Chem dog, p.1
Chem Dog, page 1
Contents
Cover
Warhammer 40,000
Chem Dog
Prologue
Chapter I
Chapter II
Chapter III
Chapter IV
Chapter V
Chapter VI
Chapter VII
Chapter VIII
Chapter IX
Chapter X
Chapter XI
Chapter XII
Chapter XIII
Chapter XIV
Chapter XV
Chapter XVI
Chapter XVII
Epilogue
About the Author
An Extract from ‘The Fall of Cadia’
Backlist
A Black Library Publication
eBook license
For more than a hundred centuries the Emperor has sat immobile on the Golden Throne of Earth. He is the Master of Mankind. By the might of his inexhaustible armies a million worlds stand against the dark.
Yet, he is a rotting carcass, the Carrion Lord of the Imperium held in life by marvels from the Dark Age of Technology and the thousand souls sacrificed each day so his may continue to burn.
To be a man in such times is to be one amongst untold billions. It is to live in the cruelest and most bloody regime imaginable. It is to suffer an eternity of carnage and slaughter. It is to have cries of anguish and sorrow drowned by the thirsting laughter of dark gods.
This is a dark and terrible era where you will find little comfort or hope. Forget the power of technology and science. Forget the promise of progress and advancement. Forget any notion of common humanity or compassion.
There is no peace amongst the stars, for in the grim darkness of the far future, there is only war.
PROLOGUE
FALL OF THE AJAXUS
Clank-clank-clank.
‘Hydra Betaris empty,’ roared the flak tank’s crew chief over the vox.
‘Hydra Betaris empty,’ bellowed Troop Sergeant Gazzin, his voice cracking after having yelled those words two dozen times in a handful of hours besides innumerable other reports and orders.
‘Reload,’ shouted Second Gun Officer Plinkin, raising his sabre. The blade, once highly polished, was now blackened with soot and dust. He stood at attention, equidistant between the two Hydras he commanded.
Several soldiers ran out onto the battlements where Plinkin and the flak tanks were situated, pushing and shoving a trolley loaded with ammunition.
‘Good work,’ said Plinkin, nodding to them, trying to catch their eye. Most didn’t look at him. He could see the bags under their eyes, the strain on all their faces, the grit between their teeth. Their uniforms, once a spotless verdant green, were caked with the filth of battle. Their skin, once immaculate and clean-shaven, was marked with grime and stubble.
‘Final… load… sir,’ the reload team corporal forced out as he and his soldiers weaved between the wreckage of destroyed ork aircraft and broken rockcrete.
‘Final load Hydra Betaris,’ Plinkin shouted. That meant there was no more ammunition. The words were part of standard drill for Cethelon artillery regiments. They were at once an acknowledgement of information received and the passing on of said information to other forces. Plinkin silently thanked the God-Emperor his voice had not yet cracked.
‘Final load Hydra Betaris,’ echoed Gazzin.
‘Make every shot count,’ said Plinkin. He said it because he knew that was what he was supposed to say.
‘Very good, sir,’ said Gazzin, all duty and propriety.
Once Betaris was empty, all they had left here was Hydra Alphus.
Thud-thud-thud-thud-thud. The Hydra opened up once more at the xenos aircraft that filled the sky. The reloaders scurried past their gun officer, giving salutes as was required by regulation.
Plinkin realised he was still holding his sabre aloft. He looked at it as he lowered it, carefully lifted the pommel so the blade pointed towards his scabbard, then inserted it swiftly. All according to drill.
Thud-thud-thud. There was a harsh squeal as the worn-out Hydra’s turret swivelled to open fire at a new airspace zone.
This and all the other drills Plinkin had been learning all his life in the Scholastica Militar gave him courage and strength. They made him feel invincible. What was before him now left him feeling anything but.
Thud-thud-thud.
The 73rd Cethelon Artillery Brigade’s constituent batteries and troops were deployed all over the battlements and towers of the Bastion Ajaxus. It was one of the largest fortifications on the world of Kruxx, impregnable to Plinkin’s eyes when first marching through its primary gatehouse – an almighty keep in itself.
