Salvation's Reach

FOURTEEN Final Shift

Tavis Sun was a memory four days behind the Armaduke when Dorden died.

Supplied and stocked with the last pieces of specialist equipment from the fleet group, the frigate had turned and translated away, running out through the murk of the warp towards the cold distances of the Rimworld Marginals.

Lord Militant Cybon had delivered a final broadcast from the Sepiterna, a valedictory address to the entire regiment. Zweil and the ship’s cleric had held services of constancy and deliverance, but the mood on the ship had changed.

They were heading into the dark, into the bleak and underpopulated regions of the Sabbat Worlds, into dead space and zones of risk, into hazardous climes and marginal fields. Though they were thousands strong, together on the ship, they felt the isolation.

Blenner was observing the specialism rehearsals that were being conducted around the clock on several of the main hold decks. The large areas had been cleared, and floor plans had been marked out on the deck in paint. In places, the layouts resembled basic obstacle courses. Squads moved through the areas, reset the obstacles, and then ran the drills again. Most of them were chamber clearance exercises. Ranges had been set up for practice-firing breaching rounds, and the ship’s artificers had rigged up a number of standard template door locks and hatch seals for teams to practise cutting. There was a lot of sweeper training going on too, and when he wasn’t supervising that, Domor was in hold six with his best demolition men, running through methods for making safe explosive devices and triggers. Major Pasha was lecturing the regiment, one company at a time, on improvised explosives and booby traps, and the finer points of pressure pads. She knew her subjects. It seemed to Blenner that Major Pasha had learned a lot of dirty tricks in the scratch war at Vervunhive.

On another range set up in one of the holds, the regimental marksmen were drilling with their old bolt action rifles. They were firing the specially machined, glass-tipped rounds to acquaint themselves with the specific weight and pull of the unfamiliar ammunition. They were saline charges, non-lethal glass projectiles filled with inert salt water.

The accuracy rate required from marksmen like Questa, Banda, Raess and Nessa was painfully demanding. Blenner was, however, astonished at the performance score that Merrt was racking up.

‘I thought Merrt was a lost cause,’ he said to Hark.

‘He was,’ replied Hark. ‘Larkin’s been working with him, one-to-one. The real breakthrough was muscle relaxant.’

‘What?’

‘He’s numbing his jaw,’ said Hark. ‘Apparently, that stops it twitching and ruining his aim. Of course, it means he can’t talk.’

They watched Merrt finish a round of shots and then turn to the other shooters.

‘I wondered why he was signing,’ said Blenner, nodding at Merrt. Everyone in the regiment had learned basic sign language for stealth work. Blenner had assumed Merrt was using it in deference to the deaf troopers like Nessa.

‘Where’d he get that idea from?’ Blenner asked.

Hark shrugged. ‘He hasn’t really explained. Larkin hinted it had something to do with one of the Space Marines.’

Blenner shuddered. The Space Marines, though they were seldom seen around the ship, were a pretty constant reminder that this was going to be more than a pleasant ceremonial excursion. Inexorably, they were heading towards the sort of fate he had spent most of his career in the Guard trying to avoid, the sort of fate where polished buttons, impeccably buffed toe-caps and a winning way with mess-room banter would not matter one iota. It was getting to the point where Blenner couldn’t laugh it off any more.

He’d spent a lot of time reading the stuff Wilder had recommended, the wit and wisdom of Novobazky. The speeches and mottos had survived Blenner’s initial disdain. Novobazky, the Emperor protect and rest his soul, had clearly been a motivating and inspiring man. Blenner had attempted to memorise some of the proclamations. He’d even practised them out loud to the shaving mirror in his quarters.

The trouble was, he didn’t believe them. He couldn’t say them with any conviction. They didn’t make him feel any better about dying, and, if he couldn’t even convince himself, he stood no chance of putting fire into the bellies of his troops.

