Aboard the Night Lord's ship...
#
HUNTED
(part 6)
Alarm klaxons were sounding aboard the enemy vessel. Volstag pulled himself up the open access
ramp, having to jump up to reach its edge as the grounded ship was cocked
backward on its damaged landing gear. He
paused there in the doorway in a low crouch, chainsword across his back, guns
on his belt. He could hear very little
below the howling of the fire alarm, but he did smell someone nearby; the tang
of mutation was in the air.
A thin figure appeared from around
the corridor, robed in dark blue with shining orange eyes. The wolf pounced and dispatched him in an
instant, easily snapping the mortal’s neck.
Limp in his arms, he could see this was a serf worker, like those that
crewed loyal Space Marine ships, though here they were more likely slaves. This one appeared to also be a plaything of
the depraved apothecary, having several scars and surgical augmentations.
A memory flashed in Volstag’s mind:
breaking free of his bindings and slaying two such slaves with a few brutal
swipes of his clawed hands. He felt the
sweaty humidity again, smelled the oil and burning flesh, heard the painful
cries of those dying.
Volstag looked at his hands
now. Had those really been his taloned
paws? No time to consider that now. He tossed the slave’s body out the hatch,
pulled his sword and bolt pistol, and proceeded into the shadowy labyrinth of
the ship.
The hot, narrow corridors were strangely
familiar to him. With his general
knowledge of Imperial ship designs and flashes of his unconscious memory, it
wouldn’t take him long to locate the radio tower. Along the way he saw only a couple more serf-slaves,
who had gone about their regular maintenance duties without noticing the wolf scout
creeping among the shadows. Most of the
Night Lord warriors were no doubt scattered across several kilometers of tundra
by now, searching for their lost prey.
The rest of the ship’s company and crew would be fighting the fire in
the rear engine compartments, though by now that situation was likely under
control. But still the alarms were sounding,
providing him some cover and reassurance.
Volstag finally located the radio
tower on the third deck of the ship. Just
as he was prepared to enter, the doors opened.
A robed figure slouched through the threshold dragging a twisted
appendage that may have once been a leg.
The slave’s pale face flashed surprise as the chainsword swung in and
tore out his throat. Volstag leaped
inside.
This was a cylindrical chamber no more
than a dozen meters in diameter with the ceiling lost in the antenna arrays
several meters above, all lit an eerie green by blinking lights and waveform
screens. Two mortal servants and a Chaos
Marine stood inside. One slave yelped
with surprise. The Night Lord turned
from receiving the latest report on the hunt and smiled. One thick finger clicked a switch on the
panel. “Nevermind, Squad Five. I have him here.” He clicked off the channel.
“Say again, control,” the speaker
demanded. “Did you say he’s there?”
“You’ve led us on quiet a chase,
little pup,” the Night Lord said. His
face was an irregular grid of scars and the chest piece of his power armor
almost matched it. He pulled a jagged
combat blade from his belt. “But the
game is over now.”
One mutant slave raised an arm and
his robe sleeve fell back. The bionic
arm beneath unfolded with a mechanical whir, extending into three thin metal
limbs, two with claws of various size, one with a long drill that whined as it
spun up. The other slave stood still,
waiting to see what would happen next.
“Shall we?” the Chaos Marine said.
Volstag hesitated, listening to the
alarm klaxon continuing overhead. He
realized it could stop any second but would cover any noise until then. “I’d love to,” the wolf snarled, “but I don’t
have much time, and you’re wasting it.”
He dropped the chainsword to the deck with a loud clang. The renegade’s mouth twitched into an even
broader smile, but only briefly. Volstag’s
now free hand seized the boltgun that hung at his side, tugged it free from his
shoulder, and opened fire. The weapon’s
report echoed around the walls of the small chamber as its vicious bolts
spattered tainted blood on the walls and instruments. After two seconds of bolter fire his ears
were ringing, the room was choked with smoke, and three enemy bodies lay on the
floor.
That
was stupid, he told himself, moving forward to inspect the radio
controls. One misplaced shot could have
destroyed the very equipment he’d come to use.
It was the wolf inside that made him so anxious to spill blood, so
careless with his weaponry. The wolf. His teeth clenched tight, eager to bite, to
feed. There was little doubt now;
Volstag knew he was tainted by the wulfen.
