Speculum Enigmate Chapter 23

Gotram rested against a stone buttress as he leaned out of cover and peered downwards. His helm was off, revealing his grizzled face and his concerned expression. He was hanging from the high roof of some form of underground transitway, many levels deep and lined by reinforced columns and archways. The Imperials had attempted to retreat from the oncoming Purestrain Genestealers via the route had entered but swiftly been cut off from their exit. Enemies were everywhere, lurking in every direction, so they had come this way seeking to escape their pursuers, who were many.

Far below packs of Purestrains scoured the floor, sniffing the ground as they sought a scent. Gotram knew their sense of smell rivalled a Mastiff's and would be relentless in their hunt. It was surprising they hadn't found the Imperials already, but whatever mysterious power the Inquisitor concealed seemed to be confounding their stalkers, creating a blindspot the enemy couldn't quite find. Gotram glanced over at Vevara who was staring downwards, standing next to the silver warrior, Mortula they had called her. The three of them had volunteered to scout ahead, seeking a clear route to the surface, only to nearly be caught in a trap.

Gotram stiffened as he saw another pack of Genestealers creeping along the floor below. Scores of them surrounding another of far greater dimensions. This one loomed over its lesser kin, with arms as wide as Gotram's chest and a stooped spine. Its jaw boasted rows upon rows of teeth and its tongue hung low out of its mouth. Its back had serrated spines growing out of the vertebrae and its head was swollen and bulbous. One looked was enough to give Gotram pause. He was confident in his own skills and strength but not arrogantly so, a Reiver had to learn to be a keen judge of danger and as he measured his skills with a knife against this one he did not like the conclusion he drew. In ordinary circumstances he would have avoided this one entirely and dealt with it by calling in an airstrike, or an orbital bombardment, but sadly that wasn't an option.

The packs of Genestealers were passing by, the Inquisitor's strange protection shielding them from detection once more. Gotram was relieved but decided not to risk further detection. They had learned what they needed to, it was time to get out of here. He attracted Vevara's attention with a waved hand, not chancing being heard even from this height, and signed them away from the edge. They withdrew silently, inching back with infinite care along the buttress. The Genestealers below moved on without any sign that they had seen the Imperials, leaving the transept behind as they swarmed into the gloomy depths. Gotram didn't say a word as they fell back, keeping utterly silent as the three of them ducked into a small maintenance access corridor. It was narrow and cramped and Gotram had to walk in a hunchback fashion, lest he bash his head on the ceiling. Vevara led the way and Mortula followed and the three of them quickly proceeded along the passageway until they reached the junction of several passages.

Gotram straightened up with a sigh of relief as he entered the space, cricking his neck to relieve the tension. Within the cramped space waited for the rest of the party: the retinue, the Reivers and Jediah. The Lieutenant didn't look happy, not that he ever did, but having to wait behind while Gotram got to scout ahead was clearly irking him. It couldn't be helped though, his Mark VII armour was loud and noisy, unsuitable for stealth work at the best of times and in its torn condition it was growling angrily. Gotram noted Jediah had kept the fan-blades he had wrested from the enemy, but wasn't about to pass comment. At the back of the room Brother Gadwen leant against a wall and clutched his guts, he looked pale and was shivering, not from his injuries but from withdrawal. The Belisarian Furnace was potent but it came with a heavy price, the cocktail of hyper-adrenaline and aggression boosters it disgorged into the blood stream took a toll in pain and vitality, leaving the recipient weak and ragged. Thankfully the new Primaris paradigm had another extra organ Firstborn Astartes lacked, the Magnifcat, to balance the effects and stabilise the warrior but sometimes it could be hair slow to kick in.

There were two others present, the mortal heir they had rescued and a young woman with blonde locks. Both of them looked sick and teary-eyed, barely able to comprehend what had happened to them. They had awakened sometime after being carried away and had babbled ceaselessly in dismay until Jediah had threatened to cut out their tongues if they betrayed the party's location. In Gotram's opinion the pathetic boy wasn't worth rescuing, but the mission objective was absolute. Goddun was to be brought back alive, that was the objective, though if the Planetary Governor thought he would be of any use in the future then she was kidding herself.

Jediah looked impatient as he snapped, "Report."
Gotram sighed, "There's no way past. As we suspected, the Genestealers are out in force. There are hundreds of Purestrains swarming the depths looking for us. They cover every exit to the surface."

Eirk hefted his Hellgun and declared, "Then we punch a path through them with raw firepower."
The Eldar interjected, "Foolish bravado. We cannot fight such numbers directly. You must outthink your foes, not charge in heedlessly like idiot Mon-Keigh always do."

The Space Marines bristled at the Xenos daring to address them and Jediah snapped, "Open your mouth again, alien scum, and I will rip your head from its shoulders."

Inquisitor Vevara butted in to say, "He's not wrong though, we are surrounded and outnumbered. We can't hide for long; they will catch our trail soon."
Gotram looked at her and queried, "I thought you were screening us with your Inquisitorial secrets."
"Only Psychically," Vevara admitted, "All it will take is for one Purestrain to sniff our scent trail and its all over."

Mortula added, "Then there's the other thing."
Jediah eyed her as he hissed, "What other thing?"

Gotram informed him, "We saw something with them, a monstrous beast. Bigger and more dangerous than anything we've seen so far. Forget the foes were dispatched already, they're nothing but chaff, that creature is a threat unlike anything I've seen before."

Jediah's eyes narrowed as he hissed, "You don't think it could be…"
Vevara finished for him, "It's their Patriarch."