When he thought about it like that, Blenner felt the fear inside him grow. It made him want to throw back another pill or two, but he had exhausted his supply. There was the contraband he’d confiscated untouched in his desk, but Curth had warned him off that. His hands trembled.

‘Heads up,’ said Hark. A wall hatch had rumbled open and Rawne’s Suicide Kings had entered, escorting the prisoner. Mabbon had been brought to observe and advise the operational drills. He was in shackles, and his face was without expression. Everybody in the hold space gazed at him.

They knew what he was. They knew the price the regiment had already paid simply having him there. They knew what kind of price they were going to pay if he was playing games with them.

Blenner felt an overwhelming urge to find a latrine. Space Marines were bad enough, but the pheguth was worse.

He got into the corridor outside, and found that his urge to crap his pants had diminished. His desire for pharmaceutical support had increased. If drugs could help Trooper Merrt improve his performance, then they would for Vaynom Blenner too.

That was how he came to be sitting with Dorden when he died.

‘I’m worried that I might be taking too many,’ said Blenner awkwardly. ‘I’ve got through the ones you gave me rather quickly.’

‘Don’t worry, commissar,’ said Dorden. ‘You’re a grown-up. I trust you not to abuse them. You’re only taking them when your nerves demand it, aren’t you?’

‘Yes.’

‘Good,’ said Dorden. ‘In fact, to make things simple, I’ll sort you out a larger supply. To keep you going.’

The medicae office was very quiet. Blenner had passed Kolding and Curth on his way in. He breathed out.

‘Can I ask you a question, doctor?’ he asked.

‘Of course,’ said Dorden. He had got up to fetch a box of pills from a shelf. He was measuring loose pills out, a dozen at a time, into a small set of brass scales.

‘Why aren’t you afraid?’

‘Afraid?’

‘Yes,’ said Blenner. He cleared his throat, nervously. ‘Of… I’m sorry, of dying.’

Dorden smiled, still counting out pills.

‘Death is nothing to be afraid of,’ he said. ‘It happens to everyone. It’s ridiculous to think that the one thing everyone has in common, the one thing that unites us, is an object of fear. I am quite looking forward to it, actually. Duty ends. We are welcomed to the Emperor’s side in some great place of triumph and glory. I imagine… I hope very much… that I will see my son again.’

‘I wish,’ said Blenner. ‘I wish I wasn’t afraid.’

‘You’re not afraid,’ said Dorden. ‘Not of death. You’re afraid of living.’

‘I’m sorry, what?’

‘You’re afraid of the things you’ll have to do before death takes you. Pain, injury, fleeting things like that. You’re afraid of life and the effort that life takes.’

‘I’m pretty sure that death’s the thing really bothering me,’ said Blenner.

Dorden shook his head.

‘You don’t want to be found wanting,’ he said. ‘You don’t want to die knowing those around you despise you or think you’ve let them down. You don’t want to face the Emperor with question marks on the account of your life. You’re not afraid of death, Vaynom. You’re afraid of the things you’re expected to do before you die. Courage. Fortitude. Sacrifice. Endurance. Those are the difficult things.’

Blenner sat back and wiped his hand across his mouth.

‘If that’s the way you see it,’ he said. He stared at the deck. ‘Those are sugar pills, aren’t they? Sugar pills or salt tablets? It’s a placebo.’

‘You’re quite mistaken,’ said Dorden, measuring a last scoop.

‘You would say that,’ replied Blenner. ‘That’s the way they work. But you’re handing them out like sweets. And you’re not even remotely worried that I might end up with a dependency.’

Dorden turned around and looked at Blenner.

‘Don’t bother denying it,’ he said. ‘I can see it in your eyes. That expression. I’m good at telling when people are lying, doctor. It’s my job. I know you don’t want to spoil the effectiveness of the placebo, but just the way you’re looking at me right now, I can… doctor?’

