LordofUzkulak’s fanfics

Chal Thike bowed his head as the sonorous chanting filled the bridge, amplified by the acoustics inherent in its cathedral-like design.  High above the main deck a priest stood at a control lectern delivered the morning’s sermon, his voice delivered all across the Judgement via a horde of patrolling servo-skulls, and set in perfect counter-point with the background chanting of the choir lining one of the galleries the lined the sides of the bridge.  Below the gantry on which the priest stood, servitors toiled on in crowded crew pits, heedless of the holy event going on above their heads.   All across the bridge, the living members of the crew, save for the various tech-priests and tech-adepts of the Mechanicum, had stopped their routines to pay respect to Him-on-Terra.  The ringing of a bell resonated throughout the command deck, signalling that the sermon had drawn to a close, and Thrike and his colleagues who were crammed into a sensor alcove turned back to their work.

His hands turning brass knobs and brazen levers worn smooth by centuries of use, Thrike watched the flickering sensor screen before him.  For the most part, it displayed a field of green static, fading in and out, and what could be discerned was grainy at best.  Frustrated, he thumped the side of the ancient hololith desk, eliciting a tutting of disapproval from his team’s resident tech-adept.  Brom, a void-born like Thrike, mock-glared at him, his still organic eyes twinkling under the shadow of the white hood he wore.  The tech-adept shook his head as he drew a vial of blessed oil from the recesses of his robe and incanted a catechism of activation and smooth operating.  Jall, the third member of the sensor alcove’s occupants rolled his eyes, sceptical that the rites of the Mechanicum were efficient means of keeping the various technologies employed by the Imperium running, but whatever Brom had done appeared to work as the display was now more grainy returns that static.

An electric coughing drew Thrike’s attention from his screen as ‘Smilie’, the servitor hardwired into the seat between Brom and Malc, the other member of Thrike’s shift working in the alcove, printed out a parchment inscribed with various readings that none of them really understood, from a device fitted where ‘his’ mouth should have been.  As Thrike turned back to his display screen he noticed Brom reach out and read the printout; that should have been his first clue that something was wrong, but instead he didn’t pay heed to it.  Suddenly, the screen flared with static as the sensors were overloaded with data.  Frantically, Thrike and his fellow crewmen pulled on levers, switches, knobs and dials to try and compensate, and were rewarded with a rare example of crystal clear output.  The static resolved into an image of a ship, centred in the display screen, various numbers, codes and status data haloing it.

“Incoming Unidentified Vessel,” snapped Thrike pulling a vox horn from the tangle of cables above their heads, “Location – 10,000-mark-37-mark-2.”  He waited for a response from one of the command-crew, but only silence answered him.  Confused, he tugged on the vox horn, and the thick flexi-plastic cable connecting it to the internal comms fell down into his lap.  The snap of an autopistol drew his attention away from the serpentine coil sitting in his lap, and looking up he saw Brom levelling the smoking weapon at him; Malc was already slumped across the desk, a rapidly spreading pool of blood blotting out the holoscreens, and Jall was sitting staring down at the mechandrite buried in his sternum.

“Why?” asked Thrike.

Gunfire was the response.

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The Judgment, a millennia old Retribution-class warship – one of the finest in the Imperial Navy – carried on it course, creeping along at a fraction of its maximum cruising speed, heedless of the warp portal that had opened in front of it, and of the ship that had been spat out by hell that is the Warp.  It too was a Retribution-class warship, but where the Judgement bore proudly the Blue and Purple of its home fleet, the newcomer’s hull was pitted and scored by micro-meteor impacts and the paint had long since peeled away, leaving bare adamantium exposed to the void.  Awareness of the other ship was impeded by the execution of the sensor crews by traitors in their midst; men tempted from the path of the faithful by promises of wealth, power and darker things; and by the tripping of the emergency blast doors on the bridge.  The Judgement’s captain, floating in a nutrient suspension tank, was unaware as the enemy vessel charged its main weapons and fired its forward lance batteries at his ship, pulverising the bridge.  The momentum of the newcomer was increased as its engines flared to life and it accelerated directly towards the Judgement.

