities, so many potential outcomes, and every one made him a winner. Yes. Cause for celebration.

Not that he could afford the time for such things. He must concentrate; force himself to contain the energies a little longer. There had been too many leakages already.

A tiny voice in his mind, words hissing like blistering flesh, whispered: Soon.

Kor’o Natash T’yra, standing at the centre of his private swarm of control drones and sensor screens, worked his jaw thoughtfully. The serene bridge of the Or’es Tash’var surrounded him in calmness, its crescent arrangement of smooth-moulded control consoles and benches typical of air caste sensibilities. Against the airy brightness of the command deck, with its serene curvature and uncluttered spaces, the main viewscreen sucked at his attention: the inky blackness of the void punctuated sparsely by whirligig lights.

It was, he thought, like a cluster of jewels; intricate crystals of white and yellow fragmenting and tumbling, spinning their multifaceted surfaces through the planetary luminescence. A tiny sapphire blossomed in one corner of the screen, quickly swallowed behind a brief diamond flare, returning again to obsidian nothingness.

He watched as impossible swarms of gue’la attack craft obliterated the few air caste fighters not grounded or damaged on the planet below, forcing his thoughts away from the abstract beauty of the sight. Every diamond, he knew, was a glowing missile exhaust, every polished sapphire the pulsefire of an outnumbered tau fighter; every crackling amber bead another life lost, another kor’ui mouthing their deathshriek into the void.

The human fleet skulked nearby, a dispersing pack of kroot hounds circling a dying preything, hungry for carrion. Every one was a beaked slab of colossal dimensions, infested by the scuttling buttresses and spires characteristic of gue’la architecture, bristling with multi-tiered turrets and cannons. It could raze a planet, this ponderous clutch of predators.

Staying out of range of their main batteries was proving problematic, even for his faster, more manoeuvrable Gharial-class warship, but Tyra was unwilling to disengage from orbit until the very last second. The swarms of fighters disgorged from the warships’ bellies like flies lifting from rotten meat were a more immediate threat. Tyra cast a sad glance towards the schematic charts. Damage indicators pulsed calmly.

“They will cripple us,” he said beneath his breath, “drain us, then move in to finish us.”

“Kor’o?” His first officer, El’Siet, had overheard him.

“Nothing,” he said self-consciously, berating himself for giving voice to his anxiety.

On one screen a camera drone faithfully documented a cluster of fighters, jagged black and grey slashes of metal superimposed with IR-sensed fuel emissions like trails of blood, as they strafed the smooth hull of the warship’s juntas side. Twin furrows of las-fire etched ugly wounds across the tawny hull, puncturing blast shields and sending great spears of debris and writhing kor’la crewmen venting into space. It happened again on another screen. And another. It was happening all over. Tyra shook his head sadly and gritted his teeth, prepared to make any sacrifice to linger here a little longer.

The kor’uis poised over consoles nearby murmured incessantly, forever dispatching message drones and crew orders with quiet industry. Tyra allowed their reports to wash over him.

“...second wave hitting the upper plates...”

“...snae’tas are targeting the engines...”

“...repair team to the tertiary core...”

“...toroq side of the fleet’s circling at the rear...”

“...major damage to the 5th and 17th weapons-pods...”

“...3rd phalanx move into... 3rd phalanx? Come in?...”

It was an endless stream of negatives and failures, leaving Tyra sighing heavily as it went on and on and on. A small kor’vesa hovered up to his side and blinked a cyan light.

“Report,” he said glumly, anticipating more bad news.

“Second hangar reports dropship Tap’ran docked,” the tiny machine droned, resonant voice absurdly incongruous with its size. “Aun’el T’au Ko’vash is aboard.”

Tyra turned in astonishment, staring at the hovering machine with wide eyes.

“Confirm!” he demanded, fighting to keep the excitement from his voice.

“Aun’el T’au Ko’vash is aboard,” the drone repeated faithfully.

“Helm!” Tyra hissed, stabbing at control drones in a blur of activity. “Set course for Rann spacedock. The ethereal is with us again.”

Whatever relief the crew enjoyed quietly at the news was short-lived. El’Siet looked up from his console — his dark expression effortlessly bursting Tyra’s bubble of excitement. “We’re under way, Kor’o...” he said, a minute frown betraying his concern. “There’s damage to the toroq rear engine. The gue’la are matching speed.”

Tyra felt his relief turning in on itself, washing over him in a wave of fear and disappointment. A tremor ran through the bridge as a strafing wave of gue’la fighters glided across the viewscreen.

One of the kor’ui controllers pressed a chime, attracting his attention. “Kor’o? We... we have incoming...”

“Incoming what?”

“Assault craft, Kor’o. Infantry assault craft.”

Tyra let his eyes close slowly, feeling the enormity of the revelation soaking in. Dozens of expectant faces regarded him from every direction, arranged throughout the bridge in silent expectation. He flicked at a small control, opening a channel on the internal communicator. Its quiet peal echoed throughout the vessel.

“All hands,” he said, fighting against the wavering of his voice. “Prepare to repel boarders.”

Lusha watched Kais hurry away, the change of armour unable to disguise him amongst the other shas’las. He walked differently: a rolling, predatory gait that the others hadn’t yet adopted, marking him out as plainly as any scarred wargear. He’d been changed by the morning’s madness, there was no doubt about it. Exactly what he had become, Lusha sighed, remained to be seen.

Up and down the rounded corridors of the Or’es Tash’var dilating emergency lights pulsed in time with the sonorous fluctuations of a siren. Maintenance drones, hovering high at the zenith of the hallway arch, prattled machine code and exchanged optic signals without slowing. Kor’la crewmen, tall frames appearing spiderlike amidst the clattering groups of fire warriors, hurried from place to place on myriad errands.

And always, every few heartbeats, came the jarring, ugly rush of another impact, another gue’la assault craft gouging its way through the warship’s hull, splitting apart at its prow in a toothless sneer of melta charges and jagged angle grinders to disgorge its huddled cargo of human soldiers. The quiet corridors of the tau vessel had become a battleground, and every able-bodied fire warrior had been sent into the fray to prevent more landings.

Except Lusha. He had more specific orders.

“This way, Aun’el,” he said, his respectful tone unable to fully disguise his impatience. The ethereal too was watching Kais depart, his expression difficult to judge beneath the medipack tied delicately around his brow.

“That shas’la,” he said, voice clouded. “He carries a great weight.”

Lusha tried to steer the ethereal away, “He’s done well, Aun’el.”

“Oh, I don’t disagree, El’Lusha... But is it not said that even when broken, a sword may still cut?”

“‘Broken’, Aun’el?” he replied, hearing his own words echoed in the allegory. “Beyond repair, do you suppose?”

The ethereal looked thoughtful. The blast door separating the pair from the rushing shas’las sealed with an organic breath. Ko’vash pursed his lips.

“We shall see. Come.”

Ko’vash turned towards the command deck elevator and strode away, robes billowing. Lusha hurried after him, gun cradled alertly at his side.

“I’m not convinced this is wise, Aun’el. Your safety is paramount.”

“Nonetheless, El’Lusha — I wish to visit the bridge. I must speak with the kor’o.”

“I appreciate that, but—”

“Good. Then you may act the bodyguard on the way there, if you must.”

“Orders of O’Udas, Aun’el,” he said, enduring the ethereal’s stubbornness with a smile. “We’ve come too far to lose you now.”

“Hmm.”

The elevator sealed behind them, delicate patterns of interlocking colours glowing on the interior walls as the carriage began to rise. Lusha let his eye wander across the ingenious skeins of pastel lattices, focusing the mind as it explored. Like everything aboard the Tash’var, even the fio’sorral artworks were unsurpassed. The idea of gue’la troopers stamping their filth across the warship’s serene spaces filled him with disgust — irrational and untaulike. Troubled at his internal impetuousness, his thoughts returned implacably to—

“You’re troubled by young La’Kais, El’Lusha.”

Ko’vash was staring at him, dark eyes narrowed shrewdly. Lusha frowned, perplexed by his own transparency. In all his tau’cyrs of service he’d met many ethereals and learned — by and large — to contain the impossible sense of awe induced by their presence. Still, rumours always abounded...

“Aun’el... Are you reading my mind?”

“Don’t be ridiculous, El’Lusha.”

“Then how—”

“Think of me as a student of tau nature, Shas’el. I watch things and...” he smiled thoughtfully, “And follow my nose, as the gue’la would say. Your concern is palpable.”

“I knew his father. He’s... I think he’s lost, Aun’el. He needs guidance.”

The ethereal sighed, eyes closed. “Shas’el — you know as well as I that one cannot be simply forced onto the pathway leading to the tau’va.”

“I know, Aun’el, but—”

“If La’Kais is lost, Shas’el, his first step to recovery lies in wanting to be found.”

“And how does he do that?”

Ko’vash smiled, a bitter, humourless grin that seemed incongruous amid his serene features. “Carefully, El’Lusha. Carefully.”

The elevator walls dimmed as the carriage decelerated, doors slewing open with a sigh. The bridge opened up before them: an arena of dashing kor’las and blurring drones. A barren-voiced AI, reacting to some hidden optical sensor, no doubt, declared, “Aun on the bridge.”

Immediately a knot of high-ranking kor— and shas-personnel surged forwards to envelop Ko’vash, bearing him away in the direction of the tired looking Kor’o in a polite clamour of questions and greetings. Lusha was left with his thoughts.

A distant roar broadcast another boarding impact, contact vibrations shuddering the length of the ship. A row of panels glowed orange, damage sensors emitting their sonorous warnings. A harassed shas’vre seated at a command console diligently began directing troops towards the new insertion zone, knowing that every assault craft left undamaged, protruding from the hull like a knife hilt from a corpse, was a docking point for the vast gue’la troop carriers, winching into position even now.

“Prognosis, Shas’vre,” Lusha grunted, keen to take command. The controller barely looked round.

“A knife’s edge, Shas’el. It could go either way.”

“How many breaches?”

“Twelve boarding groups. Eighteen more were destroyed in transit.”

Lusha nodded, impressed. “My compliments to the gunnery drones. What of our troops?”

“Not nearly enough of them, Shas’el. Not nearly enough.”

A firm hand landed on Lusha’s shoulder, surprising him. “I thought I might find you here, El’Lusha. Never one to take a well-earned rest, I recall.”

He turned to face O’Udas with a slight bow. “As the One Path leads,” he said, pressing his hands together in respectful greeting.

The shas’o dismissed the ritual with a wave of his hand. “Enough of that, Shas’el — unless you want me to bow to you too.” He smiled, regarding the knot of personnel across the bridge. “You’ve done well. I can scarcely believe the Aun’el is amongst us again.”

Guiltily, Lusha wondered if it had been worth it. Whatever happened to the equality of every tau? Would they have sent a warship to rescue him?”

More of Kais’s bitterness, addling his mind. It was too easy to lose faith. Too easy to set aside the ideals of unity in a fit of acidic hubris.