Dorden fell. His left elbow caught the rim of the brass pan on the little set of scales and flipped it, sending the white pills up into the air like chaff. They rained down across the deck like hailstones. Dorden had already slithered down the cabinet, pulling open two drawers, and subsided onto his back. His eyes were like glass. He seemed to be staring at something behind Blenner. Something parsecs behind Blenner.

‘Doctor Curth!’ Blenner screamed, leaping out of his chair so hard it fell over.

Curth ran in, followed by Kolding and Lesp. They crowded around Dorden’s untidily folded form. Blenner didn’t know what to do.

In the face of death, he was speechless.

Curth’s head was bowed. Her skin was pale, as though shock had sucked the blood out of her. She adjusted an intravenous drip.

Blenner stood at her shoulder and stared down at Dorden. The old man’s eyes were closed. Fifteen minutes of furious activity had ended with Dorden on his back on the cart, Kolding and Curth working on him. Blenner had been able to do nothing except watch. He had been fascinated by the way Curth had wept through the entire process without making a sound or halting her work.

‘He was dead for four minutes,’ she said. ‘We restarted his heart.’

‘Is the machine keeping him alive?’ asked Blenner.

‘No,’ she replied. ‘It’s just a precaution. He actually started sustaining himself once we got meds into him and resuscitated.’

‘Clinically dead for four minutes,’ said Blenner. ‘What about brain damage?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘But the machine’s not keeping him alive?’

‘No,’ she said. She turned to look at him. ‘You are, actually.’

‘What?’

‘If you hadn’t been with him,’ she said, ‘we might not have known he’d gone down. Not for minutes. It would have been too late to bring him back. We were lucky you were in there, badgering him for more of those wretched pills.’

‘Hooray for me, then,’ said Blenner. He paused. He felt like she could see the same faraway thing Dorden had been watching when he fell over. ‘To be fair, I think they’re placebos.’

‘Of course they’re placebos,’ said Curth. ‘Are you an idiot?’

‘Steady on.’

‘He’s not going to prescribe something you scoff like candied fruit, is he?’

She stopped and composed herself.

‘I’m sorry. I’ve just ruined their effect and all his hard work.’

‘I should stop taking them, then.’

She looked him in the eye.

‘I could be lying,’ she said.

‘You could. With you, Doctor Curth, it’s much harder to tell. You could, of course, just be covering because you let it slip.’

‘You’ll never know.’

‘Let’s stop worrying about me, shall we,’ he said, as brightly as he could manage. ‘What about you? Do you need a moment? This is very trying. Can I offer you a shoulder to cry on? A warm embrace?’

‘You never stop, do you?’ Curth asked. ‘One of these days I’m simply going to let you have your way, just to shut you up.’

‘I– I don’t know what to say–’

‘Thank the Throne.’

He walked to the doorway.

‘I think Gaunt needs to know.’

‘No,’ she said.

‘Maybe not before, but he needs to know now. He’d want to know. Look, I’ll go and tell him what happened, if you like.’

‘I’ll do it,’ Curth said.

Elodie was alone in Daur’s quarters when Commissar Fazekiel knocked on the hatch.

‘The captain’s not here,’ Elodie said. ‘He’s training in the hold.’

‘It’s you I wanted to see,’ said Fazekiel.

‘Me?’

Fazekiel came in, removed her cap, and pulled the hatch shut.

‘There’s a small problem, Mamzel Dutana. I’m sure it’s nothing, so I wanted to see if I could get it squared away without a fuss.’

‘What is it?’ asked Elodie. She eased her arm, still in its sling. Her head was aching again.

The commissar pulled a couple of sheets of paper out of her coat pocket and unfolded them.

‘We were clearing up after the incident with the gunman. My compliments, by the way, for saving that poor child.’

Elodie nodded.

‘The transport deck hall was a mess. Furniture broken and overturned, clothes scattered,’ said Fazekiel. ‘We found these papers under a cot. They’d been dropped, and had slid under there. Forgive me, I had to read them to work out who they should be returned to. They belong to you. You’ve signed them here, and here.’