Thud-thud-thud.
The Bastion Ajaxus was now aflame. With each passing second, ork rockets and shells blasted its walls, gun pits and barracks. The planet’s already cloud-choked skies were darkened further by palls of acrid smoke caused by burning vehicle wrecks and promethium dumps, as well as the enemy’s incendiaries. Plinkin’s eyes stung and he could taste ash.
Thud-thud-thud. There was the squeal of the Hydra’s rotating turret again.
The skies were Plinkin’s primary concern. He commanded a pair of Hydras. He and his comrades elsewhere had the duty of clearing the skies of enemy aircraft. In this task they had singularly failed, but they could have never succeeded. The ork bombers and fighters swarmed like migrating fire bees at the onset of spring. The brigade must have fired millions of rounds into the sky and destroyed thousands of aircraft, but the air was no less thick with them than when the ork attack had begun in earnest after several weeks of probing raids and what command called ‘low-intensity’ strikes.
Thud-thud-thud.
Plinkin had reached his seventeenth leaf-fall just days before the 73rd was sent aboard the troop transport His Bounty of War, and had graduated from the Scholastica barely a week before that. He had been so excited. Some cadets had to wait years to fight for the Emperor on campaign.
Clank-clank-clank.
‘Hydra Alphus empty!’ roared the flak tank’s crew chief over the vox.
‘Hydra Alphus empty!’ bellowed Troop Sergeant Heziah. His voice cracked as Gazzin’s had. The man was considered a veteran, at twenty-eight leaf-falls. He stole a glance at Plinkin. His black moustache was salt-and-peppered with the dust of war. Plinkin made a point of not meeting his gaze.
I have no answer to all this.
Thud-thud-thud went Hydra Betaris.
All I know is the drills.
Thud-thud-thud.
He realised his heart was pounding as fast as the Hydras were firing.
‘Reload,’ shouted Plinkin, drawing and raising his sabre.
Out came the reload crew for Hydra Alphus, just as exhausted as Betaris’.
‘For the Emperor!’ he roared – or tried. He didn’t know what else to do. His voice cracked.
‘For the Emperor!’ echoed Gazzin and Heziah. Their voices didn’t crack. Cethelon pride was as strong as any steel.
Thud-thud-thud.
Plinkin maintained the position of attention, looking out over the raging siege. He said nothing. There was nothing more to say.
There were several minutes of firing.
Clank-clank-clank.
‘Hydra Betaris empty and complete,’ came the word from the Hydra’s crew.
Clank-clank-clank.
‘Hydra Alphus empty and complete.’
For several seconds Plinkin, Gazzin and Heziah stood still, each not saying a word, each in their positions as order and drill dictated. None had ever encountered this situation in training, nor in battle.
Behind him he heard the feet of two marching soldiers. They passed either side of him to speak to their respective troop sergeants, though Plinkin couldn’t hear what was said. Then Gazzin and Heziah about-turned in unison and marched towards him. Each came to attention smartly, snapping a sharp salute. Their every movement was crisp, the product of cumulative months of drill practice.
‘Permission to speak, sir,’ said Gazzin. He was a full head taller than his commander.
‘Granted,’ said Plinkin.
‘The troops request orders, sir. More frankly, they wish to know what we are to do now. We are gunners without ammunition.’
Plinkin felt more than one bead of sweat trickle down the back of his neck. He felt fear truly for the first time. He could hear precious little Hydra fire coming from anywhere.
Duty first. Duty always. Duty above all, he remembered. The mantra drilled into him from the time he could speak.
‘Are we not armed?’ he asked, indicating his sabre and holstered laspistol.
‘We are, sir,’ the troop sergeants said.
‘Are we not soldiers of the almighty God-Emperor, sworn to His service even after death?’
‘We are, sir.’
‘Duty first.’
‘Duty always. Duty above all,’ they concluded.