The serene part of him — the part he trusted — whispered: Of course. Of course it was worth it. It was done in the name of the tau’va.

In the path of the Greater Good, it said, all are equal. All are as important and as fallible. As worthy and as worthless. As a being, as a cog within the machine, the Aun’el is as valuable as any of us. There is no injustice here.

But as a thing, as a receptacle of knowledge, his importance warrants any sacrifice.

Lusha breathed out with a clearer mind.

“It had little to do with me, Shas’o,” he returned.

“Ah, yes... Our heroic shas’la. I shouldn’t have doubted your choice, El’Lusha. You have my apologies.”

Lusha dipped graciously, surprised. The shas’o went on, waving him upright. “Tell me — where is this La’Kais? I should like to meet him.”

Lusha wanted to say: He wouldn’t rest, Shas’o. He wouldn’t stop for reward or remonstration. He’s out there killing, destroying, out of control.

He wanted to say: O’Udas — he is not like us.

He wanted to say: He is a weapon. We may aim him and set him loose — but nothing more. We could never hope to control him.

He wanted to say: We’re losing him.

He wanted to say: He is Mont’au.

But instead he avoided O’Udas’s inquisitive stare and mumbled:

“He fights on, Shas’o, by the One Path. He fights on.”

Kais primed the explosive, surrounded by gue’la bodies.

Some were alive still, injured and dying. Crooked legs hanging, useless. Shattered arms, spurting wounds, pallid faces. They writhed and groaned in their own fluids, leaving slick patterns across the deck. Some of them watched him, too weak to intervene. Finishing them off, he’d decided, would be a waste of ammunition.

The surprise at his own survival was beginning to fade. Luck, skill, enthusiasm; it didn’t matter why he lived whilst so many others had died. That he had survived, that he would continue to survive, was all that mattered. It presented an unreal cocktail of pride and guilt to his mind, making him frown.

The pulse carbine was an improvement, at least. All the new wargear was. Exchanging the filthy shell of his old armour for the pristine new suit had been an almost miraculous process. Standing there in the dropship with Lusha and the Aun, he’d seen himself as a kathr’yl desert reptile, heavy with the weight of its years, fronded scales pitted and sore, unable to walk any further. In the hottest part of the rotaa the oldest of them would slump to the dry sand and split from head to toe, tattered bodies disgorging a single unblemished offspring into the arid air. Purity out of infirmity.

That was how it had felt. Rebirth. Shrugging off all the doubts, the maelstrom of uncertainty and dissatisfaction that raked at his mind falling away like a tangled morass of withered skin. He should have known it wouldn’t be so easy.

So: new armour, new weapon. He’d slipped away through the besieged corridors of the Or’es Tash’var a new tau, thoughts washed clean by the Aun’s inexplicable serenity, refreshed, renewed. Then Lusha and the Aun were left behind, the gue’la were everywhere and—

And the killing started again.

He couldn’t run from it. Couldn’t hide it behind the cleansing influence of an ethereal or the guilty reassurances of sio’t lessons. He’d been a fool to believe he could expunge the rage with such little effort.

The winch dominating the rear section of the ugly gue’la assault craft gurgled and steamed, thick chains looping over and under the grinding drive-wheels. Outside, Kais knew, approaching inexorably, a troop-holder was guiding itself into position to dock. The assault craft contained elite storm-troopers, bursting into the deck to clear a space for their more numerous comrades aboard the carriers. They’d failed, in this instance. He checked the remote detonator, reassured by its glowing yellow status light, and hurried from the craft.

The damage it had wrought upon the Or’es Tash’var as it penetrated was astonishing: whole rooms crippled and caved-in, helpless kor’las crushed or suffocated as entire walls split and shifted, floors buckling and bulging. And where the doors of the gue’la vessel — itself little more than a hollow missile — hung open at the prow, a strange metamorphosis occurred, the serrated bore head of the barge amalgamating almost organically with the undulating disorder of the warship’s wound. Black ceramite, melted by superheated charges, fused in a splattered vomit cast to the mangled edges of the beige and cream hallway. It was like passing through tumorous flesh, leaving an area of ugly foreign material and entering the wounded layers of once healthy tissue around it without being able to pinpoint exactly where the transition occurred.

Kais stepped from the angular vessel into the ruptured innards of the Or’es Tash’var, slipping on human blood and tripping on singed, unidentifiable bodies. The grenade launcher slung beneath the carbine, he reflected, had already proved indispensable.

That was when he’d known. That was when he’d felt the Mont’au devil clinging to his shoulders, refusing to let go. It was in him.

He’d thumbed the grenade trigger apprehensively as he approached his appointed reaction zone, still accustoming himself to the lighter weight of the carbine. The gue’la were everywhere, spilling from the barge like sludge, shouting and whooping as they came. The grenade had bounced off a wall with a clatter.

Then everything went outwards. There was no fire, no grandiose gout of flame or smoke roiling, mushroomlike, out of the grenade. There was just a wall — an expanding sphere — of force. Flesh came off bone and hurled itself across walls and ceilings. Bodies flipped in midair, slinking head over heels to collapse in boneless disarray. Shrapnel flickered like a galaxy. There was noise and fear and screams, and afterwards only groans.

And Kais had known, in that moment. He’d known that this was his purpose. He faced a choice, he saw now. He could pretend that every death was a step on the road to the tau’va, some distant glowing impossibility on the horizon, or he could accept the truth: he killed because he could. Because he was good at it. Because... because every death dimmed the glowering embers of his father’s eyes, boring into his mind.

You see? he wanted to scream, shrieking deep into that critical gaze from his memories, You see that I excel now? You see my gift?

But it wasn’t a gift, it was a curse. And he knew it.

“La’Kais here,” he grunted into the comm. “Forward-core segment. The first charges are primed. Whenever you’re ready, control.”

“Good work, fire warrior.”

Kais recognised the voice. “El’Lusha?”

“That’s right. Still here, Shas’la.”

Kais grinned inside his helmet. Lusha’s presence, no matter how remote, was strangely reassuring.

“Get clear of the area,” the voice rasped. “We need to voidseal before detonating. There’s another impact point on the next level up.”

“On my way.”

Kais took a final look at the riot of gue’la bodies littering the floor and headed for the portal. It ghosted shut behind him, locking with a clang.

The charges detonated and everything went white.

A servitor twitched its head, owl-like. Its taut skin, stretched to near-transparency over the metal latticework of fibres and components riddling its skull, bunched in ugly dumps as it affected a frown — some vestigial impulse remaining from the machine host’s previous life as a living human.

Fleet Admiral Constantine had learned long ago to translate the foibles of his staff — even those not blessed with sentience. “Report,” he grunted.

“Assault craft #3/G9 destroyed,” the servitor droned, voice deriving ghoulishly from a speaker tube on its shoulder. “Winch assembly compromised. Troop carrier Sillandrus detached and free-floating. Contact severed. Assumption of all hands lost.”

Constantine almost spat. That was the sixth boarding point compromised within as many minutes. He lifted his peaked cap to smooth his silver hair and stared around the control deck with a sigh. Immense banks of copper-piped gauges and obsidian-panelled switch consoles blinked and hissed, dutifully manned by a menagerie of bio-machine servitors and gaudily dressed officers. The enormous logic engines rising in stacks to either side were tended by chanting tech-priests and crewmen, work seats on vertical rails slumping and ratcheting their way up and down, twitching datum drones exchanging nonsensical binary conversations. To one side surveyor screens glittered and strobed, to the other weapons data was scrutinised and processed by watch officers.

It was pandemonium to the untrained eye, but all conducted in hushed tones and infused with the ghostly scent of incense and myrrh.

The boarding craft, he knew, were woefully outdated. He’d seen stock footage of the assault boats of the Segmentum Obscura in action, a smooth and deadly deployment of resources that left little room for enemy defence. The resources of the Fleet Ultima were worryingly behind the times.

“Fury interceptor, report,” Constantine barked. A pale-faced ensign looked up guiltily.

“Seventy per cent operational, sir. Sixty-five per cent for the Starhawks.”

“So why’s that warp-damned thing still moving? Their engines should be crippled by now!”

“Wing Commander Keamil says there are enemy squadrons rejoining from the surface. They’re holding the bombers up, sir.”

“You tell Keamil that if that bloody ship isn’t powerless and coasting within the hour I’ll be holding him up on a charge of professional inadequacy. Clear?”

“Sir.”

“Good. Now. Infantry command.”

An officer saluted. “Sir. Heavy resistance, as anticipated. If we can land a troop carrier or two it’ll turn the tables.”

“If, commander?”

“When, sir.”

“Better. What about our special delivery?”

A cowled tech-priest stood with a perfunctory nod. “Adept Yenus encountered some... problems. It seems the machina locarus is somewhat decayed and the teleport array couldn’t adequately secure a lo—”

“Adept — I’m not remotely interested. Just tell me if it worked.”

“Partially, admiral. We believe two adepts survived the transmission and are in position.”

“They have protection?”

The personnel officer chimed in smartly. “Of course, sir. The storm-troopers are converging on their position and the area’s sealed with a tri-lock.”

“Hmm.” Constantine nodded minutely — the nearest he ever came to demonstrating his satisfaction. “And what about these ‘disturbances’ I keep hearing about? Commissar Varadiel’s reports aren’t reassuring.”

The officer rubbed his eyes and shook his head. “Nothing concrete, sir. Just some missing ratings scum and a lot of rumours. Too much dreamstimm amongst the conscripts and not enough whipping, if you ask me—”

“I didn’t. I want armsmen on full alert. If there’s something going on aboard my ship I want to know abo—”

He was interrupted by a commotion from the entranceway. A knot of ensigns were restraining a tall figure with as much decorum as they could muster.

“...let me through, warp take you!” a whinnying voice demanded. “I’ve been kept waiting quite long enough!”

“Sir, you can’t go on the bri—”

“Don’t you dare tell me what I can’t do, you odious little creature! Do you know who I am?”

“Yes, sir, bu—”

Constantine rolled his eyes. “Let him through.”

The ensigns shrank back. Governor Severus sneered at them victoriously, framed by the colossal archway from the chapel hold beyond the command deck. He brushed himself down, making a show of his ermine-collared greatcoat, and stalked forwards. Constantine was reminded of a strutting peacock, all gaudy colours and self-assurance. He raised an irritated eyebrow.

“Ah, admiral,” the governor neighed, saluting with insincere pomposity. “I was beginning to doubt you were actually aboard.”

“Some of us have things to do, Severus.”

“And some of us have been kept waiting like common ratings.”

Constantine sighed, fighting a migraine. “I haven’t got time for an aristocratic tantrum,” he snapped. “What do you want? Make it quick.”

“I demand to know how the battle fares.”

“Request denied. Get off my bridge.”

Severus almost roared, stalking forwards until he was face to face with Constantine. “Admiral! This system — every planet, moon, throne-loathed lump of rock and all the space between them falls under my jurisdiction! You will keep me appraised of the situation!”