‘Oh, yes,’ Elodie said. She vaguely remembered the forms that had been thrust at her.

‘I need to ask you a simple question,’ said Fazekiel. ‘Sometimes people wish to keep these things personal and private, in which case we can clear this up now, just between the two of us, and nothing else need be said about it. Are… are congratulations in order?’

‘Congratulations? I don’t understand.’

‘Are you and Captain Daur married? Sometimes it’s done in secret, I know. Perhaps before we left Menazoid Sigma?’

‘Married?’ Elodie asked. She swallowed. ‘No. No, we’re not.’

‘You’re not?’ asked Fazekiel.

‘No, unless I could be married and not know it. Could he have married me without me knowing it?’

Fazekiel smiled. ‘No, mamzel.’

‘Not even by filling out forms?’

‘No.’

‘Then we’re not married.’

Fazekiel frowned, her face sad.

‘Then we do have a problem. These papers, which you have signed, are part of a certificate for viduity benefits. The sort a wife would be able to claim after the death in service of her partner. A widow’s pension, mamzel.’

‘Oh.’

‘If you’re not married, then this is an illegal claim. An attempt to defraud the Munitorum. Unfortunately, this sort of fraud is quite common, given the large number of Guardsmen in service.’

‘I don’t know about this,’ Elodie stammered. ‘I was just given papers to sign. I was told it was something to do with the accompany bond. I wasn’t trying to scam anything. Please, I wasn’t.’

Fazekiel stared at her, eyes narrow.

‘I believe you,’ she said.

‘I should hope so,’ said Ban Daur.

They hadn’t heard him enter the chamber. He was dripping with sweat and in need of a shower. His company’s drill period was over for the day.

‘Do I get to hear this from the start?’ Daur asked.

‘A fraudulent pension claim has come to light,’ said Fazekiel. ‘Your partner is involved, but appears to me to be innocent. I am obliged to investigate. Mamzel, who gave you these forms? Who told you to sign them?’

‘I forget.’ She thought for a moment. ‘No… it was Costin.’

‘What did he tell you they were?’

‘They were to do with the accompany bond. There was him, and Captain Meryn. Some other troopers too, I’m sure. I can’t remember who. They were moving through the retinue with the forms. They said it was routine paperwork. This was just before the man started shooting.’

Fazekiel nodded.

Elodie looked at Daur.

‘We’re not married, are we?’ she asked.

Daur blinked. He laughed, and then stopped.

‘No,’ he said. ‘I think you’d remember.’

Elodie wasn’t laughing. She got up and walked over to one of the wall lockers. Clumsily, with only one hand working, she opened it, took out the petition forms and held them out to Daur.

‘What does this mean, then?’ she asked. She shook the documents. ‘Petition for Allowance to Marry. What does that mean? Why did you fill them out? If you were going to marry me, why didn’t you ask me? Is it that bitch?’

‘What? Who?’

‘Zhukova! Zhu-fething-kova!’

‘What?’

Fazekiel got to her feet.

‘Captain, I’m going to go now. I have to look into this matter. I will be back with further questions. You clearly need to have a conversation with Mamzel Dutana that I don’t have to be part of.’

On the fifth circuit of the drill course, Felyx Chass slipped and fell on a climbing slope. He was bone-tired, and didn’t want to show it. He wanted to impress the other Guardsmen. He’d always considered himself fit, but the training was punishing.

The Ghosts, even influx troopers, seemed so much fitter and stronger. Even Dalin, who was staying close to keep an eye on him, possessed reserves of stamina that Felyx found alarming. The lasrifle was a dead weight in Felyx’s hands. He felt himself lagging, stumbling on the ascents, fumbling through the crawls.

Then he fell.

‘Probably not used to hard work, eh?’ remarked Didi Gendler, helping Felyx up.

‘I’m all right.’

‘Probably comes as a bit of a shock after the life you’ve known,’ Gendler added. There was a malicious look in his eyes.

‘I’m fine,’ said Felyx.

