Tales of the Amber Vipers Chapter 105
Coluber awoke to a dream world. He knew this thanks to meticulous training by long-dead Librarians. In another age he had marched in other colours and that detested band had trained their initiates to recognise and resist psychic intrusion. So Coluber knew his mind was in a world crafted by a puissant psyker, unfortunately he was not one himself so could do nothing about it. Strong mental walls protected his sense of identity and continuity of events, but all he could see and hear was what his foe wanted him to experience, so he had to treat it like it was real.
He started by examining his feet. He appeared to be standing on a rocky shore, with smooth wet stones under his bare toes. His skin prickled with a cold breeze and the scent of cherry blossoms was in his nostrils. His body was as normal but he was wearing only a soft robe in an unfamiliar cut. He heard bird song in his ears and the faint cry of fishermen in the distance, going about their lives. The illusion was remarkably detailed, the work of a master and Coluber's estimation of the craftsman rose a notch.
Finally he opened his eyes and looked out upon a beautiful lake fed by mountain streams that were ice cold. Two suns burned in the sky but they were small to his eye and provided little warmth. Fish darted under the water and blossoming trees sat back from the water's edge. Sitting on the edge of the lake was a small white pagoda, within which a Space Marine sat with his legs crossed. He too was wearing a soft robe and before him was a low table, covered in bowls, utensils and a boiling pot of water. Coluber knew this could only be the maker of the illusion and strode closer, crunching wet stones under his toes.
As he closed he saw a Marine in his later years, body hardened with Transhuman muscle and a Black Carapace lurking under his robes. His hair was swept back and was pure white while his round face was lined with many scars and a short nose. His eyes were purple, perhaps a trait from his homeworld or a quirk of gene-seed, yet they glimmered with warp power.
Coluber was well aware that his captor could burn out his mind in an instant, so decided discretion was advised. He stopped short of the pagoda and made a short bow then asked, "Maru Kysoto I presume?"
Maru was busy tending to his collection of bowls and leaves but he replied in a pinched accent, "At last, someone who remembers his manners."
Coluber straightened up and asked, "May I join you?"
Maru waved a hand and replied, "Be seated."
There were no chairs so Coluber was forced to sit crossed-legged across from the Chief Librarian. He waited patiently as Maru aligned his tools in some ritualised fashion unknown to Coluber, then finally he looked up and asked, "You do not intend to fight me?"
Coluber shrugged, "I could not possibly win. This is your dream, therefore your rules apply."
"You recognise my weaving," Maru purred as he passed his hands over the table in ritual fashion, "This is a recreation of memory. Nippour IX, the primary recruiting world for my Chapter. Sadly gone now, I see in your memories that it was eaten by a Hive Mind. It exists only in my memories, as does the ritual of Tanna."
Coluber was worried how easily the Librarian read his memories but covered by accusing, "You killed my scouts."
Maru placed green leaves onto a stone block and began grinding them with a bevel and he stated flatly, "They were intruding in my home. They stole my Chapter's good name. So I tested their minds in the traditional fashion and found them wanting. They were uncouth, vulgar and disrespectful."
Coluber swallowed a glut of bile as he pressed, "You killed them for being rude?!"
"I killed them for being weak and unworthy," Maru replied without remorse, "I looked into their minds and saw disloyalty, ambition and a desire for personal glory festering. They brewed sedition in their hearts. If the rest of your bandits are the same then you have produced poor excuses for Astartes and I will have to end them too."
Coluber's anger rose and he snapped, "More are coming, you cannot defeat us all!"
Yet Maru countered, "They will not arrive in time to save you. This conversation is taking place between one beat of your hearts and the next. Our discourse will end when your heart beats next, which is likely to prove your last."
Bile rose in Coluber's throat but he bit it back as he countered, "I note you spared the lives of Vardat and Seyda, you left the Brother-Exemplars breathing."
Maru took up a whisk and began mixing the leaves as he explained, "In them I saw untapped potential. Dedication, loyalty, firmness of purpose and a commitment to their role that is almost admirable. Untempered swords that with proper honing may prove worthy."
"And Ferrac?"