Constantine’s temper, legendarily short at the best of times, snapped.

“Fine. The situation, governor, is that on your behalf I’m wasting time and men on a conflict that serves no purpose. I might remind you that the fleet arrived here under the impression that there was an invasion underway. Take a look at the surveyors, governor. The godless bastards can’t wait to get away!

“So the situation, ‘sir’, is that I won’t risk damaging my fleet for the sake of your wounded pride, and until we can slow them down enough to get in some broadsides we’re twiddling our thumbs.”

Severus blanched in the face of Constantine’s fury, leaning away involuntarily. “This is insubordination! I demand a full-scale assault!”

The admiral barely paused for breath, stabbing his finger against the governor’s chest with a snarl. “Governor, this ship is three millennia old. Its warspirit has fought in more campaigns than you could imagine and the inscriptions of its victories cover every last wall of the chapel you just passed through. It carries innumerable souls aboard and of all of them, only one’s word is law. Make no mistake, governor: it is not yours. Do not presume to give me orders aboard my own vessel.

“Now. All you need to know is that I’m going to capture that bulbous piece of orkspoor xenotech out there, kill every last grey-skinned abomination onboard and send it to the Adeptus Mechanicus for study with a gold ribbon and the compliments of the navy. The situation, therefore, is that everything is under control, we shall prevail and you needn’t concern yourself with it a moment longer.

“Now kindly remove your bloated carcass from my command deck or, governor or not, I’ll have you shot for timewasting. Is that clear?”

The chamber plunged into astonished silence.

Severus rallied magnificently, gashing open his face with an indignant sneer. “Eminently.”

“Good. Now get off my bridge.”

Severus turned and stalked away, all eyes following him. Something occurred to him and he turned with a hungry smile. “Oh, admiral,” he said, “there’s one other thing.”

Constantine grunted. “Astonish me.”

“I want my prisoner back.”

“You w...” Constantine didn’t know whether to roar with laughter or throttle the obnoxious fool. “You’re unbelievable...” he growled. “Get him off my bridge! Now!” The ensigns stepped forwards menacingly, but Severus wouldn’t budge.

“I’m quite serious, admiral.” His voice adopted a formal tone. “I was commissioned by the Administratum, in conjunction with the Officio Xenobiologica, to capture and study a high-ranking tau ethereal.” He pushed a hand into his pocket and extracted a thick wedge of papers, all of them marked by the winged black seal of the administratum. “This isn’t some vanity project to keep me amused, admiral. It’s all here: official tactical sanctions and permissions, resource allocations, requisitioning documents. I think you’ll find I’m perfectly within my rights to demand your assistance in this matter. See for yourself.” He proffered the wad with a sly grin, enjoying himself.

Constantine bit his tongue in fury. “‘Commissioned’?” he managed to choke, resisting the urge to splatter the governor’s smug grin all over the deck.

“Well... I admit it was my idea,” he grinned, “but evidently the proposal went down well with the robes on Terra. They’ve been most agreeable.”

“And you didn’t think to tell me this before?”

“‘Need to know’, admiral. You know how it works.”

Constantine had to concentrate hard to prevent himself from shouting. “You get off my bridge,” he whispered. “Right now.”

Severus gave a friendly grin. “One tau ethereal, unharmed. I’ll expect delivery by the end of the day. And don’t worry about the gold ribbon, admiral, presentation isn’t everything. I’ll be in my cabin if you need me.”

He walked out humming cheerfully.

Constantine counted to twenty before he trusted himself to talk.

“Adept Borial?” he said, keeping his voice calm. The robed tech-priest stood obediently. “Get that teleporter repaired. I want the wretched thing operational within the hour.”

The priest nodded quickly, knowing better than to protest. Constantine stroked his chin thoughtfully “And send someone down to the seventeenth starboard vertex. The solitarium complex. Tell the... tell them I want volunteers.”

An ensign scurried to comply.

“Right.” The admiral nodded, staring around the industrious scene before him. “Would someone please give me some good news?”

The servitor seated to his left frowned, listening to a comm signal in its ear.

“Barge #15/F0 destroyed,” it droned. “Winch assembly compromis—”

The admiral shot it in the head with his exquisitely crafted pistol and was immensely satisfied to find that it made him feel much, much better.

The comm chimed to life.

“Shas’la? That report’s just been confirmed. Definite enemy presence in the engine bay. Make for the rally point off the main promenade — I’ll try and divert some troops for a regroup. I want as many units as possible heading for the power core.”

“On my way, Shas’el.”

Kais prowled through the corridors of the Or’es Tash’var, stepping over unrecognisable bodies of tau and gue’la alike, thinking of the past.

Four tau’cyrs. Four tau’cyrs since he traded the white training regs of the battledome for the tawny plates and crested helmet of a fire warrior. Four tau’cyrs since losing the “Saal” training rank epithet and becoming “La’Kais.”

Four tau’cyrs of feigned alertness, escorting diplomats on mundane trade agreements and ceremonial engagements. Four tau’cyrs of policing the virtually crime-free streets of T’au, marching along its polished thoroughfares to protect its bright towers and domes from the terrors of antisocial behaviour. In all that time, other than during firearms training or ritualised pulse salute duties, he’d fired his weapon once. Just once.

It had been during a por’vre expedition to the kroot sept of Queh-quih. An enterprising water caste trader (whose name he’d long since forgotten) had identified a market for hand-crafted kroot jewellery (rusticity being in vogue at the time) and had arranged a trade visit. Naturally, being a por’vre, the shrewd merchant understood the importance of first impressions, opting to include two shas’las with his retinue. The kroot, Kais was told, would appreciate the display of strength.

He and Ju had been selected at random by some Shas’ar’tol AI, and dispatched aboard the merchant vessel Por’creta Tai. It had been a journey of new experiences: the wonder of void travel, the immaculate corridors of the vessel, the awkward lurch of a warp-hop and the attendant relief at exiting in open space rather than in the heart of some star. For all their ingenuity, the earth caste scientists had thus far been unable to unravel the mysteries of the warp, and even the brief “dips” into unreality that the bravest kor’os undertook were fraught with danger.

And then the wonder of a new world, to walk amongst the tall, savage kroot with their chittering, squalling language of clicks and squawks, to feel their pinprick eyes watching with something between suspicion and respect — these were experiences Kais and Ju would discuss and recollect for tau’cyrs thereafter.

The expedition had lasted a five-rotaa and was, in the end, disastrous. The por’vre was growing impatient with the incessant humidity of the world; the air caste crew of the Por’creta Tai, ordered to remain on the surface out of deference for the kroots’ inexplicable dislike of vessels orbiting their planet, were suffering the effects of prolonged gravity exposure on their frail bodies. Ju was bemoaning the lack of por’hui broadcasts which might help her to meditate. Kais hadn’t eaten a decent ration in three rotaa after witnessing the kroot’s culinary preparations. And to top it all, the promised “jewellery” had turned out to be a selection of whittled bone fragments and colourful feathers.

It was not going well.

The final straw came on the sixth rotaa during a visit to the produce market. The por’vre spotted a stall in the distance selling trinkets and baubles and, in a fit of desperation, all but sprinted to inspect the wares. Kais and Ju were forced to hurry after their supposed protectee, stifling their irritation at his spontaneity.

At which point the por’vre, in his haste, stamped on the paw of a kroothound basking in the sun and found himself the unwitting victim of one hungry vengeful predator. Cackling a birdlike shriek, the creature swatted the merchant’s legs aside with a single jagged claw and bounded onto his back.

Pandemonium ensued.

The por’vre screamed, the kroot tribesmen nearby leaped forwards, the hound opened its serrated beak to crush its flailing victim’s skull—

—and Kais and Ju shot it, once each.

Afterwards, of course, it had been made perfectly clear that killing the tribal shaper’s favourite warhound — notorious for its playful rough-and-tumble with strangers — was not a clever way of endearing oneself to the tribe. The Por’creta Tax left a dec later, in disgrace.

And even though Kais and Ju had laughed at the absurd error afterwards, he’d never forget that moment when the weapon lurched in his hands, thrumming induction field ejecting a single tumbling particle at impossible velocity, opening up in a blue teardrop of plasma in midair. He’d never forget the impart on the creature’s flank, the initial flare of energy transfer, the scorched fragments of flesh and bone detonating outwards as the squealing beast shuddered aside. He’d never forget the stink of burned flesh.

Except that he had.

Four tau’cyrs of pretending to be a warrior and now... now where was he? Stalking his way through his own vessel, fighting a guerrilla battle throughout the once serene living spaces and recreation suites of the Or’es Tash’var, ignoring the stench of singed bodies, picking off humans as they sprinted hither and thither in disorder, killing and killing and killing. The kroothound was barely a memory anymore, the horror of its destruction eclipsed a hundredfold by the insanity of a single rotaa.

The Trial by Fire, they called it. After four tau’cyrs of service a shas’la would face the judgement of an examining commander to determine their progression of rank, following a demonstration of ability. Most Trials were artificial affairs: a complex series of simulations, courses and non-lethal combat in the battledomes. They were regarded as festivals; holidays during which all castes would come together in the colossal auditoria to cheer and speculate upon which warriors would be deemed worthy of promotion. There was no sense of “success” or “failure”—to remain a shas’la was without dishonour, a celebration of discovering one’s niche and serving the tau’va in the best possible fashion.

But there had always been incidents of the trials being eclipsed by external hostilities, and — ever pragmatic — the Shas’ar’tol saw no reason not to make use of the young shas’las. They could fight for the Greater Good whilst being judged; it was in many ways a purer test of their abilities.

Sooner or later, once all this insanity was over, a critical shas’vre would sit and review the captured footage from each shas’la’s helmet-optics, poring over the sensory information, their reactions, their movements... their decisions.

Kais frowned. Someone would judge him, too. How would they see his actions? Would they see the effectiveness, the successes, the victories? Or would they see the racing heart and the enjoyment? Would they look through his eyes upon his works and see the skill of a shas’ui, or the savagery of the Mont’au?

Kais turned a corner and froze, the telltale light spillage of flickering gunfire dancing across a wall nearby. He twisted, keeping the carbine between him and the wide glass-fronted chamber at his side.

A vision of hell opened up before his eyes. On the other side of the glass the regroup point was under attack. A knot of tau pathfinders — lightly armed scouts with little of the plate armour a line warrior sported — exchanged close fire with a black tide of gue’la troopers, their pale skin invisible beneath bulbous airmasks and flak jackets. Kais hurried to find the connecting door to the chamber, helplessly watching the combat as if on a por’hui screen.

The shas’las were being cut down one by one, flipped from their meagre cover by the chattering gue’la weapons then pulverised, disintegrating in liquid disarray, screams cut short. The colliding shells created a shivering hailstorm of ricochets across the floor, some even punching at the great viewing gallery windows that opened up to the void beyond, sending tiny fissures scuttling across the surface.

Kais spotted the chamber doorway from the promenade and sprinted forwards, racking his grenade launcher hungrily. This time he could enjoy the violence, safe in the knowledge that he was helping his comrades. This time there’d be no guilt.