Plinkin suppressed a slight smile. Truly, the Cethelons are the greatest soldiers in all the galaxy.
The sound of kick-starting and pollution-belching engines drew his attention.
Above, heading straight for them, were a trio of bright-crimson ork fighter-bombers.
Plinkin saw the muzzles of their weapons flash an instant before the slugs ripped him, Gazzin an d Heziah in half.
Ladrix tensed his ears. All he heard was the dripping of leaking sewage pipes, the breathing of his comrades and the pilot light for his flamer.
‘What’s the hold-up?’ whispered Jenruz behind him.
‘Thought I heard something.’
‘Rats and drips don’t sound like orks. Doesn’t matter anyway, even down here I bet you’ll smell the frekking bastards before you hear or see ’em.’
Ladrix shuddered and started walking, his steps short. His legs sloshed loudly in the thigh-high water. Every so often he felt something hard or soft brush against them. He hoped it was just human excrement. He couldn’t believe that was what he had to hope for down here.
Thank the Emperor for overalls.
Ladrix’s squad was one of the hundreds the Athonian Tunnel Rats had sent out to patrol the drainage labyrinth beneath the Bastion Ajaxus.
‘No chance the greenskins’ll find their way in here anyway,’ said Jenruz. ‘The tunnels run for a hundred miles into the acid sea, and they’re a maze, you heard the captain,’ he added, patting Ladrix on the shoulder with a chuckle. ‘Almost done. Almost back to base for rat steak with rat stew.’
Ladrix popped another stimm pill into his mouth and swallowed it.
‘How many you got left?’ asked Jenruz, too eagerly for Ladrix’s liking. He could feel the man’s breath on the back of his neck.
‘Last one.’
‘You should be careful,’ Jenruz said. ‘Medic reckons they should last us longer than this.’
‘How many you got left?’
‘None.’
Ladrix laughed weakly. Command had ordered double patrols once the ork siege began in earnest. Sleep was hard to come by even before explosions shook the dust – and worse – from the sewer tunnel ceiling. Plus, in these places… even for Tunnel Rats the edge the pills gave was welcome. Rats as big as canids, four-eyed gators and creeping darkvines were problem enough before anyone factored in ork infiltrators. Jenruz was right, though. Orks did stink worse than anything in this place.
Fortunately – or, depending on one’s point of view, otherwise – he’d been down here long enough to get used to the stench.
One thing to be proud of, I suppose.
He dared bring his sleeve close to his nose. There was no denying it, though: he reeked. Even Athonian fleshflies, if they were to come anywhere near him now, would die before they could land to lay their eggs under his skin. He stank of the sewer. He wondered if he’d ever be rid of it, even if he survived and retired to the promised paradise world of Ekstatika Eternum.
But then he wondered: What if the orks stink of the sewer? What if Jenruz is wrong?
He felt his eyes widen as the stimm kicked in. Every ripple in the filth-filled water, every foul drip from the ceiling, every shadow caused by every flicker of light from his or a squadmate’s helm-lumen, he darted his gaze to each. He gripped his flamer so tightly it shook as much as he did. He had just enough about him to keep walking.
Several silent minutes passed. The occasional helm-lumen behind him flickered out, some flickered back on. All normal – even good – equipment was unreliable in a place like this, and the Athonians’ equipment wasn’t good.
Ladrix felt another pat on his shoulder. It was heavier than the one Jenruz gave him earlier, the hand much larger. He shrugged it off.
‘Get lost. Don’t distract me. These patrols are frekked up enough.’
The hand patted him again. Harder.
Ladrix turned. ‘What the frekk–’
An ork stood there, lit up by Ladrix’s helm-lumen. It grinned widely, a mouth full of yellow teeth. Its flesh was black with sewer-filth and what looked like some attempt at camo-streaks. It wore a peaked cap and a bandolier of stikk grenades across its chest, and carried a long knife slick with blood. What Ladrix couldn’t believe was the cigar in its mouth. A trail of smoke drifted from the warm, orange-red glow at its end.
