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Fool's Ruin – Extract

A Black Library Publication

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FOOL’S RUIN

Mike Brooks

The High Lords of Terra had called.

Captain Catallus Naxon of the Minotaurs knew nothing more than that. There were rumours, of course, because even Space Marines were not immune to rumours: rumours that Terra was under attack; rumours that Roboute Guilliman had returned; rumours that Roboute Guilliman was a traitor; even rumours that Terra had fallen. Rumours, though, were inconsequential. All the Minotaurs knew for certain was that the High Lords of Terra had called. As such, the Minotaurs would answer, as they always did.

‘Update,’ Catallus called.

‘Little to say, lord,’ ship’s captain Aerun Domock replied, from his command throne. He was hardwired into the Bronze Catechist, and had not left the strike cruiser for over sixty years. ‘The warp remains in turmoil, but we are still in contact with the rest of the fleet, and the Navigator believes that we are making good time, under the circumstances.’

Catallus grimaced. The Minotaurs were not used to being at the mercy of circumstances; they were more commonly the circumstances that befell others. However, there was nothing he could do. The warp was not an enemy that could be fought with blade and bolter, and it could not be intimidated into doing as the Imperium wished. He simply had to trust in the Emperor, and ignore the whispers in the back of his mind that queried how the Emperor could still exist if Terra had fallen. Of course, he reminded himself, that was only a rumour. But if it had, if the Emperor had also fallen, might that explain the warp’s turbulence? It was dangerous, perhaps foolish, to draw a line of connection between an observable event and the worst possible theoretical explanation. On the other hand, Catallus Naxon believed in preparing for the worst.

He was vaguely aware that mortals added a second half to that thought, something about also hoping for the best, but the Minotaurs did not believe in hope.

The Bronze Catechist shuddered more severely than before, as though it were wracked with fever, but this shaking did not die down after a few seconds, as much turbulence in the warp did. Instead it persisted, vibrating through the very bones of the ship.

‘Update!’ Catallus shouted again. The servitors at their stations continued with their roles uninterrupted, as they would unless and until whatever passed for life within their meat-and-metal frames gave out completely, but the bridge crew were wide-eyed. They were Chapter-serfs, sworn to service and ferociously loyal, and had Catallus ordered a suicide run into the teeth of an enemy fleet then they would have given their lives without question. The warp, on the other hand, was a more insidious threat. No mortal wanted their life to end pointlessly, and certainly not while mired in the immaterium. Catallus Naxon himself had only the vaguest understanding of the so-called Sea of Souls, but he knew he did not trust it in the slightest.

‘The warp storm is intensifying,’ Captain Domock replied levelly, but Catallus could hear the strain in his voice. Domock had concerns he was not voicing.

‘And the rest of the Chapter?’ Catallus asked.

‘Communications are… scrambled,’ Domock said. ‘I will try to–’

This was not the ship shaking. This was the ship being shaken, like a rodent in the jaws of a felid predator. Catallus stumbled sideways, at least until sideways became downwards, and collided with a cogitator bank with a clatter of ceramite on metal. The ship’s crew were screaming as they were thrown around. Catallus heard the distinctive snap of breaking bone, and his enhanced Astartes senses picked up the metallic tang of spilled blood.

‘Geller fields failing!’ Captain Domock barked. An unsecured data-slate flew through the air, and missed his head by a hand’s breadth. ‘Warp drives overloading! Brace for emergency translation!’

Catallus Naxon bared his teeth in anger and frustration, but there was nothing for it. Only a fool would try to outstare the warp, and the Minotaurs were not fools.

Klaxons sounded, the swirling wail that every ship hand both loved and dreaded: it was the signal that they would be leaving the warp, but sometimes those could be the most dangerous moments of all. Right now, however, it was definitely the lesser of two evils.

‘Translation!’ Domock yelled. There was a long, drawn-out moment when everything somehow continued to shake despite being frozen in place, and then the universe turned inside out.

Space Marines were supposedly immune to dizziness and nausea thanks to the Lyman’s Ear implant, but the warp made a mockery of biology. Catallus struggled back up to his feet, fighting against the sensation that the ship was spinning around him.

‘Status!’

‘We are in realspace,’ Captain Domock rasped. Half his brain and spinal column might be replaced by cybernetic implants, but it appeared he had suffered even worse from the translation. Catallus wondered for a moment what it felt like to be dizzy when you also had the sensation of being a twenty-megaton voidship. ‘Translation successful.’

Catallus glanced around the bridge. Here and there, a crewer had managed to claw their way back to their station, but many were still injured from the shaking the Bronze Catechist had undergone, and he could see at least two that were unconscious and spasming, likely as a result of the translation.

If you’re still in one piece, it counts as a success. Those had been the words of Scout Sergeant Edram, on the occasion of Catallus’ first trip through the warp. Now, he had a better idea what the veteran meant.

‘Where are we?’ he asked. The dizziness was fading fast, and he was able to stand up straight without issue.

Domock hesitated before answering. ‘Your pardon, lord, but I have little information with which to contextualise my answer. We are adrift in deep space, light years away from any star or planetary system.’

Catallus opened his mouth to reply, then frowned. ‘What exactly do you mean by “adrift”, captain?’

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A Black Library Publication

First published in Great Britain in 2022.
This eBook edition published in 2022 by Black Library, Games Workshop Ltd, Willow Road, Nottingham, NG7 2WS, UK.

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Produced by Games Workshop in Nottingham.
Cover illustration by Paul Dainton.

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