The door slid closed with a rasp, blocking his entry. Kais skidded to a halt before it, confused.

“Shas’el?” he commed, bewildered, “Shas’el — you need to open this door!”

“It’s on override, Kais. Standby...” Kais thought he heard Lusha hiss lightly, “Oh, by the path.

“Shas’el?”

“The AI’s detected a breach.”

“A... I don’t unders—”

The cobweb of shatterlines scampering across the gallery windows blossomed, sudden rosettes of gossamer lurching into existence and, just as quickly, vanishing. The windows belched outwards into nothingness.

One raik’or the room was a battleground: overturned arc benches and fragmented fio’sorral sculptures lying in disarray; the next, emptiness. There was the briefest impression of speed, a blur of rushing shapes and clutching limbs, then only the silent vastness of vacuum. A body tumbled serenely past the yawning windows, chest caved in, eyes bulging, trailing frozen blood-crystals like a necklace of diamonds.

Kais gagged inside his helmet, backing away from the awful vision. The enormity of the destruction, the sudden, natural power of it-He envied it.

“L-la’Kais...” Lusha sounded shaken. There’s no time. You have to get to the engine bay.”

“They. They’re all gone.”

“La’Kais. Do you hear me?”

“They’re gone. All of them.”

“La’Kais!”

He snapped back to reality with a jolt, tearing his eyes away from the scene. That split-second vision of rushing bodies, venting air... it wouldn’t leave his mind.

“You can do this, Kais.”

“I don’t know, Shas’el. These decks are crawling... It’s too much...”

“The other cadres are engaged elsewhere, Shas’la. We’ll reroute as soon as we can.” A strange taint entered Lusha’s voice — fear, perhaps? Or guilt? “You can do this,” he repeated, sighing.

Kais frowned, feeling the fear creeping into him again. Not the conventional horror of death or injury or pain, rather the fear of overreaching; the fear of uninhibited insanity, the fear of once again revelling in his own unwanted appetite for destruction. He hadn’t asked to be a killer, hadn’t strived all his life to develop the rage and the spite that, unbidden, came naturally to him. He wanted to scream: It’s not fair!

With every human they sent him against it became harder to pretend that he was doing it for them, doing it for their tau’va, doing it for their “Greater Good”, their pure racial goal that eluded him with infuriating intangibility. Every time he killed for them, it became harder to deny that really, secretly, he was doing it for himself.

Kais searched for words, unable to contain the turmoil any longer.

“Shas’el?”

“Yes, Shas’la?”

“Why me?”

Lusha sounded concerned. “What do you mean?”

“Why... Why do I have to be the one to...” His voice faltered. The words didn’t sound right; to express them could only expose the selfishness at their heart. “I’m damning myself!” he cried, a bubble of uncertainly and rage puncturing obscenely in his soul.

Lusha took a long time to answer.

“You’re the only one who can do this, La’Kais.”

“But—”

“Fire warrior! Nobody ever pretended it would be easy.”

Kais hung his head. “Yes, Shas’el.” There was nothing else he could say.

“Get to the power core, Shas’la. You’re our only hope.”

Kais’s hand rested on the wafer in its pouch.

No expansion without equilibrium.

No conquest without control...

Military words. Aggressive words. Expansion, conquest. Victory, violence. But always tempered by control, by balance.

Maybe it deserved another try. He took a deep breath, focused his mind upon an ideal far greater than he could hope to appreciate, and scuttled away across the promenade.

Captain Bortailis Seylind had enjoyed a long and eventful career.

He received his military commission at the early age of nineteen and was thrust quickly into the terrifying world of combat service. He saw active duty on the Fell Core hiveworld when the rebellion began; he assisted in the mop-up operation after the Space Marines had dealt with the genestealer infestation; he was there when the first “nid spores landed and he personally oversaw the clearance of Hive Tertius after the vent system was breached. He was in orbit, looking down, when the Exterminatus virus-bomb punctured the atmosphere of the doomed planet.

At twenty-three he was transplanted from the 35th Octobian Regiment of the Imperial Guard to the StormTroop Assault-core, attached to the Battlefleet Ultima (Secundus) as an experimental specialist regiment of boarding infantry guards. The brutal complexities of ship warfare became his specialised field.

Under Nobilite Captain Ferringus he took part in no fewer than thirteen major boarding actions in his first few years: a variety of rogue traders and suspected pirate craft proving a more-than-trying opportunity to hone the storm-troopers’ abilities. He received two citations for bravery, a medal for distinguished service and the cherished Crozius Ultima as a personal recognition of his courage under fire. By his twenty-eighth birthday the encroaching fragments of the Tyranid hive fleet Kraken were pushing before them all manner of scum: an ork flotilla, badly crippled by some recent encounter with the hive swarms, was to prove his first engagement with xeno troops. The assault craft scythed into the ineffectual hulls of the greenskin ships and Seylind received a further citation in the carefully executed cleansing of the flotilla that followed.

By the time he was thirty-five, Seylind had been promoted to captain, decorated twice more for his cool-headedness and efficiency, had personally founded three more regiments of storm-troopers for assignment aboard other fleets in other Segmenta, had conducted successful boarding missions against the orks, the eldar and three “stealer-infested space hulks; had received the gratitude of Governor Quotho following the elimination of a mercenary invasion force, and had been personally singled out to oversee the extension of the storm-trooper regiments to the Battlefleet Ultima Primus.

He was received by Admiral Constantine of the Enduring Blade two weeks after his thirty-sixth birthday, earning a further service medal and a pleasant evening in the officers’ mess, courtesy of the navis nobilite. Life was good.

Three weeks into the new commission, with much of the nascent regiment still comprised of green-around-the-gills conscripts, the opportunity to add the tau to his burgeoning list of defeated enemies was forced upon him. The boarding had been a difficult affair and resistance was well-organised and heavy, but he was confident. The insertion of tech-priests into the engine bay had been fraught with difficulties, but malfunctions aside, the teleporter had succeeded in delivering a pair of adepts. With his two most trusted secondaries, Seylind had occupied the surrounding decks, sealed the engine bay with a tri-lock (his third of which nestled securely in his utility holster) and could now continue with the pressing business of co-ordinating the infiltration of the vessel. Yes — he had reason to be confident. With foresight and planning, no obstacle was insurmountable.

There’d be another medal in this one, he was certain. Perhaps even a promotion.

He smiled, arming his hellgun happily.

Someone shot him in the gut.

As the colour went out of his world, he felt gloved alien hands rummaging in the utility holster at his hip.

Adept Natsan, Reverus Illumina of Mars, magos of the Cult Deus-Mechanicus, second-level student of xenotech and mechanicus heretica, beneficiary of the Puritens lobotomy and recipient of no fewer than seventeen Spiritu-Mechanica surgical augmentations, was annoyed to notice he was bleeding heavily. He concentrated, internally arresting the flow of blood to his left upper limb, cauterising the wound with an acetylene lamp attached to his right elbow and watching as the neatly sliced flesh scarred over and cooked.

Matter transmission had proved contrary to his expectations. He’d speculated upon a gravitic shift as the body adjusted between two localities in “overlapping” warp space, hypothesised upon the presence of emitted “waste” energy, sound and heat, and theorized upon the effects of matter occluded by existing dense material upon transmission.

He had not expected a blinding discharge of light, a sharp tug in all directions at once, the bewildering sensation of falling, then a coalescing series of sensory feedbacks containing screams, fountaining blood and the unpalatable aroma of singed hair. It didn’t take him long to conclude, in fact, that something had gone wrong.

The initial displace party had comprised five adepts of his order, several dozen armed servo skulls and a trio of combat servitors to provide a clearance security zone. The servo skulls, at least, had been delivered safely.

The servitors had arrived all at once in the same spot: a fascinating arrangement of meat and metal, fused together and segueing from state to state apparently at random. It had mewed twice, coughed, then toppled sideways with a lurch and — in as much as it had ever been alive — died.

Adepts Armill and Nyssen had, it would appear, been reconstituted beyond the limit of the locarus engine; pulped flesh and blood scattered in a perfect circle around the boundary of the safe zone. This hypothesis would seem to explain the damage to his own body: he estimated thirty-five per cent of his left limb had been breaching the safety perimeter upon materialisation, neatly amputating it below the elbow. Had he any pain centres remaining he suspected, the injury would be agonising.

Adept Idow’s fate had been stranger still. Natsan had theorized that the locarus safe zone had overlapped part of the tau engine bay’s bulkhead, delivering Idow into the wall. His astonished features, flayed to a ruddy red liquescence and splattered by molten metal, leaned from the structural panel as if breaking the surface of a vertical pool.

So, alone amongst the sentient transportees, he and Adept Tertius Rolan had survived the transition from the Enduring Blade to the alien vessel. Indignity upon indignity, it had fallen to them, lacking the combat servitors, to defend themselves against the xenogens — a tiresome business more suited to the plebeians of the Imperial guard, had they been present. Still, the task was quickly completed; those tau specimens already inhabiting the cavernous powercore were a craven breed of gangly air caste crew, easy pickings for his sanctified plasma pistol.

Thankfully, the delay had been nominal. Within minutes the storm-troopers from the first assault craft had converged on his position, completing his carefully prepared security arrangements.

The door into the tiered chamber had been sealed as comprehensively as was possible, preventing any tau troopers from entering. As far as Imperial intelligence was aware, the xenos possessed no teleport analogue technology, so there’d be no danger from that direction. Further, he had released two dozen of the armed servo-skulls into the ductways around the enginebay to patrol against any surreptitious entry from that quarter.

The storm-troopers were deployed carefully across the lower levels of the power core, taking up position around the trunklike pillar at its centre which, he guessed, was the taus’ bizarre equivalent of a generarium reactor. The gantries and mezzanines which rose in platformed tiers around it had taken a while to climb in his hunt for a central console, his augmented frame not designed for such athletic exertion. The view from the summit was breathtaking.

And finally, as if any living creature could penetrate so far, the upper levels of the construct, where he and Adept Rolan swiftly and silently worked to cripple the vessel’s engines and decrypt its datavised secrets, were bordered by a coruscating energy field. Natsan’s aggressive assault upon the vessel’s AI, a heretical intelligence that would be purged the instant it was no longer required, had yielded fruit quickly: he’d identified and implemented the shield device as a final, utterly impenetrable defence.

Thus reassured, he gathered the full enormity of his mental faculties— reasoning that such comprehensive security arrangements negated any need to spend time considering his safety — and focused on the console before him. The datum drones at his side blinked and chattered, ferociously eating away at the AI’s defences. The language decryption paradigm running in Natsan’s head decoded a string of characters and he stabbed at a sequence of controls, exposing yet another level of sophistication. Like some energistic equivalent of the gantry surrounding the powercore, the ship’s logic engine was a structured gem: a perfectly aligned arrangement of operative tiers and commands, symmetrical and cohesive. Had his sense of awe been complete, he suspected, he might actually be impressed by the technology’s complexity. As it was, the puritens surgery released a stream of disapproving endorphins into his mind, filling him with revulsion and making him all the more aware of the xenogens’ blatant disregard for the proper obeisance owed to the Machine God.

