Tales of the Amber Vipers Chapter 213
Hornan saw the gaping barrel of the bolt pistol coming to bear upon him, it's black maw promising instant death. He knew the potency of the weapon and that a direct hit would end him once and for all. His own pistol seemed to be moving at a glacial pace, so slow in his eyes. It moved with the speed of ice crawling down a mountain, as his rival's whipped around. His finger tightened but it felt like nothing was happening and the instant stretched out to eternity. Then suddenly the frozen moment snapped and both men fired.
At that exact instant something crashed into the ladder he was standing on, some random combatant careening into the frame. The impact caused Hornan to lose his grip and he fell a step, jolting downwards just as the duel started. The motion saved his life, just as he fell the bolt round soared overhead, passing so close it ruffled the hair on his head. In return his own aim was spoiled, the bullet flung wide. A shot that should have taken the Commissar in the heart merely grazed his arm, leaving a deep furrow in his bicep but not a fatal wound.
Hornan cursed fickle misfortune as he clung to the ladder, trying to recover his balance. He knew he was vulnerable and expected the Commissar to pounce and finish him off, but to his astonishment nothing happened. He looked up and saw black boots retreating, falling back hastily along the mesh. Hornan was confused but not about to pass up this chance, Landry was fleeing but he wouldn't get far.
Juto gritted his teeth and forced himself up the ladder, heaving his body onto the gantry. The Commissar had fed down the length of the lance array and that troubled Hornan. Landry wasn't the type to turn his back and run at the first hint of danger. He was up to something, Hornan knew it in his bones. The Commissar must have some nefarious scheme to outfox him and it was up to Juto to stop it.
Hastily Hornan ran down the length of the gantry, pistol braced in a two-handed grip. Below the fight continued, zealots against mutineers, loyalist against traitor, men and women dying and killing with shouts of anger and screams of agony. It was a microcosm of the battle raging beyond the ship's hull, both sides certain in their just cause and set upon the annihilation of the foe. Hornan ignored it all as he ran, eyes searching for his elusive quarry.
He turned a corner and found Landry. The commissar was standing at a console, fiddling with the rune marked levers and icons. Blood stained his bicep but not enough to debilitate and he seemed utterly focused on whatever he was doing. Hornan didn't know what he was scheming but it boded ill and he elected to put a stop to it with his gun.
The barrel of the pistol came up but Landry must have eyes in the back of his head for he threw himself aside just as the pistol fired. The bullet sailed through the empty air and smote the console, smashing apart the panel and killing the machine spirit within. Hornan cursed his bad luck and tracked the Commissar but Landry returned fire with a bark of his bolt pistol. Now it was Hornan's turn to evade, throwing himself behind an upright pipe for shelter. The bolt round slammed into it and burrowed deep, making the metal shiver against his back as it detonated. Instantly Hornan leaned out and let off a burst of bullets blindly, only to come up short as the pistol clunked empty.
Hastily he ejected the magazine and slotted in a new one, only one more spare left, he hadn't expected a drawn-out firefight. He wished he could draw his chainsword and charge the Commissar but knew he wouldn't get three steps before being cut down, cunning and guile would have to suffice in this fight. He leaned out a hair, scouring the area for Landry's location, sadly all he spied were thick conduits and intruding devices hiding Landry's location.
"You cannot defeat me traitor!" came the voice of the Commissar.
Hornan instantly tried to pinpoint the source but the mess of hard angles echoed the noise and made it seem to be coming from everywhere. Frustrated he barked, "Step out and say that to my face!"
"So you can shoot me?" Landry sneered, "Your mind is as feeble as your spirit to think I would fall for that."
"You don't get to judge me," Hornan hissed as he scoured the area, "You serve a rotten and corrupt Imperium, ruled over by a corrupt regime of hypocrites. The high lords don't care about you, the Emperor doesn't even know your name. They will not notice when you die, there is no reward awaiting you in the afterlife."
Landry sneered, "Still thinking of rewards and accolades, you never change. You never served for duty or honour, you thought only of what the Navy could do for you. How it could Clear your family name with victories and promotions. You never understood the nature of duty!"
"Is that what you learned on your precious mountain?" Hornan scoffed, "To lay down and die for a flag."
"I learned that death doesn't matter if a man serves something greater than himself. A man is judged not by what he gets but what he gives: blood, pain, tears and life itself."
Hornan had an idea and picked up his empty magazine as he said, "Nice sentiment, but it won't help you take the Carmilla back from me."