It made him laugh, even as his bladder emptied in his terror.
The ork laughed too.
Then the ork gutted him, and laughed even harder when Ladrix slumped into the water, alive long enough to feel his innards slip from his body and into the sewage of the Bastion Ajaxus.
‘First rank! Rapid fire!’
Captain Jesk of the Mordian 2202nd counted meticulously as the troops of the first squad of each of his company’s four platoons opened fire. One shot, every two seconds. Each had thirty shots per charge. When they reached twenty-eight, which he counted, he issued a new order.
‘Second rank! Rapid fire!’
In the time it took to bark the words, the first rank had finished firing, dropped to one knee, and commenced reloading in perfect unison.
Ahead of him, Jesk watched as crimson beads of las tore into orks charging down the long passageway, which was flanked either side by yard-thick ferrocrete walls. The aliens’ corpses were piling up, slowing down the others, buying more time for Mordian strength to blow them away.
Die, xenos, Jesk thought. He would have spat, were that not a hideous act unbecoming of a captain of the line. You’ll rue storming the Bastion Ajaxus.
‘Third rank! Rapid fire!’
Ork war cries reverberated in the space, which was barely wide enough for a platoon to march down abreast, the noise seeming to battle the high-pitched cracks of the Mordians’ lasguns. Their fire popped alien eyes, burned open throats and shattered kneecaps. Over the din of battle Jesk heard ammunition-lugging servitors bringing fresh charges and water for his troops. They had been here for less than ten local minutes and were well supplied. Jesk estimated they could hold here as long as they could stand.
The aliens stop here, he thought with some satisfaction.
‘First rank! Rapid fire!’
Barely halfway through the rank’s salvoes, the orks withdrew.
‘Cease fire!’
The Mordians stood in perfect drill stance, awaiting instruction, ready for a fresh wave of attackers. Only the ill-disciplined, and the soon-to-be defeated, would celebrate in such a moment. The orks possessed a savage cunning and die-hard mentality that, for all the inherent inferiority of the alien, should not be trifled with. This was a lesson the people of Mordian had learned long ago, and they remembered it well. Thousands of battle honours, won in glory, could attest to that.
‘WAAAAAAAAAGH!’
Here they are again. Predictable in their unpredictability.
‘Steel yourselves, soldiers of Mordian.’
Jesk felt a tremor beneath his feet. Whatever foul nonsense you bring us, alien, we will see it undone.
‘Ready lascannon!’ Jesk shouted. In short order, a team of Mordians rolled forward the company’s primary anti-armour weapon and primed its charge.
The tremors grew stronger and more frequent.
And then they emerged.
Dozens of clanking bipedal constructs, thrice the height of a man, enormous circular saw blades buzzing, exhaust pipes billowing thick black smog. They charged the Mordians, barging past the ork corpse mounds, crushing bodies underfoot with their arms and armour.
Jesk’s heart sank as the monstrosities closed in.
‘All ranks open fire! Open fire!’
He watched as lasgun fire struck the oncoming ork war machines to no effect. Heavy bolter rounds exploded upon impact, the clanking constructs walking through the barrage with naught but scratches and scorch marks.
The Mordians’ lascannon made two shots, each claiming an ork war engine as their searing beams burned holes through their armour, before the walkers reached the lines.
Jesk breathed just long enough to watch his company be torn apart before his eyes, Mordian blue turning black with splattered blood, limbs and heads cast in all directions by the orks in wild abandon. Then his head was ripped from his body and shattered against a wall.
Colonel Xerenz tapped furiously at her primary command console in her headquarters chamber. Several other officers around her were doing the same. Out of the corner of her eyes she could see the veins bulging on their foreheads and hands, their clenched jaws and tense shoulders. Half of the lumens in the room had been blown out by shockwaves from explosions, the others flickered haphazardly. Fires now provided more light in the prefabricated ferrocrete space, the shadows of the soldiers moving around hurriedly dancing on the walls and high ceiling.