A sharp-toothed grin touched his lips as he fished the voice-corder from
its belt compartment. He realized that
he had no regrets about the darker side of Russ and would give himself
willingly to the creature’s full fury, once his business was done. But not yet.
He quickly assessed the radio
panel, tuned up the standard Imperial distress frequency, and plugged in the
device. The fire alarms ceased at that
moment, leaving only his own voice in the room: “...I shall do what damage I
can, then see you in the mead halls of the afterlife.” Volstag set the device in a repeating loop
and gathered up his weapons.
One
more task, he told the beast within, leashing it with his will. The
signal’s out, we’ve little else to live for now. But I have to be sure. Something the traitor PDFs had said under his
tree resonated in his head, something about being rewarded with the gene-seed
of Kurze, thus being remade as a Night Lords Space Marine. What if Abaenon had stolen the gene-seed of
Russ from his tortured captives, that which made them all sons of their beloved
Primarch? He had to find and destroy the
apothecary’s lab. Then he’d unleash the
beast. Then he could die in blind,
furious combat with honor in his heart.
#
The wolf’s unconscious memory guided him easily to the place
of its birth. He therefore knew where
the laboratory could be found. But now
that the fire had been squelched, the ship’s passageways were busier with robed
slaves and servitors returning to their usual duties.
And that suited Volstag fine.
He heard mumbled conversation around
a corner and sped his pace to meet it, his bare feet pounding hard on the steel
grid of flooring. The Night Lord Space
Marines and their servitor were not expecting a half-naked beastman to come
bounding around the bend, chainsword growling in both hands. With two swings and a howl of bloodlust,
Volstag beheaded one Marine and cut down the other two. Their bulky bodies would choke the
passageway, slowing down any pursuers.
He climbed a ladder to the fourth
deck and shot two slaves waiting there with his bolt pistol. Subtlety was falling away. Something in him was no longer being
cautious.
Two more robed figures saw him
coming down a long corridor; there was no way to hide himself now. One was a half-machine servitor. It leveled its inhuman limb at him and fire
poured forth, filling the hallway with bright yellow flames. Volstag leapt through the wall of fire, bare
skin singed, the hair on his face and chest burned off or smoking. His chain blade hacked off the offending limb
and his massive body smashed the other man against the bulkhead. The servitor stared in shock as his severed
arm’s promethium fuel squirted on the walls and deck plates.
“Another fire,” the Space Wolf
said, himself alight with several tiny flames.
“Just what we need.”
He lowered his pistol and shot the
mutant he’d knocked to the floor. The
exploding bolt scattered the slave’s brains and sparked the lost fuel. A new barrier of flame roared to life. Volstag’s chainsword gave the servitor its
death.
#
”
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oNormal style='text-indent:.3in'>The Space Wolf hauled himself back
up to the open compartment on the dreadnought’s rear. After twelve seconds of trial and error, he
had complete control of the twin autocannons.
The creature entombed within complained with bestial noises but could do
nothing to stop him.
This should give me just the diversion I
need to get aboard, Volstag thought, and triggered the firing
mechanism. The heavy shells detonated
against the hull just to the left of the primary engine cones.
“But a space ship’s hull is built
to take more punishment than that,” Volstag said aloud. “Let’s try this instead.” He adjusted his aim and fired again. This time twin trails of fire shot right into
the engine cones, followed by explosions deep inside. He fired another volley. Green-blue plasma belched out from deep
within his target, indicating an engine breach.
“And while we’re at it...” The dreadnought’s weapon ground and clicked
in an arc, then roared off several more rounds.
The earth around one landing leg exploded, then the leg itself. Volstag directed the fire to a second leg and
destroyed it, too. The whole ship listed
backward, tilting it into further confusion.
“I know you’re wracked with guilt
over this,” Volstag told the dreadnought, “but don’t worry, you won’t have long
to live with it.” He set another krak
grenade inside the beast’s hull, set it with a long fuse, then dropped back to
the ground.
“In Femyr Longspear’s name.”
The wolf rushed back into the darkness. Thirty seconds later there was an explosion
within the dreadnought’s body, followed by several more as his remaining
munitions went up and finished him from the inside out.
* * *
Conclusion tomorrow!