Maru's lip twitched slightly as he said, "Your attack-dog believes he is taking Tanna with the Djomo's six-year old daughter. He is most irate, he has snapped her neck one hundred and four times already only to be reset to the beginning… correction: One hundred and five times."
Coluber cut to the real issue and asked, "And myself?"
"That remains to be seen," Maru demurred, "Your life depends on your answers."
"Can't you just reach into my mind and find what you want?"
"Naturally, but knowledge and understanding are two sides of the blade. Your responses will tell me more than any amount of psychic probing. Do not mistake my courtesy for tolerance or forgiveness, if you fail to convince me to spare you then your death is certain. Let us begin by you excusing your many crimes."
Coluber sensed he was in trouble and deflected, "I don't know what…"
"Do not lie to me!" Maru growled as thunder rolled in the clear sky, signs that his anger was stirring, "I have seen your origin. You ran from the renegades who turned against Terra. You thieved and killed to survive. I see blood on your hands, servants of the Most Glorious Emperor and loyal Space Marines died so you could live. I behold the sordid deals you make, the dishonourable pacts and base trades. Selling your Brother's lives for fuel and bolt-rounds. You are shameful and dishonourable, a mercenary sword for hire to the highest bidder. You taught your mockeries of my Amber Vipers to revel in the eight cardinal sins: indolence, deviousness, imprudence, vulgarity, covetousness, opprobriousness, sedition and intemperance. As if these crimes are not serious enough you stole our name and dragged our memory through the mud!"
Coluber retorted, "I have done the Emperor's work. I have put down rebellions, cleared out pirates and heretics. Slain Xenos hordes."
"Pathetic victories, unworthy of mention. Nothing you have done justifies your crimes."
"We had to survive!" Coluber snapped testily, "We swore oaths to seek revenge on the traitors, only to see them die before we could catch up! Then we had a choice, throw our lives away on a worthless mission or rebuild under another banner."
"You feared death," Maru stated flatly as he poured the crushed Tanna leaves into a porcelain bowl.
"My only fear is an unworthy death, a death with no purpose. I sought to serve the Emperor and find a death that furthered His cause."
"Throwing my words back my face will not further your plea," Maru snorted.
"Then tell me what you would have done in my place."
"We chose death!" Maru roared as his calm demeanour snapped, "When the Ghost Crusade was beset and overrun by the Necron menace my Master Tsumetai called for a Steel Typhoon. The full and total commitment of every asset we had. Every relic was unsealed, every tank and plane and bolter was sent forth, even the lowest recruit and most crippled training instructor was dispatched. Every Brother accepted the command and wrote his death poem before setting forth, resolved to not return. Only once in our history has such an order been given, for the Chapter must accept its total destruction as the price of failure. It was the ultimate expression of our Way, the most perfect example of our commitment to the Emperor."
"I read the logs," Coluber sighed.
"You know nothing," Maru hissed, "I alone was left to guide our fleet, a safeguard to enact the ultimate sanction if they fell in battle. And they did, I sensed my Brothers being dragged down one by one. When it was certain the Necrons would win I moved the Serpens Rex into low orbit and unleashed our full arsenal. I unleashed the Exterminatus weapons and watched the Dyson Sphere burn. But to my horror they instantly started rebuilding, undoing the damage like it never was. Under fire I pulled the fleet back and made our last stand. The void was aflame with dying ships and the detonations of ordnance. That we would die was certain but we were determined to make them remember us, remember the pain we inflicted."
"It must have been glorious," Coluber sighed.
Maru's face fell as he continued, "We hurt them, we hurt them so badly their patience snapped. They came at us with a weapon unlike any other, a device fitted to their largest ship. It blew through our shields like they were not there, liquefying the brains of mortals in an instant. Nothing could withstand it; nothing could stop it, save my Psyker powers. It killed every last one of our crew and left our ships adrift in space, only I remained. Alone with my grief."
"I have seen similar guns in action," Coluber mused "But this sounds like a macro-scale variant, a weapon to scour fleets and worlds bare. An exterminatus-grade version."