With no one to direct it, the Imperial vessel was a sitting duck, and the attackers hit it right in the smouldering ruins of the bridge.  The impact nearly tore both vessels apart, and large sections of the hull of both were ruptured, exposing several decks to vacuum.  The attacker’s engines continued to flared, pushing the ship deeper into the hull of its victim until the two ships finally wedged together, neither able to get free.

Explosions rippled along the attacker’s flanks as false plating was blown off, and a swarm of armoured figures drifted ‘down’ into the mass of masts and defence turrets studding the topside of the Judgement.   No one within the crippled ship knew that they were under attack, and upon breaching the hull, the boarders met little initial resistance.

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Valk Trimpsam clutched his lasrifle to his chest.  It had been three hours since the ship had began to shake violently, and garbled reports broadcast between various crewmen over that time had made it clear that they were under attack.  Having been stationed in one of the cargo holds in the belly of the Judgement, he had yet to encounter any of the boarders, but it was clear from the handful of voxcasts that had got through the jamming that the defenders were being herded back towards his position and he’d set about organising defences for his security station.

Another hour passed before the first signs of combat entered his vicinity.  The echoes of weapons fire and the screams of the dying resonated down the labyrinthine corridors.  Valk could hear the snap-hiss of the defending ratings’ lasguns, and the answering barks of the invaders’ boltguns.  Glowglobes flickered in wall sconces and one by one died; a wave of darkness flew up the corridor in their wake, blotting out anything beyond a few feet.  As if guided by a malign intelligence, only the globes beyond his position died, and a small patch of light was cast back up the corridor from the illuminators strapped under the muzzles of his fellow ratings’ weapons; a few rays glinted off the sculptures lining the walls, giving the impression that they were looking into the jaws of hell.

Far in the distance, red las flashes and indigo explosions flared into life as the sounds of combat grew louder.  Squinting into the darkness, the defenders readied themselves to fire on any foe to head down the corridor.  More screams chilled them to the bone, and the beat of footsteps overlapped with their echoes as someone, or something, ran towards them.  Blue lightening sparked at the end of the corridor and arced to the glowglobe sconces there.  The crystal balls erupted in a shower of multicoloured sparks, and the lightening leapt to the next pair.  The fantastical light display surged towards them, haloing a group of ratings who were fleeing from the unseen menace.

Silently Valk urged them to run faster – the lightening was swiftly catching up with them – but it wasn’t enough.  The lightening arced out from the walls and into the group of frightened men, flash boiling their blood and charring their bones to ash.  A red mist filled the corridor, and Valk and his men gasped in horror at what they’d just witnessed and the magikal charge detonated the smoke grenades carried by their late fellow crewmen.

Valk squinted into gloom, unable to see through the wall of smoke.  The barrel of his lasgun tracked back and fore, searching for something to shoot.  Heavy impacts rang out as something large paced towards them.  A massive shadow, far greater than a man should ever be able to reach, loomed out of the darkness and panicking Valk opened fire.  The lasbolt splashed on the armour, no more effective than the light on the illuminator strapped below.  The grey smoke wreathed the giant as it strode out of the cloud towards him, giving it an even more daemonic visage than it possessed anyway.

The daemonic warrior stood nigh on ten feet tall including horns, and its gold, high-crested helm almost scrapped the high, vaulted ceiling of the corridor.  Twice as broad as a man, the blue and gold shoulder pads gave it a relatively squat appearance compared to its height; an attribute enhanced by the flowing robes.  In one hand it held an ebony staff, twisted beyond sane description, its very existence seeming wrong to the rational eye.  As he looked into the ruby eye set in its forehead, Valk fell to his knees, weeping in horror at the presence of the ancient sorcerer.  The daemonic man hefted his staff, and the defenders knew no more.

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Ahriman shook his head.  Pathetic.  The followers of the Corpse-God were weak and their attempts at resistance futile.  Nothing could stop him from achieving his goal here – the Runes of Ulthwael would be his!