‘No nice lifeguard to carry you around on her back today?’ asked Gendler.

‘She’s busy.’

‘Get on with it, Gendler,’ said Ludd, coming over. ‘Or I’ll make you run the circuit again.’

‘Just trying to help, sir,’ said Gendler. He ran off, throwing a toxic look back at Felyx.

‘Go rest on the bench,’ Ludd said to Felyx.

‘Why don’t you just shoot me?’ Felyx replied.

‘What?’

‘I’ve got everything to prove, so please don’t make it harder for me. They think I’m nothing. A privileged brat.’

‘They don’t think that,’ said Ludd.

‘Screw them if they do. I’m going to continue, commissar. I don’t want any favours.’

‘I’ll run the course with Chass,’ said Dalin, coming up, lapping Felyx.

‘Just carry on,’ Ludd told him.

‘The colonel-commissar asked me to keep an eye out,’ said Dalin.

‘On you go then, both of you,’ said Ludd.

On the sidelines, watching the last of the shift’s exercise drills, Hark came to a halt beside Kolea.

‘Well, they’re clearly both in love with him,’ said Hark.

‘Who?’ asked Kolea.

‘My boy and yours, Gol. Nahum and Dalin. Look at them trying to outdo each other to become Chass’s new best friend.’

‘They’re not stupid,’ said Kolea. ‘Getting in tight with the commander’s son, that’s a fast track to advancement or decent favour.’

‘The regiment doesn’t work like that,’ said Hark.

Kolea looked at him, and smiled. He patted Hark on the arm.

‘For a smart man, you’re surprisingly naive sometimes, Viktor,’ he said. ‘All regiments work like that, even the best ones. This is the Imperial Guard.’

‘There you are,’ said Luna Fazekiel, walking over to them.

‘Is there a problem?’ asked Hark.

‘I don’t know. I don’t know what to make of it yet.’ She handed Hark the folded slips of paper bearing Elodie Dutana’s signature.

‘I wanted to see where you think we should go with this,’ she said.

‘You were going to ask me to marry you, and then you didn’t,’ said Elodie.

‘It’s not quite like that,’ said Daur.

‘Then what are these papers for? This petition?’

‘All right. It is like that. A little like that.’

Elodie took a deep breath.

‘So, it’s Zhukova,’ she said, rather too fast. ‘She turns up, and you rekindle your old romance, and suddenly marrying me doesn’t seem like such a great idea–’

‘Oh, Throne,’ said Daur. ‘Please, listen to me. Zhukova means nothing to me. I knew her years back, in the Hive Defence days on Verghast. She was incredibly young. Incredibly stupid, too. She had a crush on everybody.’

‘Including you?’ Elodie asked.

‘Yes, including me. She likes… ambitious and successful men. Officers. I was in her sights for a while, but it was never reciprocated. It was just interesting to see her again. A reminder of old times, of mutual friends long gone. I was being polite.’

She sniffed.

‘You were really that jealous?’ asked Daur.

‘Yes. I always will be.’

He nodded, half-shrugged.

‘I’m honoured to be the subject of such jealousy,’ he said.

‘What about the petition?’ she asked. ‘Explain that.’

He was silent for a long time.

‘I wanted to ask you to marry me,’ he said at last, quietly. ‘I got the paperwork organised, ready for written permission from Gaunt. Then I realised the timing was bad. You know, because of what it would look like.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Guardsmen who get married on the eve of war, they only do it for one reason.’

‘And what’s that?’ she asked.

‘Because they assume they’re going to die,’ said Daur. ‘They want to make sure their wife has the paperwork to support her claim for a widow’s pension from the Munitorum. They do it so their spouse qualifies for the benefit. They do it because they’re not coming back.’

He looked at her.

‘I want to come back,’ he said, ‘and I didn’t want you to think I wasn’t going to.’

Curth didn’t want to use the intership vox, or send a message through channels. It was too impersonal. She went to Gaunt’s quarters and knocked quietly on the hatch.