To his side, Adept Rolan controlled a group of servo-skulls as they swarmed around the thrumming engine pile at the centre of the tier stack. The technology contained within that single pillar of silent componentry was utterly foreign, an impure antithesis of the arcane knowledge of the Adeptus Mechanicus. Natsan’s brief glimpse through a viewing portal had raised more questions than it provided answers, revealing a luminous green liquid gas swirling with convection currents and speckled by drifting, glowing particles of matter. When the tau vessel was captured he would relish uncovering its secrets.

So rigid was the careful distribution of his concentration that he was completely oblivious to the heavy clang of the engine bay doors unlocking, drifting open with a rasp. His ears — sensory ganglia improved years earlier by cranial implants — competently recorded the unmistakable sounds of hellguns chattering angrily, but his consciousness was busy elsewhere and the harsh frequencies went unprocessed.

So immersed was he in his analysis of the AI systems, that only when the faint blue light of the energy shield collapsed upon itself and faded to nothing did he allocate a corner of his processing ability to analysing the new situation. He regarded his surroundings suspiciously, quickly noting the wrecked corpses of storm-troopers littering the chamber’s floor, and the console venting smoke on the next level down. He realised too late that the energy shield was not quite the impenetrable protection he’d surmised.

Before he could consider the new scenario in depth, a bipedal figure surged up the ramp onto the top tier and raised a weapon. Natsan grudgingly allowed his entire mind to drop the complex algorithms it had been studying and concentrated upon the new threat.

He drew his pistol.

Kais was up and sprinting before he had time to think.

There were two of them, he saw, and they were fast. They were armed and firing in a heartbeat, so alike in their movements they could have been twin linked machines or mirror reflections. They shifted in a rolling gaggle of insect jerks, metal pitted heads clicking like broken engines as they tracked him, eyes twinkling from the darkness beneath their black robes.

Kais thumbed a thirty-raik’an delay on a grenade and rolled it silently towards them, scurrying for cover. He pushed his armoured shoulder into the ground and rolled towards a dip in the mezzanine floor; radiant orbs of plasma impacting all around, splattering liquid metal across the dome of his helmet. The cover swallowed him up and he fought the temptation to lurk there, catching his breath.

Instead he sprinted onwards, sensing the fio’tak haemorrhaging behind him in an eruption of plasma and shrapnel. Scampering across the control tier, he caught a brief glimpse of black robes to his left and fired a ragged cluster of pulses towards them, earning a satisfying belch of smoke and sparks and forcing the gue’la back behind the sho’aun’or’es energy stack, near to where he’d secreted the grenade. Kais winced inside his helmet: a single breach of the core would not only cripple the ship’s movement but risked destroying the entire lower segments of the vessel.

As if testing his fears, the grenade detonated.

The first gue’la, the one with slightly less artificial features and two complete arms, was taken by surprise, somersaulting backwards on the crest of the Shockwave, legs detaching in a tracery of mechanical joints and ribbon sliced flesh. It screamed at the apex of its impromptu flight and Kais, never staying still for a moment, pumped two carbine rounds into its jerking torso before it had even slapped into the deck. It landed with a crack and flipped backwards off the tier. Every time it landed it bounced outwards, shedding chunks of biotech and flesh.

Kais watched it all the way, resisting the smile forming around his lips. The energy pillar, he noticed with relief, was undamaged.

The other gue’la, one arm ending in a scar tissue clump, lurched from the tangled wreckage in a crescendo of creaking parts and chittering components. Its shrapnel shredded face, welts of flesh hanging loose from the cable-studded bone beneath, stared ghoulishly. It was a lurching remnant of a being, neither crying out in agony or sneering in pain-dampening insanity at its injuries. But its eyes... its eyes were cold and dead — mechanical orbs of ice and metal. It raised the plasma pistol in a single angle-perfect movement, weapon fixating on Kais faster than he could ever hope to react. It pulled the trigger.

Kais wondered abstractly, in that miniscule moment before he died, whether he was looking at the gue’la vision of the tau’va.

For the tau, he thought, the One Path is a victory over individuality. It is gestalt over self, rationality over impulse, logic over spontaneity, focus over Mont’au...

But this thing, this creature with a scarred brain and a body more metallic than organic, this thing is rationality, it is logic, it is tau’va...

Is that what we’re trying to become, he asked himself? Painless, fearless, passionless... Monsters?

The plasma pistol made a sound.

Fzzk.

The gue’la tilted its head and squeezed the trigger again. A row of warning icons illuminated in fiery red along the bottom of Kais’s HUD, detecting a surge of energy nearby. He squinted at the gue’la pistol, heart racing. A single sliver of shrapnel had gouged itself into the firing mechanism at the base of the weapon’s barrel, smoking with a burgeoning hiss.

The gue’la vanished beneath a cloud of fire, flames billowing outwards and hurling Kais to the floor. Unvented promethium ignited in a rush, an inverted waterfall of thermal fury that gushed over him and boiled upwards to lash impotently against the chamber ceiling.

He stooped to his feet when the inferno finally abated, methodically checking for injuries. The gue’la priest stood as it had been before the explosion, skin peeling back, extended gun arm obliterated at the shoulder, a rarified sculpture with charred skin. Kais, shaking his head to clear the exhaustion, thought its blackening features seemed somehow interested, as though analysing its own immolation. Its expression of scrutiny remained until its silvery eyes melted and the flames burned through from the inside of its skull.

Kais stood and watched it until it flopped to the floor and was still. He watched until the cables and tubules running throughout its frame began to liquefy and puddle around it. He watched until the reinforcements arrived and Lusha voxed him with an almost paternal expression of congratulation.

He stood and watched the flickering, crumbling husk until it atomised and gusted away, and as he watched he wondered which was worse: to surrender to rage or to become a living machine?

He didn’t know the answer.

Kor’o Natash T’yra took a final glance at the Tash’var’s status display, patted Kor’el Siet fondly on the shoulder to finalise the temporary delegation of command and hurried off the bridge into the boardroom. The Aun’chia’gor was already underway.

The origins of the ceremony were clearly prescribed in the datatexts of Kilto and it had remained almost unchanged in the two and a half thousand tau’cyrs since its inception. It was a product of the time of Mont’au, before the Auns came, when the tribes of T’au balanced on the very verge of self destruction.

As history had recorded, at the siege of Fio’taun, when the fate of an entire species hung precariously in the balance, where only a miracle could have prevented the emergence of an age of anarchy and turmoil, something impossible occurred.

There had been lights, glimpsed dimly around the distant mountaintops, for three rotaas. Stories spread amongst the armies of strange figures lurking in the mist of the hills, colourful attire and fluted limbs melting and capering through the haze. In the heat of battle few of the tribes gave any credence to the tales, stubbornly ignoring the phenomena that pulsed in the night sky, bending all their attention upon the hostilities that were tearing their world apart. On the final day the wind had carried strange resonances, swept aloft from the heights of the jagged peaks. They sounded, the Kilto histories recorded, like a choir of voices, raised in a song of impossible beauty.

And then the Auns had appeared. They came slowly, calmly — barefooted and unsullied by the hate and suspicion of their astonished brethren. They stepped between the campfires of the besieging army and appeared as if from nowhere within the impassable walls of the city.

And they talked. And as they talked, the tribes listened. They listened and they wondered, and they were filled with awe and reverence for these strange, graceful beings with their words of unity and progress.

And the gates of Fio’taun opened, so the legend went, and the tribes met unarmed for the first time, and their leaders were seated at a mighty round table named Chia’Gor. And the Auns talked until the spokesmen of the tribes summoned the courage to participate. And slowly, so gradually that even the fiery plains tribes were gently coaxed into harmony, the tau’va was born.

And so it had remained. The Aun’chia’gor had become a sensible paradigm for the meeting of the castes: wherever the five aspect pathways of the race were represented its simple procedures were rigidly observed. The table was a ring— a halo of artfully decorated materials, each appropriate to a single caste. The four “elemental” classes each occupied a quarter of the ring’s boundary, a single speaker surrounded by lesser aides and advisors.

Tyra took his place at the centre of the air caste segment, a polished, voidlike swathe of dark tinted moriin-resin, filled with icy impurities and glimmering nebulae of coloured dyes, and nodded to each of the other top ranking delegates in turn.

To his left, rigidly composed as if fresh from the parade-ground, Shas’o Udas drummed his fingers on the fire caste tabletop segment, a rough-hewn conglomerate of ruby and amber, and pursed his lips. Two shas’vres stood to attention on either side of him.

To Tyra’s right sat the vessel’s earth caste representatives, squat and wide with flat, open faces and bulky, simple clothing. At their centre was Fio’el Boran, clutching a data wafer in his extraordinary artificial arm, traceries of silver and gold decorating its eight-fingered hand. His aides whispered to one another, lowly, uncomfortable in such formalised society. Their segment of the table was perhaps the most stunning of all: a single block of juntaa-stone, inscribed with an astonishing filigree of flowing patterns and mandalas.

And directly opposite Tyra, seated comfortably and chatting affably with her equally at ease assistants, was Por’el T’au Yis’ten, the vessel’s foremost water caste diplomat. Her group wore simple but colourful robes that turned their corner of the room into a riot of shades and hues. Elegant jewellery adorned their necks and wrists and domed pol hats were arranged at jaunty angles atop their braided locks of hair. As if in direct contrast to their gaudy appearance, their section of the table was a simple block of silver dusted j’kaara, perfect mirrors on every surface. Tyra thought it most appropriate: the Por were renowned for their ability to adapt to any situation, reflecting and imitating those around them.

The Aun’el, of course, was central.

Alone in the barren space between the arc segments of the table, lit from above by a single light drone, Aun’el T’au Ko’vash devoured the attention of every individual and returned it in kind: a glowing beacon of certainty and assurance that calmed every nerve and soothed every impatience. He took small steps as he talked, turning from group to group, showing as much consideration to one caste as any other. His staff of office, a delicately ornamented honour blade set upon a tall cane of fio’tak, tapped out a rhythm as he moved, giving his words a metered, songlike rituality.

“...would certainly seem their attempts to slow our progress have failed,” he was saying, “Path be praised. Nonetheless, let us not celebrate nor shield ourselves from the enormity of what the gue’la have undertaken this rotaa.” The Aun swivelled in his spot, ancient gaze settling upon the rigid fire caste quarter of the room. “Shas’o, if you would begin?”

O’Udas nodded brusquely, rising to his feet and clearing his throat.

“Honoured tau’fann,” he began, using the age-old address for members of alternate castes, and half-bowing. This episode has cost us dearly.

“We estimate thirty per cent losses amongst the line troops. There’s a full cadre at least, maybe two, still tied up on the planet. The further we move from orbit, the harder it becomes to retrieve them.”