"You understand nothing Traitor," Landry spat, "We should have culled your entire bloodline when we had the chance!"
At that Hornan chucked the magazine into the open and heard it clatter loudly. Instantly he spied a dark shape shifting among the metal maze, the Commissar instinctively shifting to examine the threat. Hornan grinned wickedly as he stepped out and took aim, then he fired three bullets. The loud retorts heralded shots hitting home, sinking into vulnerable flesh, but as they did so the boom of a bolt pistol firing rang forth. Hornan flinched as a single round clipped the pipe he was leaning against, the angle had been poor and the round missed, but bolt weaponry had a deadly second effect. The round detonated a moment later and sheared metal shrapnel from the surface, spraying Hornan's left side with jagged splinters.
Hornan cried out in pain as filaments violated his face and arm, but worse was a jagged shard that sank deep into his leg, cutting muscles terribly. His leg gave out under him and he toppled to the deck, hissing in torment as the jolt dug the filaments deeper. He was in excruciating pain but through it he saw Landry. The Commissar had fallen prone, laid out on the deck and facing his way. Blood gushed from his side and Hornan saw the bullets had sunk into the chest, penetrating vital organs and spelling his ending. He was already going pale and his life was measured in moments.
Despite his torment Hornan laughed, "I got you, you smug cur. I beat you!"
"You die..." Landry wheezed.
"Never, I shall live, you hear me, I yet live! The Carmilla is mine, you have failed to take her from me!"
Landry coughed up blood as he gurgled, "Never wanted to take... die in His name... Fool, you forgot to check the lances…."
Hornan guts turned to ice as he grasped the man's meaning. A sudden memory surfaced of the Commissar warning him a critical overload had been narrowly averted and he saw then that Landry was content to die, so long as he took Hornan with him. The Commissar had never planned to retake the Carmilla, his plan was to blow her apart. Desperately his eyes shot to the console Landry had been messing with but no help was found there, the panel was dead and useless. There was no telling if the Commissar had succeeded, or how long was left if he had.
"What have you done?!" Hornan gasped, "Answer me!" There was no response for Landry was dead, his heart still and cooling. Frantically Hornan tried to stand but his leg wouldn't support him. He tried to crawl to the console but vicious spikes of pain stilled any notion of moving. He wasn't going anywhere. In terror he scanned the looming bulk of the lance, trying to guess if the mighty weapon was even now building towards catastrophic overload. Sadly there was no hint to be found, the blank metal could be inert or brimming with power enough to obliterate the ship, he had no way to tell.
"Help!" he shouted, "Help me! Someone warn the bridge!" His cries went unheard, the sounds of fighting drowning him out. Even if someone should hear him it would take an age to find him in this warren. He was on his own. Stark dread stole over him as he contemplated the reality of death and grasped that his life could well be over. His life had been too short, and his choices all wrong, he was a Traitor and a mutineer and a failure. Like his family before him he had failed to break free of the Imperium. He hoped there was no judgement awaiting him in the afterlife, for surely it would go ill for his soul if there were.
"You've killed me," he hissed at the corpse, "Damn you I was nearly free and you killed me. I Could have been great, I could have been free if it weren't for you. You wretched..." He never got to finish for at that moment the lance's capacitors surged beyond their safety limits and exploded. A titanic blast erupted in the tangled maze, ripping metal apart and turning the space into a howling blizzard of flying shrapnel. Moments later combustible elements ignited, filling the chamber with a firestorm to match the inferno of hell. Any man not killed in the blast roasted alive, reduced to ashen corpses.
The fireball tore out the lance array, spilling flames throughout the bow of the ship. Emergency bulkheads tried to close but were blown from their frames by the force of the detonation, ripping through them with ease. Men barely had time to scream as they were incinerated, the blistering heat chewing the flesh off their bones in a heartbeat and leaving shadows etched into molten metal walls. Mess halls, billets, holds and hoist shafts were consumed by fire, thousands dying in an instant. Then the flames penetrated the main plasma conduits and the front half of Carmilla disappeared in a new born sun, leaving the shorn stern to spin away into the night as a testament to her heresy.
Hornan however saw none of that. He died in the first blast, his body reduced to atoms and scattered across the void. He left no trace that he had ever existed, his dreams of freedom reduced to nothingness as was his body and soul. So Juto Hornan died alone, one more forgotten casualty in the endless slaughter that was the Imperium of Man.