When he didn’t answer, she let herself in, intending to leave him a private note asking him to come and see her.

Maddalena was just coming out of the bedchamber. She was naked. When she saw Curth, she didn’t grab clothes or anything to cover herself. She grabbed her weapon and aimed it at the doctor.

Curth yelped and leapt backwards, her hands raised.

Gaunt came in, pulling a sheet around his waist.

‘Put that away,’ he said to Maddalena. ‘It’s Doctor Curth.’

Maddalena lowered the weapon, put it aside, and disappeared, naked and long-limbed, into the bedchamber.

‘This is awkward,’ said Gaunt. ‘Sorry.’

‘Yes. I shouldn’t have come in without permission.’

‘I assume it is important, Ana.’

She nodded.

‘Out of curiosity, how long has this been going on–’

She stopped herself.

‘Forget it,’ she said, closing her eyes and shaking her head. ‘It’s not my business, and it was inappropriate of me to ask.’

Gaunt looked uncomfortable. The scar across his abdominals was old and pale.

‘You can ask,’ he said. ‘We’ve known each other a long time. It’s been going on since the conjunction. I don’t know what it is. It’s just sex.’

‘Oh, good,’ said Curth, without any warmth.

Gaunt frowned. He looked lost for words.

‘Just a hint,’ she said, ‘from a friend. If I was the girl in the bedchamber, overhearing this conversation, I don’t think I’d be happy to hear it was “just sex”.’

‘If you were the girl in the bedchamber–’ Gaunt began.

‘Yes?’

‘Ana, I–’

‘You know what, Ibram. I always thought I might be the girl in the bedchamber one day. Funny that.’

He took a step towards her. The edge of the sheet snagged on the door frame. She held up a hand and turned away.

‘Don’t,’ she said. ‘Just get dressed and come down to the infirmary, please. I’ll wait for you there. I came to find you because Dorden is dying. He’s going now. There isn’t much time left for him, and I think he needs you to be there.’

She paused.

‘Actually, I’m not sure he does. He seems quite content. But I think you need you to be there.’

Most of the regiment had gone to the dining halls for supper. Shift bells were ringing. She was walking back along a half-empty main spinal when Blenner saw her.

‘Doctor Curth, has Dorden gone?’ Blenner asked, crossing to her in concern.

‘No. Not yet.’

‘But you’re crying.’

‘Tension. It’s a tension valve, commissar.’

‘Dear lady, I told you I know very well when people are lying,’ he said. ‘It comes with the job.’

‘It’s the truth,’ she said.

‘It’s not the whole truth, though.’

She snorted a laugh, wiping her eyes.

‘Dorden’s going to die. There’s nothing I can do about it. He’s part of this regiment’s soul, and he’s been my mentor and friend and everything else besides since I signed up. I don’t know what I’ll do without him, and that’s only just hitting me. I’ve known for months, and it’s only just making horrible sense now. He’s going to leave us and we’re supposed to carry on.’

Blenner nodded. He patted her shoulder.

‘And that, on top of everything else, made me realise that nothing and no one lasts. Nothing lives forever, no matter how much we want it to. No matter how hard we fight. No matter how patiently we wait. I see that now.’

‘You were… waiting for something?’ he asked.

‘And I waited too long. It’s never going to happen. I understand that now.’

She wiped her eyes again and looked up at him.

‘I have to go to the infirmary, to make sure Dorden’s comfortable. I have to wait for Gaunt there, and brief him. Later on, I am going to need to be very seriously cheered up. I intend to get extremely drunk, Commissar Blenner. I believe you’re the sort of person it’s fun to get drunk with.’

‘My reputation precedes me.’

‘I will require sacra. I trust you’ll be able to procure some?’

He nodded.

‘I should warn you,’ he added, ‘I feel it’s only fair. After a drink or two, I sometimes forget myself, Doctor Curth.’

She looked him dead in the eye.

‘It’s Ana,’ she said.