Tales of the Amber Vipers Chapter 232
Kerubim had visited many worlds in his young life, but none were so bizarre as Hadreb. His time with the Amber Vipers had taken him to worlds of natural beauty and fertile bounty, or industrial hellscapes and dying ecology, yet nothing in his experience compared to the stark alien nature of this planet. This was a world that had not known the tread of humans for twenty-thousand years and it was easy to see why.
He stood upon a great mound, staring across a vista as beautiful as it was alien. Set atop a bluff overlooking a sea it gave him commanding views of the ocean. Not water, but mercury, a sea of crashing quicksilver waves that pounded upon land covered by dull crystals. The sky was sapphire, not the comforting blue of an agri-world but akin to a spill of paint over a canvass. The local star was a faint mote, barely enough to differentiate the day from the night, leaving the planet locked in temperatures that never rose above minus twenty degrees.
Kerubim gazed upon the mercury sea as cold winds blew over him, it was always windy here, without any hint of vegetation to offer shelter. His breath was loud in his ears, being forced to seal his armour with vacuum protocols, and yet he heard the wind constantly. In that gale tiny flecks of light danced, reflecting off fused particles of grit. It rained glass on Hadreb and he was constantly brushing the joints of his armour to clear accumulations from the fibre-bundles.
Kerubim knew the Imperium of Man encompassed a million worlds, but he had never considered that this was but a tiny fraction of the galaxy. Humans required a very select range of conditions to live, less than a tenth of a percent of all planets could be deemed habitable. The vast majority of known planets were alien, and Hadreb was not a world fit for human life. One breath of the methane-oxygen atmosphere would kill a mortal man. Humans had no business being here and Kerubim was eager to keep this trip short.
He turned from the view and began making his way uphill. On the way he passed teams of Skitarii, all sealed in metallic armour and breathing recycled air via implants. The tech-soldiers of Mars were well suited to this environment, hardened against the elements thanks to their many Augmetics. They were digging in to defend this position, ringing the summit with Heavy Bolters and multi-lasers, weapons that could work in any conditions. Dannye was among them, tirelessly marching to and fro to correct fire angles and set up crossfires.
Kerubim kept climbing, heading for the summit. It wasn't far, this hill would once have been considered a mountain, but twenty-thousand years of surface erosion had buried the lower slopes, leaving only the summit sticking out. Kerubim crested the top and found the leaders of this expedition, gathered around a digging team. Ruuka was in command of the mission, as executor his duty was to lead from the front, while Magos Pycelo stayed safe in orbit. With them were Brontes, Jordig and Wulfe. The squat was dressed in a sealed vac-suit, his beard tucked under a bucket helm with round portholes on either side. The squat had been glaring at Brontes throughout, kneading his gravity hammer constantly, but the Silica Animus had steadfastly ignored the insult. It was the best they could hope for, in Kerubim's opinion.
"Finished pissing off the cliff?" Brontes grunted via vox wave as Kerubim joined them.
"I was surveying the local topography," Kerubim asserted via vox, "I judge a surprise attack to be unlikely, any approach will be spotted leagues off."
"Good," Ruuka accepted, "Orbital scans will be limited by the environment, we can't count on Tezla spotting a hostile force before they reach us."
"Ack," Wulfe sneered from under his helm, "We're a thousand leagues from the nearest settlement, we'll be in an out before the buggers know we're here."
"I wouldn't count on it," Jordig countered, "Underestimating the foe is a fool's first mistake. Combat protocols dictate we operate under the expectation of an attack at any moment."
But Brontes snorted, "You're all worked up over nothing, the Jathyr are primitive creatures. They were barely capable of making spears and slings when the Hegemony came to this world."
"That was twenty-thousand years ago," Kerubim replied, "A lot can change in that time. The cities we detected from orbit looked industrious, they could have advanced greatly in that time."
Brontes dismissed, "I'm telling you, the Jathyr are not a problem. Cowardly little glass-spindles, that's all they are."
