Legends of the Smoke Jaguars Chapter 152
After nearly a day of constant bombardment the Terrans stopped firing. A hundred-kilometre radius around the infected repair base had they scoured clean, leaving a blasted wasteland of charred ashes. Many regiments had been within that area, either moving to reinforce the base or fleeing for their lives, none had made it. No chance of Chaos persisting could be tolerated, and so the Terran fleet burned out the rot as if it were a cancer. The Emperor had long ago laid down the proscriptions for eradicating warp-taint, even when the truth of Chaos was hidden from all, and His decrees were enacted without question.
Damchak looked down from on high and beheld the will of the Sun-Emperor made manifest. A great stain of dust and ash was spreading across the continent, blanketing cities and towns in choking darkness. Fertile crops were being suffocated in black flakes and rivers were choked by growing clumps. The ecological damage to Nova Terra was immense, the damage to its productivity equally terrible, but by the laws of Imperium that was a small cost compared to the risk of a warp rift forming.
"We have become grim destroyers," Nizca sighed, "No better than the Fire Lords."
"Necessity compels our hand," Damchak intoned, "Against such horror the fiercest blow alone will suffice. To hesitate is to die."
"Are we soldiers now?" Nizca argued, "To stand on the wall and beat our chests in defiance is not the way of the Testimony. Circumspection and guile have ever been our path, to end a foe with a single shot, thus Arkqas the Wise envisioned our perfect war."
Damchak's eyes narrowed in anger, "It was not we who wrought this black day; it was the Devil-sons. Vorshaan, Empex and all their thrice accursed Kin. They summoned the enemy beyond, they called nightmare aspects of ruin into the waking world. Upon their heads lies the judgement, and what must be, must be. To end an incursion there be but two ways the Imperium owns. To find and kill the summoner, or lay waste to cities, continents and whole worlds. Better it be that million perish by own hand than trillions in the maws of Daemons."
Nizca looked sad and Damchak could not fault his old friend. Long had the Smoke Jaguars dwelt in isolation, facing no greater challenge than Orruk hordes. To be reunited with the Imperium had been joy and sorrow in equal quality. To clasp hands with comrades worthy of esteem was a boon beyond measure but the scope of the threats the blood of their blood faced was horrifying to the pit of the soul. For this reason the Novan empire must be crushed, all worlds of men must be united under one banner, so the Sun-Emperor had decreed.
Damchak's eyes rose to the heavens and he beheld the lines of troopships and mass-conveyors still delivering Guardsmen and equipment in endless numbers. Despite the setbacks, despite the murder of leaders and tainting of soil, the High Lords remained determined that Nova Terra would rejoin the Imperium. The Novan Crusade had come too far and sacrificed too much to destroy their prize at the final hour, but what role would the Smoke Jaguars play, that remained to be seen.
Among the drifting warships Smoke Jaguar vessels cruised. Older patterns that had served for the millennia of their isolation along with two standard-pattern Strike cruisers. Gifts of provender given to seal their troth with the Imperium, along with Terminators, Jump Packs and Land Raiders. To these castles in the sky the Smoke Jaguars had returned, their facilities on the surface too rude and sparse to tend to their many wounds. In the Houses of Healing Genewrights toiled over the broken bodies of their Kinsmen, while Techwrights bent their efforts to cleansing wargear of any lingering trace of corruption.
"How grievous are our wounds?" Nizca asked in hushed tones.
"My hearts break to count our losses," Damchak lamented.
"Surely the Red Sleep will keep many among the land of the living?"
"Some, most even, but our wounded are teeming and the Genewrights few. Not overmorrow they say to restore our Prowls, but overweeks."
"Salt tears wet the ground, no more flowers shall grow in the field," Nizca lamented.
Damchak shared his pain. Space Marines were hard to put down but next to impossible to kill. Nearly any wound that did not kill instantly could be recovered from, the ancient mysteries of Gene-seed miraculous in effect. A thousand Astartes could not last a year of battle without such boons and countless times a Space Marine deemed dead in the mud would be up and fighting again in days. To have their Prowls put out of action for weeks was a crushing defeat indeed.
Nizca frowned at the distant curve of the terminus, "The war continues, but we have no hero to sound the rallying cry."
"Small efforts can we offer," Damchak muttered, "The Smoke Jaguars will be looked for on the field but none shall find us."
"I speak of the Shade-lord's mantle," Nizca argued.
"Such discourse must abide, till the Firsts can gather and choose among the challengers."
"The fight is today, our need is great!" Nizca spat, "You are a Shadow-Chieftain, voted Prowlmaster, you must assume the mantle, in deed if not in name."
"Such is not our way," Damchak refuted.
"It was Q'umarkaj's will!"
"The Shade-lord's supremacy fled with his final breath. The Firsts of Copan will not heed any whom they have had no say in elevating. For better or for worse, we are shattered till fresh unity can be forged."
