Dan Abnett - Know no fear. The Battle of Calth

‘Wh-what did you do?’ she asks.

She still has no idea.

‘Listen to me,’ Ventanus says. He kneels in front of her, towering over her even so. ‘Seneschal, listen. We’re going to find you a medicae and–’

‘Why did you hurt me? You hurt me!’

‘Seneschal, you must listen to me. There’s been–’

What has there been, Captain Ventanus? What should he say to her?

He has carried her into the shelter of an underpass walkway. The tiles are cool, but they can feel the heat of the fires at ground level. The sidelong light falling into the underpass is twitching orange.

‘What has happened?’ she asks. She’s starting to realise the extent of the situation.

Selaton approaches, herding some of her staff and a few dock workers. They’re bloody and dazed. One of them is hurt quite badly.

‘I can’t reach the company or the Chapter,’ Selaton tells Ventanus. ‘Vox is scorched out.’

Ventanus nods. Information is what they need right now. Information is victory. To get that, they’ll need a high-gain transmitter, a primary caster, something robust enough to have survived the electromagnetic shock.

He hears a noise. It vibrates the rockcrete beneath him. He strides to the mouth of the underpass.

The sky is a firestorm, ruddy and bright. Spikes and fronds of searing yellow and orange spit across it. There’s lightning too, massive electrical discharge. Burning debris is hurtling down. It’s as though they’re caught in a meteorite shower.

The starport is in chaos. Parts of it, especially the masts and higher gantries, have been damaged by the air-blast or the rain of debris. Heat-sear and overpressure have blown down cranes, rigs, loaders and illumination towers. Thick plumes of black smoke are rising from promethium tanks and sundered refineries.

Many loading vehicles, including two heavy lifters, have been brought down by the shock, and their crash sites are ablaze. Personnel are running in every direction. Ventanus sees bewildered crash teams and fire fighters. He sees bodies on the ground.

The noise is coming from a bulk transport. Trailing smoke and flames, it is passing low overhead, so low he feels the urge to duck. Fragments of debris are tumbling off it. It’s struggling to rise, but it’s never going to get enough lift. Two missiles of debris streaking down from high altitude spear into its back, exploding, causing it to lurch.

It ploughs on, engines howling, ground shaking, and crawls out of sight behind the towering hive habs and the outer docks.

There’s a blink of light. He feels it hit. How far away? Six kilometres? Seven? It feels like an earthquake. The air turns gritty and the vibration is so intense his vision blurs for a second.

Behind him, Arbute screams. The scream is so sudden, it makes Ventanus jump slightly. She’s limped up to join him at the mouth of the underpass, and she’s just seen everything else.

‘What is this? What’s happening?’

‘Stay calm. Please,’ Selaton says, reaching them.

‘Is this an attack?’ she asks.

The heat is intense. The smell of burning is dry and caustic. She has to shield her eyes from the glare. They do not.

‘No,’ says Selaton. ‘An accident. It has to be.’

Ventanus doesn’t know what to say.

‘Sir!’

An Ultramarine has appeared. He’s spotted them. He’s got a kill team with him. It’s Amant, a squad leader from 7th Company.

‘Do you know what this is?’ Ventanus asks.

‘No, captain.’

‘How many are with you?’

‘I’ve got three squads on port protection detail,’ replies Amant. ‘We can’t find or contact our sergeant.’

‘Do you have vox?’

Amant shakes his head. ‘Nothing working.’

‘There’s a listening station on the far side of the concourse,’ Arbute says. Ventanus looks at her. She’s leaning on Selaton’s arm to get up, wincing at the pain.

‘A listening station?’

‘Part of the port’s original traffic control system, before the upgrade. It has old but powerful casters.’

Ventanus nods at Arbute.

‘Good. Let’s find out what’s going on.’

‘Maybe we can find out about this gunfire too,’ says Amant.

‘What gunfire?’ Ventanus snaps.

‘Reports of shooting along the western perimeter, sir,’ says Amant. ‘I think it’s most likely a payload of munitions that’s been set off by fire, but it’s not confirmed yet.’

‘Let’s move. Quickly,’ says Ventanus. ‘I don’t think this is an accident at all.’

The moment it’s out of his mouth, he regrets saying it aloud.

‘Why not?’ asks Selaton.

‘Because I’m a pessimist,’ says Ventanus.

Selaton looks at him. They start to help the injured seneschal along.

‘Look,’ Ventanus tells his sergeant, ‘I couldn’t have caused this much disruption to Calth’s transport network if I’d tried.’

Amant glances at them.

‘Of course it’s an accident,’ he says. ‘What else could it be?’

Ventanus isn’t listening. He can feel a tremble in the air.

Everything turns black. A deep shadow has swept over them. He hears Arbute and her aides exclaim in mortal fear.

A ship is falling backwards across the sky. A grand cruiser. It’s immense. To see something so big and space-borne in scale comparison with a world’s surface is fundamentally shocking. It makes the ship look like the biggest object any of them has ever seen.

It is falling so slowly. It is sliding down the sky, spilling clouds of debris, trailing the disintegrating remains of its drydock. It’s as though Calth’s atmosphere is a deep lake and the ship is a tree trunk sinking gracefully into it. There is a primal majesty to such destruction. The descent they are witnessing feels mythical. It is like a moon that has slipped from the firmament. A god that has forgotten how to fly. It is like a fall from the old fables. Good’s plunge into evil. The bright to the dark.

‘The Antrodamicus,’ Ventanus whispers, recognising the lines of the cyclopean shape.

It seems as if it’s hanging, but it’s only moments from impact. It’s going to crush the world. The fires of its demise will scorch the continent.

‘Back,’ he starts to say. ‘Back!’

Brother Braellen assumes they’re going to head for the city. Captain Damocles has already ordered the transport crews to get ready. Whatever’s going on, it’s bad, and the people in Numinus are going to need help. Disaster control. Lock-down. From the Ourosene Hills, they can probably be there in two hours.

No one’s giving any orders. No one’s giving any anything. There’s no coordination.

So the captain is the ultimate authority 6th Company has. That’s fine with Braellen. They’ll move in, deploy, secure. Rescue and secure, they’ve trained for that.

And if it’s not an accident, if it’s an attack… They’ve trained for that too.

He’s thinking that when things change and their plans change with them.

It starts raining main battle tanks.

The first impact is surreal. Braellen sees it plainly. A Shadowsword superheavy, almost perfectly intact apart from one trailing track section, drops out of the stained sky about sixteen hundred metres ahead of him. The tank’s hull plating is faintly glowing pink from re-entry.

It hits. Hammer blow. Blinding light. Shock-wash.

The impact creates an explosion akin to a primary plasma mine. Battle-brothers are thrown through the air like toys. Some bounce off transports or stacked freight. Braellen’s squad is at the edge of the blast force. They stay upright as their power armour auto-locks and braces, sensing the explosion. Inertial dampers straining. Braellen feels grit and micro-debris spattering off his armour like small-arms fire.