Gotram shuddered, for Patriarchs were creatures of nightmare. Tales abounded of the beating hearts of Genestealer cults, the oldest and most grotesque Purestrain of the infestation, probably the first to arrive on this planet and founder of their bloodline. The Patriarch would be the nerve centre of their organisation and the keystone of their Broodmind. As if that wasn't bad enough they were infamously powerful and deadly foes, many Space Marines had fallen to their vicious claws and prodigious strength and tactical doctrine usually demanded the presence of a full Company to take one down in combat.

Jediah's eyes however gleamed as he speculated, "If we could kill it we would cripple this infestation."
Gotram shook his head as he countered, "Ten Space Marines against that? Not in this lifetime."
Vevara added, "Besides the mission is to retrieve the boy, not engage in forlorn escapades. We need to exfiltrate and come back with serious reinforcements."

Suddenly there was a soft whimper and everybody turned to look at the pair they had rescued. Goddun looked bereft as he said, "Please don't leave us alone down here."
The girl, Petalia she called herself, sniffed, "It's… its been a nightmare. The things they said to us, the threats they made."

Gotram snorted, "If talking to you was the worst they did then count yourself lucky. You'd be dead if we hadn't rescued you."
The pair clutched at each other as Goddun whimpered, "It was supposed to be the start of our adventure. We were to fly to the stars together. Odrin promised to take us to a better life."
"And you believed him?!" Eirk snorted, "Throne, stupidity like deserves a lasbolt to the head."

Yet Vevara stepped up and hissed, "Odrin? The First Secretary?"
Goddun nodded as he explained, "Yes, he smuggled us out, he promised us we would be safe."

Gotram's ire rose as he remembered that slimy weasel lurking at the Governor's side. So smug and superior, it wasn't surprising he was mixed up in this. Gotram had thought him a typical double-faced politician but it seemed he was much worse, he was involved with the cult, there could be no doubt of his guilt. The Sergeant hissed, "Odrin, I should have known not to trust him."
Vevara's eyes hardened as she said, "When we get back the first thing I will do it nail him to an excruciation rack and burn some answers out of him."

"Good plan," Erik affirmed, "But we still have to get out of here."
Gotram sighed, "An army lies between us and the surface and we are hysterically outnumbered."

Goddum looked up and pleaded, "But you're Space Marines, the God-Emperor's Finest, you can fight your way out."
Gotram shook his head as he replied, "We're Reivers, infiltrators and sabotage units. Part of that is knowing what you can and can't do, knowing what risks are worthwhile and what is suicide. I'd fight off a hundred Hybrids with ease but the same number of Purestrains… no, that's not happening."

Vevara tapped her lips thoughtfully as she mused, "What we need is a distraction."
It was then that Jediah growled, "No… what we need is a decoy."

Gotram was forced to step back as Jediah sprung into life, striding past him with a purposeful step. He took one, two, three steps and then grabbed Petalia by the shoulder and heaved her up against a wall. Everybody started in surprise and Gotram opened his mouth to question the Lieutenant's intent but before he could speak Jediah's sword flashed, tearing across the girl's abdomen in a deep and vicious cut. The girl screamed in pain as her belly was sliced open and blood poured down her legs. She struggled pitifully in his grip but it was too late, the wound was a fatal one. Then Jediah dropped her at his feet and turned away as the girl's eyes went wide and she clamped her hands over the blood pouring out of her guts as her pained cries rang loudly. She desperately clung to the gaping wound as slick fluid coated her fingers and sought to keep her entrails from spilling out on the dank floor.

"What are you doing?!" Gotram gaped in disbelief.
"Providing a decoy," Jediah replied not looking back at his wailing victim.

Gotram was stunned by the callous disregard for an innocent life. He had slain hundreds, if not thousands, of heretics and traitors but never an innocent; at least not up close and personal. All he had ever heard from the Firstborn Astartes were words of honour and duty but Jediah had just violated every tenant he'd heard the Storm Heralds spout. Gotram had known the Lieutenant was different, but not how much different, he had still tried to idolise Jediah and to justify his callous nature. For the first time Gotram grasped that Jediah cared nothing for justification, he had no shred of honour in his soul and cared nothing for the principles that underpinned an Astartes' life. Jediah was no warrior, no Champion or Defender of mankind: he was a murderer.

The stunned silence was split as Goddun gasped, "Petalia! No, what are you doing?!"
Jediah faced him squarely and said, "Her blood will draw the Purestrains and while they are busy eating her, we shall escape."Goddun looked like he was about to be sick as he cried, "What?! But… no, we can't leave her. I won't…"

His protest was cut off as Jediah thumped him about the head with an open palm, knocking him senseless. He grabbed the toppling youth and slung him over his pauldron as he began striding towards another exit and ordered, "We're moving out."

Vevara fell in at his side as she said, "The scent of blood will spread fast. We better move fast else the Purestrain will swarm us."

Gotram stared at her as he gasped, "You approve of this?"
Vevara sniffed, "The boy is a mission-critical asset, the girl is not."

Gotram had no response to that and Jediah was already leaving, so he fell in at his Lieutenant's side. Petalia looked up in horror as the Space Marines turned their backs on her and she reached up with a blood-slicked hand, pleading for aid, "Help.. please help. Don't leave me." Gotram couldn't even look at her, at her feeble entreaties not to be left alone in the dark. She was trying to stand up but her legs couldn't work. She was losing blood fast, sitting in a pool of her own vitae and she would bleed out in minutes. Gotram could only try to convince himself she would die of shock before the Genestealers found her; it would be a more painless end if she did. So he left her, a piece of his soul withering as he forsook mercy and honour and willingly followed Jediah into the darkness.