"That wasn't the worst," Maru lamented, "I sensed my Brothers yet lived. They were dragged out of stasis one by one and experimented upon like vermin. Taken apart one cell at a time, neuron by neuron. I felt their deaths from here and I watched them pass in shame and indignity. The Necrons did not even grant them an honourable death. I watched them all pass, then sealed myself in stasis to linger with my shame. The dishonour of having lived when my Brothers died."
Coluber heard the pain in his voice and saw possibility unfolding. So he bowed his head and said, "I too know this shame, it was the root of my quest. I see we have much in common, shared suffering and a…"
"Stop," Maru commanded with a glare, "Do not think to turn my will or sway me to your cause. Your mind dwells upon the possibility of recruiting me but I will not abandon my honour to consort with bandits like you."
Coluber's faint dream died as he whispered, "Of course, a wounded Dreadnought like you would not desire to live."
Maru added boiling water to the green leaves, filling the air with pungent aromas as he scoffed, "Again you display your ignorance. I was not wounded before being interred. I chose this fate, as do all Amber Viper's Chief Librarians. I spent a year and a day meditating upon my duty, consuming nothing but leaves and water as I forsook all desires. I became the purest expression of duty, before I was sealed into the sarcophagus of the Chief Librarian's Dreadnought."
"You became a Dreadnought willingly?!" Coluber yelped.
Maru nodded as he explained, "The real Amber Vipers taught: Be true to the thought of the moment and expunge all distractions from your soul. Other than continuing to exert yourself, desire nothing but to become a living embodiment of a single thought. I was the avatar of that creed."
Coluber commented, "A noble sentiment, yet inflexible in practice. An Astartes should be ready to fight with whatever comes to hand. Everything should be a weapon to him. He should excel in any role, at any time."
"A limited philosophy and a poor attempt to avert my wrath," Maru Kysoto scoffed, "You have failed to convince me to spare you, or your little band of renegades."
Coluber's anger stirred as he barked, "We are not renegades!"
"Not yet but soon," Maru stated, "Your bandits know not the eight virtues of Honour: Determination, Courage, Sagacity, Courtesy, Penury, Dignity, Fealty and Self-Control. If you had a real Librarian in your ranks he would have rejected every last one of those wretches upon recruitment. They think only of themselves, when the last of your 'Old Seventeen' passes they will turn from the service of Terra. Within three generations your bandits will embrace the Ruinous Powers of Chaos. That is what you have built, that is your legacy."
Coluber hissed, "If I believed that was true, I would slit every last recruit's throat myself."
"You speak truth," Maru remarked with surprise, "Unexpected, but it does not change the facts. You have already scorned eighteen chances to end your story with pride and honour, now I must do it for you."
"But there is yet hope!" Coluber pleaded, "With the Serpens Rex as a base I can teach my recruits what it means to be an Astartes. Show them the worthiness and glory of our order. They can learn what it means to live as a warrior of the Emperor. You can help me; you can instil in them a determination to be better!"
Maru's lip curled as he snapped, "You sully my Brother's memory and you think I will help you?! You are a bandit and a thief, without principle or dignity. You have nothing to offer me."
Coluber was desperate now and cried, "I can offer you revenge!"
Maru's hands froze and his eyes hardened as he growled, "What?!"
Coluber swallowed as he elaborated, "The Necrons took your Brothers apart, they rendered them down to nothing in shameful defeat. They inflicted the greatest dishonour a warrior can know. I can offer you a way to hurt those bastards, to make them bleed for what they did. I offer you vengeance, pure and simple."
"I do not desire revenge; I do not desire anything save my duty."
"I think you do," Coluber argued, "I think that's why you went into stasis, to await a chance to strike back, to exact one last wound on those who destroyed your Chapter. You may be a philosopher and sage, but you are yet Astartes and in your hearts burn the fires of a warrior. No Space Marine would allow his Brother's deaths to go unavenged. I offer you the means to do so. Join my Chapter and we shall take the Emperor's wrath to the Undying, even if it is our last battle."
Maru's hands were still and his thoughts impenetrable. The Chief Librarian was still as a statue and Coluber felt the weight of the decision being turned over in that cool mind. Finally Maru placed his hands flat on the table and stared into Coluber's eyes as he stated, "You have my interest… tell me more."