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The Harrowing – Extract

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The Harrowing

Rob Sanders

Let it be shown that at elapsid/nullus-beta, Dartarion Varix of the First Hort, Third Harrow and strike commander of the Alpha Legion, allowed his hearts once again to beat to the rhythm of war. Operative-unit 55/Phi-silon observes mission subsequence initiations, while maintaining full noospheric and haptic integration.

Gamma, delta, epsilon… commence.

New target: Mechanicum super-heavy ark freighter Omnissiax, registered out of the Heliodyne shipyards with charters for forge worlds on the Dextura shipping lanes. At the time of action-initiation, the Omnissiax is under the command of Arkmaster Manus Cruciam, with Magos Dominus Oronti Praeda assigned to security measures and Collegium-Mandati Jerulian Hax responsible for temple-freight transportation and ritual observance. Deific-cargo inspected at Heliodyne and logged as Titan Battle Group Astramax of the Legio Perennia, fresh from inception at the Gallileon temple-forge, Bronta-Median.

Worlds sundered in the name of the Machine-God: none.

Battlegroup confirmed kills: none.

Ranking Princeps Majoris Alvar Pallidon of the Warmonger-class Titan Abyssus Edax. Tribute destination recorded at Bronta-Median as the Solar System. Manifests list Ordo Reductor siege machines, two hundred battle tanks and armoured transports of various signification ready for force allocation, as well as five hundred suits of Mark IV Legiones Astartes battleplate, intended for the VII Legion. Newly-appointed Fabricator General Kane to personally receive cargo at Terra. Wayfarage estimated at two solar months.

Transit interrupted twenty-two days into voyage after reception of new orders and subroutines from Gaius Trasq, Fabricator Ancillaris – the Omnissiax and Mechanicum light cruiser escort Dentilicon ordered to break warp at the Gnostica System and report to the garrison world of Callistra Mundi.

I patrol the vaulted cargo-chamber of one of the ark freighter’s many sub-holds. My true name is long forgotten, but my designation is 55/Phi-silon. I am sparatoi, a ‘sown man’ and agent operative of the Alpha Legion. I adjust my disguise: ocular-mask, tattered cloak, battery-pack and las-lock rifle. I present as a Mechanicum tech-thrall, one of thousands throughout the vast ship, assigned to onboard security and the mind numbing patrol of the vessel’s holds.

My enhancements are real. My disguise. My sacrifice. My mind, however, is still my own. The Alpha Legion needs agents who can think for themselves. I was thrall to the XX Legion long before I went under the bladesaws of augurnauts and surgeo-cyberseers, volunteering for the adaptive surgeries that would make my disguise complete.

I kneel before the artistry and craftsmanship of Legiones Astartes battleplate. Rows and rows of paintless suits. Their systems await designation and the honour of Legion colours. They are blisteringly new. Spread throughout their number are suits that still sport their tarps from quality-control and sample testing at Bronta-Median. The fabric flaps in the perverse air currents that afflict a vessel of the ark freighter’s size.

The army of empty suits is indeed a wonder. A blessed expression of the Omnissiah’s divine will. To an observer, however, such reverence might appear odd or misplaced in a wretched thrall, which is why I phased the auspex and lonely pict-feed lenses monitoring the deck before re-routing the servitors scheduled to inventory the sub-hold.

‘Report,’ Dartarion Varix orders.

Like the fifty Alpha Legionnaires of his veteran demi-hort, he is hidden. They are all living weapons, concealed and deadly. Like the fang retracted within the serpent’s jaws, they are primed with death, ready to be revealed, waiting for the moment to strike.

That moment is now. One of the tarp-draped suits of powered plate moves.

Then another. Then another.

Not all of the suits are empty. Now that their strike commander has broken dissimulatus, the veteran Alpha Legionnaires of the First Hort, Third Harrow can reveal themselves. Auto-suggestion engages. The implanted sus-an membrane of the legionnaires’ trans-human physique responds. Their state of suspended animation breaks. Hearts are allowed to beat once more.

Punctuating the ranks of motionless suits, armoured Alpha Legionnaires begin to move. They tear the tarps from their armoured forms to reveal the indigo blue and cerulean blaze of their plate, the serpentine iconography that coils itself about their power-armoured limbs, and the infernal glow of optics burning to life.