But Wulfe growled, "That was before ye lot enslaved their world, forced them into labour camps and made them toil under ye lash. If they remember half the stuff you did, they'll attack on sight. They know what happens when one lets lanky streaks of piss like you think you own the universe."
"When I want your opinion..." Brontes sneered, "No strike that, I'll never want your opinion."
"Arrogant garbage-crusher," Wulfe retorted.
"Rock for brain," Brontes snapped back.
"You're so ugly you'd scare the crap out of a toilet!"
"You piece of sputum floating in the gene-pool!"
"Enough!" Kerubim interrupted, "Just leave it for five minutes! We can't waste time bickering while danger is all around!"
Ruuka agreed, "He's right, we're about to step into the unknown. There could be anything down there, even legions of Men of Iron waiting to pounce. We need to work together, and fast. Put your barbs aside and focus on staying alive."
Bitter silence fell between the pair but then the digging crews sent up a cry. Kerubim turned to look and saw heavy servitors backing up from a pit they'd dug, revealing a flat surface. Under centuries of accumulated glass was a dull layer of firm matter, some blend of crystal and Ferrocrete he judged. It blocked their entrance but Brontes had warned about this. From the rear came a trio of servitors on tracks, their arms heavy with embedded multi-meltas. Driven by an escorting Tech-Priest they aimed their guns into the pit and let fly. Searing fusion fire made the air broil, molten glass shards dripping from the streams as they cut into the surface. Under the touch of melta-fire the barrier dissolved, revealing a dark pit.
The beams cut off as Ruuka ordered, "Get some climbing gear set up, and signal the data-savants to start unpacking the Cogitators and plasma generators. We'll scout the way for them, as soon as we have a harness-rig ready."
"Pathetic," was all Brontes said as he stepped past and dropped into the hole.
Kerubim started but a few seconds later Brontes called up, "All clear, no more than ten metres drop."
"Get the rigs ready anyway," Ruuka sighed as he drew his power sword and bulky pistol then stepped in.
Kerubim waited a moment then followed. In this low gravity it was a gentle descent, easily absorbed by his power armoured legs. He hit a hard floor and came up with Adrathic rifle in hand, sweeping for threats. None presented themselves but he kept his guard up, alert for danger. A moment later Wulfe touched down, then Jordig, who lighted his plasma-saber the instant his boots connected.
The party swept about, finding themselves in a wide chamber. The walls had a curiously melted appearance, without a single decent right-angle to be seen, but the wind finally died and Kerubim's ears throbbed with the absence. In the wan light many doors could be seen, along with numerous small openings in the walls, that served no function Kerubim could discern.
"My armour detects methane-oxygen," Jordig noted, "This place was breached to the outside at some point. Doubtful any human personal survived."
"After twenty-thousand years I'd be astonished if they did," Ruuka retorted, "Still keep your guard up."
"What are those?" Kerubim asked gesturing to the holes.
"Resonance channels," Brontes stated.
"For what?"
"I have no idea; the metaphysics of Quantum entanglement was not a subject I ever asked about."
"So much for the brilliance of Abominable Intelligence," Wulfe scoffed.
"I am a battle-unit," Brontes snarled, "My speciality was making things go boom, care for a demonstration?"
"Stop it," Ruuka snapped, "Which way to the core?"
"Calculating," Brontes muttered, "There, that door will lead to the Data-looms."
Following Brontes' directions the party set off, leaving the workers above the task of lowering cogitator cores and robed adepts on thick hawsers. Kerubim kept his eyes front as he swept the passageway beyond, on a hair-trigger for threats. The walls swelled and closed in a disturbing fashion, twisting about and doubling back on themselves. Kerubim set a trail of vox-relays in their wake, markers for the following workers and a way to stay in touch with the surface. There were many dead-ends and pitfalls, funnels that rose out of sight and branching turns. Kerubim found it to be curiously organic, like they were bacterium moving through the arteries of a body, unfamiliar infections sneaking past an immune system. The emptiness of the place made Kerubim's hackles rise and the sense of a great weight over his head grew, he didn't like this place, something about it felt off.