The Aun nodded thoughtfully.

“Still,” the general went on, rubbing his calloused knuckles. “We’ve brought the boarding crisis under control and the power core is secure. A near thing, by all accounts, but we’re stronger for it.

“I’ve compiled a status paradigm with the assistance of the AI, taking into account the strength and deployment of our resources. With your permission, tau’fann, I should like to propose a retaliatory strike within the d—”

Por’el Yis’ten scoffed loudly, rolling her eyes. Tyra, watching her exaggerated performance with interest, reminded himself of the flamboyant reputation of the water caste, traditionally a point of enmity with the characteristically austere fire caste.

“El’Yis’ten?” the ethereal purred, turning to face her. “You wish to comment?”

She slouched upright and tossed her hair braids over her shoulder. Tyra had to admit that her beauty — legendary throughout the ship — was enough to drive any male to consider breaking caste. He quashed the thought with an embarrassed cough, wondering vaguely when his next summons from the Propagation Department would arrive. The Fio’os back on T’au, preoccupied with “optimum genetic compatibility”, orchestrated inter-caste couplings without prejudice or emotion, but still... Tyra found himself musing enviously upon which lucky por’el male would discover his name beside that of El’Yis’ten on the summons form. He snapped himself from the reverie with a guilty wince as she began to speak.

“Retaliation seems a little... premature, tau’fann,” she trilled, smiling warmly. “I’d never attempt, of course, to counsel the honoured shas’o in his duty—”

“Huh,” O’Udas grunted, a little too loud.

“But the arithmetic seems comprehensive. The gue’la fleet is, how can I put this? Extensive. We are but a single — damaged — warship.”

“Then how,” O’Udas interjected, “do you propose to dissuade them from chasing us all the way back to the spacedock at Rann? A pleasant chat over a cup of j’hal nectar?”

“As it happens,” El’Yis’ten returned, “we have been attempting to contact the gue’la vessels. Is it not said that ‘no enemy is beyond the reason of the tau’va’?”

The Aun’el dipped his head in her direction, clearly gratified by her knowledge of the sio’t. “There are some who might disagree,” he said with a nod, “but the gue’la are not fools. They are, perhaps, ignorant — even shortsighted — but we must strive to forgive them their faults. They are the product of their history, not of their choice. We must attempt not to hate them.”

“Tell me, Por’el. Have your entreaties achieved any success?”

Yis’ten appeared to deflate, all of her cocksure confidence deserting her in the face of the ethereal’s attention.

“No, Aun’el. Our hails are either ignored or returned with viral data streams. Nothing threatening to our systems, of course, but hardly a diplomatic victory. I’m confident that if I can converse with ranking personnel rather than the machine constructs manning the comms I could make some headway.”

“Mm.” The Aun’el pursed his lips. “Ifs and buts, Por’el. Ifs and buts.” He swivelled in his spot again, turning to the Fio caste.

“El’Boran?” he invited. “Anything to report?”

The engineer took a final glance at his data wafer and stood, obviously uncomfortable at the attention. His voice was a characteristic earth caste burr.

“Yes...” he said, scratching at his chin. “The damage to the power stack seems minimal, despite everything. I’ve sent a crew down to find out what the gue’la were up to in there. Nothing major, we don’t think.”

“Full speed?” the Aun’el asked, tilting his head.

“Two decs. Maybe three. As for the ship... I’d say we’re probably structurally sound — no more breaches — provided we can dry dock in, oh, two rotaa, maximum?”

“Thank you, Fio’el.” The Aun’s honour blade tapped on the floor. He twisted to face Tyra.

“Kor’o. Please.”

Tyra unfolded himself from his seat and waved his first fingers in the customary air caste greeting. “T’au’fann,” he said, considering his words with care. “I must admit to being... bewildered, by the gue’la strategy. Initially I was convinced of their intention to destroy us, perhaps out of some Mont’au sense of revenge for our liberation of the Aun’el’s personage. Who amongst us could appreciate such things, but they are at least plausible. Then the boarding began.

“My duty... my place within the One Path, has never been to understand the ways of the alien. I leave such duties to my esteemed cousin.” He nodded respectfully at El’Yis’ten, who returned the gesture with a smile. “But these gue’la... To me it seemed clear they were intent upon capturing this vessel — a worthy prize for any race, enlightened or otherwise.

“But now it seems their attempts to slow us, to outwit us... it seems they are outdone in these things. As the noble shas’o opined, they came close, but we are stronger for it. They are defeated, then. We can evade their main weapons indefinitely and, provided we remain alert and mobile, their boarding assaults will consistently fail. The question, then, esteemed tau’fann, becomes this: Why do they persist in their pursuit?”

Ko’vash stared at him for a long time, bottomless wisdom filling him with light and acceptance.

“Your logic, Kor’o,” he sang, “is flawless.”

The Aun stepped into the very centre of the circle and stared at each face in turn, the light never leaving his long, thin features and the decorous i’helti cap disguising the scar upon his brow.

“It seems clear that the prize the gue’la pursue is not this vessel, nor the eradication of its crew. I rather suspect they want me.”

“That won’t happen, Aun’el,” O’Udas grunted, standing. “I won’t allow it.”

Ko’vash almost smiled. “Rash words, Shas’o, are the enemy of the One Path. My presence among you is the cause of this pursuit. I think the time has come to put an end to it.”

Figures at all sides of the table leaped to their feet, protesting. Tyra found himself amongst them, sickened by the idea of sacrificing the Aun.

“Nothing so dramatic,” Ko’vash said, waving the throng to silence with a half smile. “I have no intention of surrendering myself, or of losing my faculties to sentimentality and seeking a martyr’s death.

“No, what we face, tau’fann, is a simple decision. We can run with our tail between our legs, like an anxious ui’t, all the way to Rann. Perhaps the gue’la will catch us, perhaps not. Perhaps it won’t matter, either way. There are, to my knowledge, three Auns aboard the dry-dock station at this time — more than enough to render my presence entirely superfluous. We would, I think, be leading these humans to a greater prize than that which they currently pursue.

“Or...” He took a deep breath, ancient eyes narrowing. “We make a stand.”

Quiet murmurings erupted from all quarters of the room, delegates and aides discussing the disclosure animatedly. Shas’o Udas, Tyra couldn’t help noticing, wore a small smile — he’d get his retaliation after all. Even El’Yis’ten was nodding quietly.

“Aun’el,” Tyra said, standing. “Should I contact Rann? Perhaps they could spare us reinforcements?”

Ko’vash stared at him, again drowning him in perfect peace and calmness.

The ethereal smiled. “That won’t be necessary, Kor’o,” he trilled. “I summoned the flotilla two decs ago.”

The room fell into astonished silence. Every tau stared at the tall figure, wordlessly contemplating his revelation. El’Yis’ten recovered first.

“You... You had already decided, Aun’el?” she asked, confused.

“I had.”

“Then why this? Why the Aun’chia’gor?”

Ko’vash smiled, his long fingers forming a thoughtful cradle. He turned the warm expression upon each caste group in turn. “Understand, tau’fann. This course of action is in the best interests of the tau’va.

The gue’la grow more opportunistic with every rotaa. In the past tau’cyr alone there have been four sizeable breaches of the Dal’yth Treaty and countless smaller operations and incursions into our space. Until now the council within the Aun’t’au’retha has been reluctant to antagonise the gue’la, broadly tolerating these... infringements. The council places great importance upon good will. This episode, it would seem, has swung the balance.

“I contacted Aun’o T’au Kathl’an as soon as I was aboard the dropship that returned me from captivity...”

The mere mention of the prime ethereal, a figure of almost mythical status, was enough to leave Tyra and the other delegates around the table fighting to restrain their shock. Ko’vash allowed the pause to hang in the air before continuing.

“He is no longer prepared to allow these hostilities to go unanswered.

“A demonstration must be made, the council has decided. Oh, let us pity them, these gue’la. Let us not hate them for their ways, nor seek their extinction as they might seek ours. But hate or not, let them underestimate us no longer.”

Shas’o Udas led a chorus of consent, rapping his knuckles appreciatively against the tabletop. The other castes joined in with varying degrees of accordance. The ethereal bowed gratefully to each corner of the room, turning finally to Por’el Yis’ten.

“To answer your question, honoured cousin, I had no great need to conduct the Aun’chia’gor, it is true. My decision was made and I might have ordered you, in the name of the One Path, to conduct your duty as I commanded. Is that not so?”

“It is, Aun’el.”

“And yet I know, Por’el, as do you, that a being is far more content in the execution of its duties when it has unravelled the need for them, than when forced to comply. We each are called to serve the tau’va without question, but let us be under no illusion: the need to understand one’s niche is often powerful indeed. The Aun’chia’gor is a great tool in removing the reliance upon unthinking obedience. To become dependant upon such a thing would make us little better than the gue’la, with their stark Emperor and their blinkered, narrow little minds.” He leaned in close to the Por group, infinite eyes drinking them in. “Tell me, El’Yis’ten. Will you support me in this burden I carry, now that you see its necessity? Will you aid me in this unhappy duty?”

She looked directly into the ethereal’s eyes and Tyra, watching from across the room, was again struck by her beauty subtly enhanced by her proximity to the Aun.

“Without hesitation,” she replied.

The portal latch chimed, shattering the expectant atmosphere. Tyra watched the door melt open silently, recognising the entrant as the middle-aged shas’el who had accompanied Ko’vash to the bridge earlier. He looked tired.

The Aun tilted his head. “El’Lusha?”

“Apologies, Aun’el. And, ah, honoured tau’fann. There’s something wrong. The gue’la are scanning us, somehow. Some sort of transmission, fixing on the bridge. The AI doesn’t recognise it.”

Fio’el Boran stood, frowning. “Is it a tightbeam signal?”

“I wouldn’t know, Fio’el. Is security an issue?”

The engineer nodded, brows furrowed in thought. “I should think it is, yes... We picked up a peculiar sort of signal just before the assault on the power core. Some sort of... ‘matter transmitter’, I suspect. Fascinating.”

O’Udas addressed the room patiently, ignoring the fio’el’s enthusiasm. “I’m invoking Martial Command, just for now. With your permission, Kor’o?”

Tyra nodded helplessly, feeling events slipping beyond his grasp.

The general continued with gusto. “All ranking personnel to evacuate the bridge.”

The shas’el hurried to escort the ethereal from the room, already a hive of activity. Tyra sat in silence — how could they expect him to desert his bridge? The very idea was ludicrous.

His troubled thoughts were shattered by Udas, calling after El’Lusha. “Shas’el?” the general barked. “What’s the infantry situation?”

“Not good, O’Udas. We’re diverting all units to the central promenade — the gue’la are making a last stand.”

“Can you spare any to guard the bridge?”

“I wouldn’t like to. We’re not out of trouble yet.”

“Very well.” The general fidgeted with the single braid of hair hanging over his shoulder, deep in thought. He fixed El’Lusha with an inquisitive, if troubled, gaze. “Tell me... Where is La’Kais?”