‘You have been monitoring, my lord?’ this unit asks.

‘I have.’

‘Then you know that our warp translation is complete.’

‘I felt it.’

A legionnaire approaches, almost indistinguishable from his brothers.

‘Strike commander.’

‘Prime,’ Varix acknowledges him. ‘Your host is ready?’

‘Always, my lord. Permission to secure the sub-hold.’

‘Authorised.’

‘The Omnissiax is passing through a debris field of remnant rock and planetesimals approaching the edge of the Gnostica System,’ I report through the modulations of my skull-riveted mask. As I do, the Alpha Legionnaires break formation, spreading out across the sub-hold. Umbra-pattern boltguns and sickle-mags of various ammunitions are handed out from cargo crates, while bulkheads and blast doors are secured.

‘Is the system contested?’

‘Planet-wide mutiny on Callistra Mundi, the primary world of the system,’ I continue. ‘Imperial auxilia garrison world and fleet anchorage.’

‘Who leads the rebellion in the Warmaster’s name?’

‘You’re not going to like it.’

‘My primarch’s objectives have been compromised and my mission parameters expanded beyond the remit of the forces at my disposal. What is there to like?’

‘Long-range voxmissions and noospherics betray encrypted legionary signatures.’

‘Alpha Legion,’ Varix confirms.

The strike commander takes this revelation in his stride. Even to my cogitator-afflicted brain, this is a surprise. Have the heads of the hydra become tangled?

‘Perhaps they too are beyond their mission parameters,’ I offer, but Varix has moved on.

‘No,’ he says. ‘This is something else. Status?’

‘It’s a mess,’ I admit, ‘and perhaps as their commander intended. Forces on the ground, in the air and in the void are declaring for the Emperor or the Warmaster.’

‘The Legion?’

‘No sightings or pict captures reported,’ I tell him. ‘The Alpha Legion on Callistra Mundi have yet to reveal themselves.’

‘They will,’ Varix assures me. ‘The Omnissiax…’

‘Has been re-routed to deploy its god-machines,’ I inform the strike commander. ‘The battle group is to crush the rebellion.’

‘Well we can’t have that,’ Varix says. His words are laced with a dark humour. ‘We have to at least give my brother-commander a chance. He’s barely begun.’

‘Forgive me, lord,’ I venture, ‘But I am more concerned with our own disposition. The Omnissiax will be met and intercepted. Both traitors and loyalists will seek to harness its apocalyptic cargo.’

‘Well, quite,’ the strike commander says. He is already several steps ahead of me. ‘Is the Dentilicon still with us?’

‘Yes, my lord.’

‘Prime,’ Varix calls.

The Alpha Legion officer acknowledges his commander: ‘Ready, my lord.’

‘This cargo will never reach the Solar System as planned,’ Varix tells us both. ‘We shall not arrive at Terra, but need is great out here. The battle group will undoubtedly be sucked into the conflict. I’m authorising secondary objectives and initiating proprietary action pseudaspis from a range of forty-four tactically antiphonus responses.’

‘Yes, my lord.’

‘I’m enacting these contingent protocols and pursuing secondary objectives under my own recognisance. These supersede my primarch’s orders. I don’t need your concordance, but for the identic record I want it.’

‘Pseudaspis, aye,’ the prime agrees.

I nod also. ‘The Omnissiax carries a considerable force escort, my lord. We are not outfitted for this.’ Dartarion Varix nods his helm slowly. ‘Plus, loyalist forces have a void presence throughout the system. At least nine cruisers and assorted escorts.’

‘Duly noted, but that will not stop us. The order is given. The ark freighter is to be taken. Activate our agents. All legionnaires are authorised to enact kill-shot protocols. The Mechanicum is our enemy. We shall explain that fact to them with overwhelming force. In one hour, I want the Dentilicon neutralised and both the Omnissiax and her payload in the Alpha Legion’s hands. No one must ever know we were here. There can be no Mechanicum survivors. Is that understood?’

‘Yes, my lord,’ I reply.

His lieutenant salutes. ‘It will be done.’

‘Then let us begin.’

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A Black Library Publication

First published in Sedition’s Gate in 2014
This eBook edition published in 2016 by Black Library, Games Workshop Ltd,
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Cover illustration by Neil Roberts.

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