It was the way of the Smoke Jaguars that authority could not be bestowed or passed down as the inheritance of birthright. To lead demanded the esteem of one's Kinsmen, to be claimed through mighty deeds and treasured Deed-title. Respect must be earned and the Shade-lord could only command once voted to the post. Perhaps the Lord Headsman or Shade-Seer could step in to take the lead in times of crisis, but they were far removed. For all its hallowed truths the Testimony proved to have a distressing weakness, unlike the Codex Astartes, with many Firsts incapacitated Damchak could not step into the gulf and claim leadership through seniority or rank.
Disgusted Damchak turned and marched into the ship's guts, leaving the vista behind. Stark walls passed by, bare metal corridors gleaming. Fresh this was from the forges of Mars, Damolos' Wroth was she named, but the Chapter had not yet had time to personalise her. Serviles parted before him, bearing brands of the Techwrights and Shipmasters upon their brows. Damchak ignored them all, till he reached the House of Healing. A stark, white chamber packed with medslabs and the Serviles of the Genewrights, tending to the mangled forms of Smoke Jaguars.
Damchak strode through the chamber, hearing groans of pain and hushed whispers of sawbones at work. To the rear of the room, where a doorway was hidden by Plastek sheets. A figure was within, clad in armour plated over with human bones, flashes of white underneath. A Genewright, being blasted with scalding steam to sterilise contaminants. Damchak's hearts grew heavy at the sight, but the look in the emerging Genewright's eye told a dire tale. He stepped out and past without a word, but the lingering glance he cast at the First was more eloquent than a thousand words.
Damchak and Nizca entered the chamber one by one, hot steam blasting their armour and faces. The hot burn of skin moulting would have laid out a mortal man, but the Space Marines were barely discomforted. Through another curtain they pushed to find Tikal laid out on a medslab. His armour had been taken from him and his flesh was deathly pale but black veins pushed out from his flank. The open wound still remained, swaddled in bandages but yet oozing. His Larraman cells were failing and his flesh would not close. Blisters formed around the edge of the wound, suspiciously grouped into threes. Death was the least of the woes Tikal grappled with, far more damning fates fought to claim his soul.
"First," Tikal wheezed.
"Kinsman," Damchak said flatly, "Does the pain abate?"
"Pain is to be cherished," Tikal murmured through marble-white lips, "Pain tells me I am alive, that the rot has not taken me. Numbness I fear, the passing of sorrow. The diseased hand of decay offers respite, but I refuse the whispers with all my soul."
Nizca interrupted, "The day is yet young, the Genewrights may find an elixir to purge your blood."
Tikal's black within black eyes turned to the pair, "My blood touched the soils of rot, life essence mixing with the blight. I know my flesh is tainted, I feel it. Spores settled in my open wound, and no man, not even a Space Marine may revoke the fates themselves. The rot in is me, I feel it, there is no denying what is to come."
"Truth is harsher than lies," Damchak intoned, "Is there some comfort we may offer?"
"I am for the lands of the dead, but I am not yet departed," Tikal spat, "Give me my armour and my Obsidian Blade. I shall walk into the halls of our enemies and die as a Smoke Jaguar ought."
"You walk the path of a fool, to throw your life away," Damchak refuted.
"I follow the footsteps of Sedaxus at the Dawning. The path of the Moritat calls, and I answer. Let me go forth alone and find our enemies at rest. If I am swift and silent I may take Vorshaan's head, if the Sun-Emperor smiles upon me I may claim Empex too."
Damchak looked upon the youth and the ghost of memory stirred. That laughing Doan on the Proving Grounds was long gone, taken from them by cruel fate and uncaring destiny. The Sable Brand had been harrowing, but the faint prospect of recovery lingered, but now Tikal's death was certain. Better to die with a knife in hand, facing enemies vile and terrible, than to linger as the rot burned through him. Tikal's soul would wither, something despicable would take its place and the festering malignancy of Chaos would alter his flesh. If Jorrim of the Fire Lords learned that the rot had found purchase among their numbers he would turn his armies against the Smoke Jaguars, his ardour unflagging and his judgement stern. Better Tikal die the Marine he was and yet Damchak could not bless this solitary doom.
"This I cannot permit," Damchak stated.
Tikal shook his head, "First, by your will or not, the sun sets upon me."
But Damchak explained, "I cannot permit you to walk this path alone. I shall accompany you and we shall face the Devil-sons together."
Nizca's jaw fell, "You cannot!"
"No man tells me where I may walk. The other Prowls will not follow me, but I do not require their blades. Two may pass unseen where a hundred may not, verily unto the hearths of our enemy's most secure fastness."
"Twice have you fought Vorshaan, twice as he bested you," Nizca argued.
Damchak's will was set and he stated, "I sought to grapple with the traitors before, blade to blade, as warriors squabbling over acclaim. No more, glory is meaningless now, the gaes is upon me and my life I count cheap so long as the devil-sons die. No matter the cost, no matter what terrible deeds I must discharge, the murderers of our Kinsmen shall be brought low. I set aside the way of the Testimony and the title of First of Umbral Flame, to set foot on a darker path. Tikal and I shall depart the next time the Devil-sons rear their heads, spirits disposed never to return. This I troth: my life given to end theirs, a death to pay for a death."