"You said the Jathyr built this place?" he asked warily.
"The natives built the structure," Brontes answered, "We installed the mechanisms. All this serves to amplify the beacon somehow. I never grasped the principle of its operation, sometimes I thought my makers didn't either. The Farum, and others like it, were reverse-engineered from older ruins, there was an awful lot of copy and paste in the process."
"Course there was," Wulfe muttered snidely.
Soon their course brought them deep into the hill and here at last they found evidence of habitation. The corridor took a right turn and they found piles of bodies laid out, or rather armour. In heaped piles silver plate was strewn, shorter than Astartes but definitely power armour in make. They were tangled with the shattered remains of multi-limbed automatons, blank-eyed killing machines who lay alongside their foes in death.
"Looks like this place wasn't abandoned after all," Ruuka declared.
"I recognise the Men of Iron," Jordig stated, "But who were they fighting?"
"Solar Knights," Kerubim answered, "I've seen this before. These were the ancient's geno-troops, the only defence left when the Machines rebelled. They were the ancient's version of Space Marines."
"Solar Knights weren't..." Brontes began, "Oh forget it, you'd never grasp the difference."
The party left the dead where they lay and pressed on, entering a vast cavern at the centre of the hill. The roof rose out of sight, lost in darkness but from on high dangled mirrors, hundreds of them all sitting at different heights. No two were alike in size or shape but all shared a liquid mercury sheen. Kerubim could only assume they served some vital purpose, but these weren't why they were here. In the centre of the cavern squatted twelve black cubes, each of them as tall and wide as Brontes. They were set up in a ring and their facings bore the welcome stamp of human make.
"Data-looms!" Kerubim cried.
"Are they intact?" Ruuka urged.
Jordig hastened to them and hurriedly carried out an inspection then declared, "No external damage, no erosion. We need the generators to be sure, but I think we can awaken the Machine Spirits within."
Ruuka nodded and opened his vox to order, "Scout team to Adepts, we have secured the site and marked the route. Make haste, I want the star charts extracted as quickly as possible!"
Everybody stepped back but Kerubim gazed upon the data-looms and mused, "I wonder if we can awaken them fully, and put this place back into operation."
"Doubtful," Jordig stated, "This is not Psyker based, like the Astronomican, and nothing here conforms to STC lore either."
"STC," Brontes snorted, "Simple colonial gear, brutish and simple, the Hegemony had wonders that far outstripped those flimsy makeweights."
Kerubim sighed loudly, "Cawl did seem to think the Farum wouldn't be able to pierce the warp anymore regardless. The Empyrean is tormented in a way this place was never meant to cope with. Still, the starcharts within will be of great use. A single location..."
He was cut off as the vox-squawked, "Alert, alert! Threat incoming! Recon party, do you read me?"
"Dannye?!" Ruuka spat, "What is it?"
"Hostiles spotted on approach, many thousands travelling on grav-skimmer. An army is closing on our position."
"The Jathyr," Wulfe spat, "Looks like they aren't so harmless Afterall."
"Ungrateful wretches, after all we did for them," Brontes growled, "I'll incinerate the lot of the glittering freaks."
Ruuka didn't sound convinced as he pressed, "Dannye, can you hold them?"
"Probability of success is low," Dannye stated, "Calculations are difficult without a measure of their weaponry, but if they can match us in arms then projections are less than an hour until we are overrun."
"Red Sands," Ruuka spat, "Hold the line, we're coming to assist you."
"What of the Data-looms?!" Kerubim cried.
"The adepts will have to figure it out," Ruuka cried, "We have to help hold off the attack until they complete the data-interrogation. Come on, we have to get up there!"
Kerubim grabbed his rifle and sprinted for the entrance, followed closely by the others. He didn't know how the Xenos had found them or organised a response so swiftly, but he was sure the aliens intended to wipe out the intruders to their lands. For the mission to succeed, for the knowledge they had come so far to retrieve, they had to fend off this attack. For as long as it took they had to hold this hill, and if that meant wiping out every last one of the stinking Xenos, he would gladly do so.