They were a magnificent sight, Ensign Kilson thought (with, he admitted, a healthy twinge of fear). Clambering aboard the grid plate at the centre of the tech shrine, easing their way between resonating coils of copper viscera — they were enough to leave him staring dumbstruck, mouth hanging open.

Their enormity was, in itself, daunting. Half as tall again as an average man, they hulked above all the personnel around them, grey-green armour plates glinting dully in the light. More striking even than their appearance was their reputation: warriors such as these saturated the legends of the Imperium with tales of glory and honour and valour. They were avatars of humanity’s magnificence, living weapons designed solely to serve the Emperor’s guiding light.

Kilson had never imagined in his wildest dreams being so close to a Space Marine that he could almost touch its articulating armour segments, feeling the vibrations of its colossal strides running through the deck beneath his feet. To see even one of the legendary figures in an entire lifetime was considered extraordinary. To escort a full squad, across four decks and two vertices of a battlecruiser, no less... it was beyond incredible.

The chamber he’d led them to, a cavernous hangar with floating glow-globes and buttressed walls, was alive with the cloying emissions of two incense drones, circling one another in the shadows high above. A trio of tech-priests, sinister figures peering out beneath heavy cowls, chanted litanies from a pulpit nearby Arranged with sprawling organic randomness at one end of the hangar, the strangest machine that Kilson had ever seen thrummed with barely restrained energy. Its looping coils and copper ducts reached a higher resonance and Kilson felt sure the air itself had begun to shiver.

He’d been astonished at how enthusiastically the squad — a brother-sergeant and five Marines of the Raptors Chapter — had volunteered for the mission. On the admiral’s orders he’d visited the isolated section of the vessel where they were quartered, mind awash in excitement and trepidation. He’d not been allowed entry into the vaulted hallways and chapels of their habitation, of course (the very thought of desecrating those purified chambers was insane), but his stammered vox call across the internal comm had been answered almost immediately.

They’d come stamping along the deck like ancient giants, red eyeplates glowing, titanic frames easing forwards in a chorus of voices requesting information. With their helmets cradled uniformly in their left arms, Kilson had taken the opportunity to compare the exteriors of the armoured giants with the all too human, almost frail-seeming faces peering from within. Not that their features betrayed any fragility, of course; their dark expressions put him in mind of starving men, reacting to the promise of food.

He’d done his best to satisfy their curiosity, though they spent much of the journey to the tech bay in vox-communication with the admiral, clarifying their mission. He’d caught a snatch of their rumbled conversation as he led them along the secured corridors of the ship’s core (hastily cleared of ratings scum by a small horde of armsmen). They’d seemed eager for action.

At one point they’d passed through a crewspace where someone had daubed red graffiti across the tarnished bulkhead, an illiterate splatter of paint.

THEY iNSiDE AMUNG. ALL DiE!!

“Ensign,” one of the Marines had barked, gauntleted finger jabbing in his direction, then gesturing at the inscription. “What is this?”

“J-just nonsense, my lord. Ratings gossip. Superstition, you understand.”

“Explain.”

He swallowed, throat dry. “There’s talk of... uh... things, sir. Aboard the ship.”

“What ‘things’?”

Kilson shrugged helplessly, cheeks burning. The Marines exchanged glances, faces invisible behind glowering eyesockets.

“Lead on,” the sergeant growled.

And now, four decks and two vertices later, Kilson was forgotten by them — a brief insect guide that had fulfilled its purpose and vanished. He lurked in the doorway of the tech bay and watched the priests fussing around the energy grid.

As they worked, the Space Marines replaced their helmets and linked arms, bodies swaying almost imperceptibly in time to some unknown purification prayer or litany. Kilson found himself wishing that they’d share its comforting verses with those beyond their circle of internal communication. Despite the awe and fear he felt, he was quickly finding an urge growing within himself to cherish every moment of their presence, as if somehow their unmistakable righteousness and purity might rub off, even on one so humble as him.

“The locarus has a deployment solution,” a priest hissed, studying a complex arrangement of brass-bound gauges. “Omnissiah be praised.”

“Begin,” another barked, his cassock marking out his seniority, tracing a complex shape in the air. A group of servitors began opening valve wheels, atrophied muscles bunching at the command of their unthinking logic engine minds.

“The fixation target is acquired,” the first priest intoned. “All is ready.” The trio of chanting acolytes raised their voices higher, sonorous mantras ringing throughout the echoing cavern. The thrumming of the copper coils became almost unbearable, and Kilson clamped his hands over his ears in pain.

“Now,” the senior priest demanded, striking his censure against a plated duct in a flurry of incense. An inhuman howl consumed the chamber.

“For Corax and the Emperor!” the brother-sergeant roared through his helmet speakers, startling Kilson.

The incense danced, sparks drizzled from the air, the Marines clashed their weapons together with a roar and—

And a perfect orb of light flickered into existence, flared more brightly than Kilson’s eyes could stand, and vanished. The Space Marines were gone.

Something moved further ahead.

A piece of shadow detached from the smoothness of the duct, oscillating slowly into a new position. Kais tensed, raising the carbine. The tight confines of the crawl tube made the simplest movements a process of contortions and cramping muscles. The object shifted again. It flitted from shadow to shadow, hovering off the ground in the rounded cavity peaking the duct. It came to a halt and blinked a green light.

Kais relaxed.

“Kor’vesa?” he whispered. “Identify and report.”

The green light winked out.

Kais tried again. “Drone? What’s your status?”

The shape clicked: a slow reptile rattle, building in volume. Two bright points of light, like eyes, fixated on Kais and flicked off and on.

Then the thing was rushing forwards, breaking from the cover of the shadows with the hiss of displaced air. Light fell across it like a blade and Kais saw it fully, gasping: This was no efficient tau drone, perfectly engineered gravitic stabilisers allowing unrestricted and silent manoeuvrability.

It was a gue’la head.

Disembodied and cadaverous, frail skin necrotic and sallow, pitted with maggotlike extrusions of circuitry and cabling. Its ancient lips, long since desiccated by age, were peeled back in a papery sneer to reveal the gap-toothed gums below, a network of bloodless flesh and exposed bone. From its abortive neck a thrumming anti-gravitic drive held it aloft. The ghoulish machine’s jawbone ratcheted open with an audible crack, hanging monstrously in a silent shriek. A gun barrel, hidden in the leering maw, briefly reflected an overhead light.

Kais blasted the ugly device into spinning fragments before it could fire, scattering the tight confines of the duct with scorched components and lumps of bone. A series of teeth rattled cheerfully on the dome of his helmet. He shook his head and moved on, too exhausted to wonder where the monstrous attacker had come from.

The journey was proving tortuous. He’d been ready to rest following the incident in the engine bay. It had seemed fair. He felt like he’d spent tau’cyrs — his whole life, perhaps — fighting and killing and running; the exhaustion had finally overwhelmed him and he’d stood, swaying, as things returned to normal by degrees and his friends and comrades gathered around him. The ship was still full of gue’la, but they’d be hunted down. It had been as good as over, and the conflicting sides of his brain had gratefully segued into a single, relieved whole.

He should have guessed it wouldn’t last.

So: first a garbled message from a fraught-sounding El’Lusha, requesting his presence on the bridge. Not by the normal route, oh no, that was either blocked off or breached or infested, it didn’t matter which. Instead he found himself worming along tor’kans of intestinal ducting and vent systems.

Second, the unpleasant business of guerrilla tunnel combat. The various conduit intersections and turbine chambers had yielded plentiful surprises in the form of gue’la troopers (mostly casualties or cowards who’d crawled off to hide, he suspected). He’d lost the top segment of his shoulder torso guard when a gutshot trooper had taken a respectable stab at blowing his head off. Kais had returned the favour with rather more success.

Third, the internal workings of the Or’es Tash’var— normally a paragon of silent efficiency, out of sight and mind — were not operating in his favour. Much of this part of the ship had been damaged by assault imparts, forcing him to travel further into the complex innards of the vessel than seemed sensible. His attempts to hail the bridge to shut down the blade fans and circulatory turbines had met with a stony silence, forcing him to divert several times into human-occupied chambers to power down systems. Control panels that would, no doubt, appear self-explanatory to any of the kor’la crewmen were, to him, little more than meaningless jumbles of switches and dials. Thus far he’d prevailed by pressing everything at once.

And now, to cap it all, just as the intersection containing the command deck elevator was drawing near, he was getting attacked by scum-fire shyh’am-eating blood-of-t’au skulls, of all things. He swore out loud, just for the sake of it, not caring about the breach of etiquette. He was ready to drop, and he didn’t mind admitting it.

What kept him going was numbness. He’d reached a point beyond exhaustion. To stop now would cripple him, he suspected; the natural stimulants and pain were all that sustained him, pushing him on, delaying that moment when he could finally collapse and sleep and pretend to be normal again.

But there was something else. The remoteness of his physical fatigue was no protection against the turmoil in his mind, and for that he clung grimly to a single phrase:

“Nobody ever pretended it would be easy...”

El’Lusha had been right. To feel unfairly treated, to pity oneself somehow at the injustice of being responsible for such destruction: these were symbols of arrogance and Mont’au.

Kais had understood, as he crawled through the belly of the ship. Every fire warrior, he could see, must face their own Trial by Fire. For some it would be as simple as a physical test of their skills and abilities. For others — for him — such a test was redundant.

His proficiency for violence was inherent, no more open to adjudication than was the slant of his eyes or the size of his feet. For him, the true trial took place not at the tip of his gun barrel or in the bleeding piles of corpses he left behind him. For him, the trial took place in his mind.

So he kept going. He would accept the challenge and strive to succeed, to placate the devil inside him. He’d wage a tranquil, quiet war against the rage, using swords of focus and spears of calm, and in the name of the One Path he’d succeed.

He reloaded the carbine, chewing his lip.

Thinking it was a lot easier than achieving it.

They’d killed everyone.

El’Siet, his second in command for six tau’cyrs. Ruptured parts scattered across the deck, tendrils of brainsludge slithering down his control console.

El’Ver’sev’a, his personnel officer. They’d taken time with her, blowing off her limbs one at a time until she just lay there, emptying across the deck, too traumatised to even scream.

El’Gei’ven and El’Fay, the six kor’vres manning the comms and all the kor’uis and kor’las that hadn’t yet evacuated the bridge. Pulped. Shredded. Atomised and seared, knocked apart by hungry bolter shells or scorched into bubbling liquescence by all manner of vile, howling gue’la weapons.

Kofo Tyra forced open his swollen eyes and surveyed his domain, resisting the urge to vomit. There had been no fight, here. No honourable battle or measured struggle for supremacy. The attackers had stepped out of thin air without warning or challenge, opening fire with a savagery Tyra could never before have imagined. This was carnage, pure and simple. They’d turned his bridge into an abattoir, and expected... what? Cooperation?

“You will tell us,” one said, its voice a metallic boom. Its face, occluded behind a dark green helm with glowing eyes, glowered down from high above.

