C. Goto: Dawn of War

The Wailing Doom, the ancient weapon of the avatar of Khaine, seemed to fall into slow motion, sweeping up in a vertical crescent from the avatar’s feet, leaving a stream of sparkling energy in its wake. Its tip ripped into the body of the daemon prince with the sound of reality being torn asunder, and the avatar pushed it on with the very last of his ageless strength. The blade ploughed through the abdomen of the shrieking daemon, spraying warp energy and toxic liquids across the mountain, and then sliced up through its neck, smashing into the base of its skull. The daemon’s head was shattered in an immense explosion, sending the collapsing skull rocketing up into the gyring storm above.

The head of the daemon prince detonated like a mine, blasting rings of ugly, purple light and splatters of filthy ichor across the mountain top. The blast seemed to consume the storm, and the roiling clouds were a sudden blaze of red fire.

Macha raised her arms to the heavens, holding a small, shimmering stone of maledictum between her hands. She was whispering and chanting into the blaze that engulfed the sky. Then suddenly, as if on command, the fiery clouds spiralled into a whirlpool and vanished down into the farseer’s stone, leaving the scene in stillness and silence.

The avatar of Khaine pushed his sword into the air and a last fork of lightning ruptured the sky, striking the ancient blade as though it were a conductor. The sword flashed momentarily and then shattered with a crack of thunder, sending a shard splintering off against the rocks, as the avatar slumped to the ground with the rest of the blade still clasped in its hand. He lay prone on the mountain top as the clouds parted, leaving him bathed in starlight. His magma-like blood oozed slowly from his stricken body, forming little streams of lava that trickled down the mountainside, as though it were a volcano.

On the lower summit, Macha the farseer collapsed in exhaustion, but she knew that this was not over. She struggled against her exhaustion, trying to warn the warlocks that were rushing to the aid of the avatar, but she could manage nothing more. A curse on the naive humans.

“Now. Now’s our chance,” said Jhordine, but Prothius was already on his way.

The Librarian vaulted across the lava flows that radiated out from the fallen avatar and rolled beneath the fire that seared out from the line of eldar warlocks who had already gathered to honour him. Streaks of blue power jetted through the air, sending up explosions around the charging Librarian. But the eldar were tired and spent, and Prothius was easily their match. His spinning force staff deflected the bursts of alien power, and sent back flares of its own, smashing into the line of stationary warlocks.

Stooping, Prothius scooped up the abandoned shard of the avatar’s blade, feeling its writhing energies repulse at his touch. Voices started to whisper into his mind, but he shut them out and turned. The whispers persisted, pressing at his soul and driving up the pressure in his head to bursting point.

He leapt the last of the magma streams and slid down a short cliff, crashing into the middle of a ring of his battle-brothers who awaited him at its base.

“Let’s get out of here,” recommended Jhordine, as streams of warlock fire crested the cliff top, raining energy down onto the team.

The Deathwatch Marines returned fire instantly, sending salvoes of bolter fire streaking back up the cliff, breaking away chunks of rock and sending a few eldar flipping over the edge to their deaths.

“Agreed. The Thunderhawk is already on its way. Extraction point is less than five hundred metres,” barked Trythos over the din.

Prothius could not let go of the sword fragment. It was as though it was fused into his grip. He felt weak and drained, and the shard had grown heavier with every hard fought step. Heavier still after they had climbed into the Thunderhawk and blasted away from Tartarus. It was as though it wanted to be back with the eldar. And the whispering wouldn’t stop. His mind was peppered with thoughts that were not his own, chattering and debating all around him. But one voice was clear, and its pain was exquisite: Human, you know not what you have done.

C.S. Goto (ebook by Undead)

01 – Dawn of War

Tartarus system, 999. M41

The voices soared into an angelic chorus, filling the furthest reaches of space with silver light. It was a divine sound, ineffable in its beauty and valorous in purpose. The Astronomican pulsed with life, riddling the Imperium with the light of the Emperor, filling it with the perfect sounds of his psychic choir.

Gabriel held the voices in his head for an instant, thrilling at the touch of this sacred beacon. They filled him with cool light, flooding his soul with the promise of salvation. It was like looking into the eyes of the Emperor himself and seeing him gaze back with implacable calm.

But the sound seemed to shift. The harmony faltered and then collapsed. Soaring sopranos screeched into shrill screams, and the unblemished light was suddenly awash with tortured faces. Deep reds bled into the stream of silver, curdling his thoughts into a sickly blend of bloody images. The screams grew louder, threatening to overcome his mind with their potency. And voices started to emerge from the forest of sound-voices that called his name-Gabriel Angelos, this was your doing. They were accusing him, hating him, reaching for his soul with the ice-cold fingers of the dead.

“Gabriel!”

He fired out his hand, grasping the nearest neck in his iron-grip. The immense muscles of his shoulder and arm bunched in tension.

“Gabriel.” The voice was firm and gentle, but it was accompanied by a palm that slapped across his face.

The Blood Ravens captain prised open his eyes and stared into the face of his friend. “Thank you, Isador.”

Isador Akios gazed back at his captain with the tenderness of decades of familiarity. “You look terrible.”

Gabriel’s skin was glistening with sweat and a single bloody tear had streaked down his face, leaving a scar-like mark over his already scarred cheek. His lip was split and bleeding where Isador had struck him. The plain tunic that he wore was soaked with sweat, and it clung to his muscular form as he rose from the posture of supplication before the altar.

“Again, thank you, Isador,” he replied as he got to his feet, meeting the Librarian’s eyes levelly with his own, and wiping the blood from his mouth. “I was praying,” he explained.

“Yes, I can see that.” Isador had seen Grabriel pray at each of the designated times of every day for over a century. He had always been devout, as you would expect from one of the Emperor’s Space Marines. But something had changed since the Cyrene campaign. There was not much room in their daily routine for personal space, but Gabriel now spent every spare moment in the temple, and Isador was concerned for his old friend.

“Are we closing on Tartarus?” asked Gabriel, reasoning that this would be why his meditations had been interrupted.

“Imminently, captain,” replied Isador, still studying Gabriel’s face carefully. “We have entered the Tartarus system and are preparing a trajectory for optimum orbit around the fourth planet-Tartarus itself.”

“Any more news from the regiment on the ground, Isador?”

“No, Gabriel, none. I pray that we are not too late,” said the Librarian with concern. The Blood Ravens Third Company had received the distress call from the Tartarus Planetary Defence Force-a regiment of the Imperial Guard affectionately known as the Tartarans-a couple of days earlier. The report was broken and intermittent, but the Tartarans appeared to be under attack by a large force of orks. Gabriel had immediately directed the company’s battle barge, the Litany of Fury, to make for Tartarus to offer assistance. The Blood Ravens had fought orks many times before, and they knew how to confront this foe.