“Where is the ethereal?” said another.

“You will tell us,” the first repeated, “or you will die.”

A segmented gauntlet backhanded him across his face, snapping his head around and dropping him to the floor. Pain blossomed along his cheekbone, and he dribbled blood onto the deck. It didn’t matter.

“Tell us,” one said. He didn’t know which. They all looked the same: hulking bodies destroying his sense of scale, their thrumming armour moving with speed and agility defying their enormity. A metal boot caught him in the ribs, flipping him onto his back. He felt the bones of his chest crackling as he landed.

“The ethereal,” one said. “Where is he?”

He forced his lips to part and hissed at the impossible shapes towering over him. “Sssafe...” he managed.

The colossus at the edge of the group stamped forwards, armour decorated with whorls and runes that seemed clipped and ugly to Tyra’s eyes. He wore no helmet, frail gue’la features protruding bizarrely from the slabs of ceramite that covered his shoulders. A long pinion of blue metal arched over his bald skull, tangles of cables infesting the ridge of his brow. His eyes seemed to glow.

“You will tell me, xenogen,” it said, mournful voice reaching into Tyra’s mind and sweeping a wave of nausea and dizziness across him. “You have no choice in this.”

“I think not,” Tyra croaked, voice heavy with a confidence he didn’t feel.

“Xenogen. I am Lexicanium Librarian Macex of his Imperial Majesty’s Raptors. Understand this: you are going to die. Today. By my hand. Tell me where your ethereal is hiding and I’ll make it quick, on my honour. I have no greater kindness to offer you, alien.”

Tyra almost laughed, coughing on the blood in his throat. “I... hh... I’m not afraid of you, gue’la.”

The human’s features creased, its expression almost sad. It extended one gauntleted hand, fingers spread, pressing down with surprising tenderness against his brow. “More the fool you,” it said, eyes crackling with a strange energy.

Daggers hit the inside of Tyra’s mind. A splintering medley of pain, indescribable agony that violated every part of his brain, surged through his head, making him cry out in astonishment. Tendrils of fire, like superheated proboscises, examined his thoughts in a series of clumsy incisions.

Like a bubble rising to the surface of a pool of sludge, he could feel the knowledge of the ethereal’s whereabouts distending and blooming upwards, thirsting for light, coiling inexorably towards the burning pseudopodia that invaded his brain. Sensing the nearness of his prize, the librarian’s psychic assault strengthened, charring the very skin of Tyra’s face where his hand made contact.

The kor’o was still screaming and flailing when the unhelmeted warrior’s pink features exploded in a gust of blood and brains. Tyra sagged gratefully to the floor, smoke coiling from his eyes and ears.

The other colossi reacted immediately, raising weapons to cover all points of the room, frantic gestures seeming ridiculous without the spoken commands to accompany them. Tyra wondered abstractly, hazy with pain and fear, what they were saying to each other in the insulated sanctity of their helmets. He hoped they were scared.

In an instant the room became a maelstrom of dizzying weaponsfire and detonating shells. Weak from his injuries, bewildered and stunned by the chaos of the combat around him, Kor’o Natash Tyra barely even noticed when one of the Marines carefully stamped on his skull and crushed his brain.

The first one was a gift. He fragmented its ugly, exposed head from his concealment in the space beside the elevator. He ducked back into the recess and waited for the resulting whirlwind of directionless, panicky return fire to abate.

Curled foetally in his concealment, Kais’s ears became his eyes. There was a heavy clang— the dead Space Marine’s body toppling to the deck. Its power output thrummed noisily before hissing away into silence. Kais seized upon the distraction to ease onto his feet, melting into the shadows cast by consoles nearer the centre of the bridge. He stole a single glance at the group, arranged on overwatch as one bent over the body of their dead comrade. He seemed to be pushing some sort of instrumentation into the ragged wound of the corpse’s neck, oozing blood and filth across the deck.

Heavy footsteps clanked nearby, the Marines spreading out to find their prey. Their silence was somehow horrifying, reacting to commands only they could hear, more like machines than organisms. Kais found himself again pondering upon the nature of the tau’va, and whether the cost of efficacy was a lifetime of mechanical hollowness. He eased himself into a crouch and flicked a button-sized signal-flare quietly across the room, not allowing himself the time to worry about what he was planning next. The flare clattered quietly behind the communications consoles and ignited with a fizz.

The firestorm rumbled to life again, gunfire shredding the consoles like a hungry zephyr, an invisible airborne claw raking spitefully at the fio’tak surfaces. Kais didn’t wait, pouncing from his concealment whilst the Marines were distracted and sprinting forwards, assessing as he moved.

Time slowed to a crawl.

There were two to his left, pumping long streamers of bolter fire into the tangled morass of metal where the consoles had once stood. A nebulous orb of plasma distorted across his vision from the right, adding to the wreckage around the flare, now venting purple smoke. Kais rolled as he moved, snatching a glance to his side where two other Marines hulked, plasma-weapons raised.

The final gue’la stood at the apex of the bridge, facing... directly towards him.

Watching him. Unfooled by the distraction. Raising its weapon.

“Death to the unclean!” it roared, voice thick with metallic transmission.

The bolter opened fire and Kais pounced away, tumbling clumsily sideways. Miniature explosions rattled all around him and he scrabbled forwards, racking the carbine’s underslung secondary parts as he went. He had time to squeeze the trigger just once before stumbling aside as the column of detonating shells raked past him.

The gue’la saw a spinning object flipping through the air and caught it instinctively, bringing its gauntleted fist up to its face in confused examination. The grenade blew the top half of its armoured body into fragments of gore and ceramite, transforming the bridge into a bone-pocked atrocity and leaving the Marine’s disembodied legs, like the remains of a vandalised statue, planted stalwartly amongst the carnage. The other humans swivelled towards him instantly, colossal silhouettes hazing through the violet mist like ghosts, eye slits blazing eerily.

He became an animal, sprinting for its life. He was a clonebeast being hunted, a ceremonial preything being stalked by the shas’uis during the festival of T’au’kon’seh. Weapons opened up on either side, invisible traceries whistling past his head, narrowing-in implacably. And all within moments that lasted forever, a single raik’an stretching on glacially for tau’cyrs.

He danced through the purple flaresmoke, lurching and rolling and feinting, wondering abstractly which of the four gue’la — arranged almost formally to either side — would be the first to find their mark. A plasma orb shrieked past within tor’ils, singeing the fabric of his regs at his elbow.

What does the clonebeast do? he asked himself.

It runs. Even when exhausted, foaming and coughing, breaths laboured and bloody. Always away, running from the jeth’ri spears of its pursuers.

And they always catch it, sooner or later...

So what does the clonebeast never do?

He adjusted his angle and, not slowing, sprinted directly at the two Marines on his right. A bolter shell, fired from behind, ripped through the outer layers of his thigh armour and shredded a clod of weave fabric, detonating angrily as it spun away. He kept going, finding time somehow within the adrenaline chaos and insanity of his mind to enjoy the bewildered posture of the Space Marines before him, bending away in astonishment as their easy kill bounded towards them. The bolter fire at his back didn’t stop.

He dived between the legs of the nearest colossus, rolling madly and leaping, cat-like, for the cover of a recess. The two Space Marines across the room, bolters chattering hungrily as they tracked after him, were too late to realise their mistake. The threads of impact fire chased him across the deck until he was shielded by the bodies of their comrades, purple haze wafting around their huge forms. Caught in the crossfire, bolter shells stabbed ugly holes through their armour before they could even protest, leaving ribbon trails of blood hanging in the air. The shells that had lodged inside them detonated one after another, sending the gue’la in an absurd jerking jig as they slumped to the floor, innards pulped, plasma weapons clattering to the deck.

Their comrades ceased fire, rushing forwards through the mist as they saw what they’d done. Kais wished he could hear their vox-exchange, relishing the anger and guilt they must be feeling. Their advance was a riot of clanging footsteps and racking weapons, smashing their way through the shredded remains of consoles and benches. One hulked away towards the side wall of the bridge, moving around to cut Kais off. The other edged forwards, bolter barrel sweeping from left to right hungrily, seeking out its prey.

Kais quit his cover in a flash, muscles bunching. He was past the Marine and sprinting before the colossus could even react. He imagined the figure behind him, gyrating around with that strange mechanical fluidity, weapon raised, to track his movements. This time he would be too close to miss.

Kais’s hand closed over the dropped plasma gun he’d been leaping for, slick with blood from its owner’s mangled body. He turned and fired in a single, leg jarring movement, crying out in desperation.

A bolter shell tore into his helmet.

The impact flipped him backwards like a piece of paper, scattering the pixellated view of his HUD. Before the dark clouds of unconsciousness swarmed into his eyes and mind he heard, far away, the satisfying impact of a plasma orb and the dying screams of a gue’la.

The shadows came down. Kais just had time to wonder, dully, how long there was between impact and detonation of a bolter shell before everything went black.

Her team was exhausted. They’d fought off three boarding parties back to back, wading through the bodies of their enemies to take ground and corner the gue’la invaders. They’d watched friends and comrades falling and dying pulverised by the chattering hellguns of the humans or sucked silently into the void behind sealing blast doors, screaming the last of their air away into nothingness.

They’d reinforced the engine bay where the last of the gue’la were converging executing every last one without compassion or mercy or hate. It was a cull, cold and pure and simple.

Then they’d rushed to the bridge, picking off the few wounded stragglers that remained among the crippled corridors of the Or’es Tash’var, until at long last, after what seemed like rotaas of running and fighting they’d found a working elevator to the command deck.

Shas’la T’au Ju, reciting the sio’t meditation of focused aggression beneath her breath, stumbled onto the bridge in a knot of other shas’las and faced a nightmarish vision.

Purple haze, thin enough to give everything an insipid, violet taint, hung listlessly in the air. Wrecked controls and shattered technology blinked and sparked spastically, splattered by the mingled blood of tau and gue’la alike. Kor’o Natash Tyra, unmistakable in his robesuit, lay in a heap in the centre of the bridge, smashed skull leaking fluids.

Then she saw the Marine. There were others, dead and shattered, lying in enormous mounds at different points of the bridge, but this one was alive: an articulating monstrosity straight from the didactic courses that had given her nightmares as a youth. It stood in plain sight, leaning over the body of a fire warrior and raising its blocky weapon.

Ju didn’t think. She lifted her carbine and shot the gargantuan warrior over and over again, and didn’t stop when the rest of the team joined her. The figure seemed to glow briefly at the combined assault, then, with an aborted roar of pain and frustration, exploded. The mess on the bridge got worse.

The fallen shas’la, she found, was Kais. He’d been shot in the head.

When he awoke he laughed like a yearling shas’saal at the sight of her, and they were still hugging and smiling and examining the almost fatal dent in his helmet, a miraculously unexploded shell still buried in the fio’tak, when Shas’o U’das, concealed with the other dignitaries in some well-guarded part of the vessel, spoke across the ship’s communicator.

The fightback had begun.