Durlo clamped the breach shut – his hasty repair wouldn’t withstand any degree of scrutiny, but would pass a cursory glance at night.

  The first fire team slipped off, making their way to the north towers while the second team headed south. Norroll drew his monoblades, starting towards the guardhouse with Durlo in tow.

  Daviland followed Bissot, creeping along the edges of the garrison facility’s buildings as they approached the north-east guard tower. She had slung her lasgun and drawn her pistol and blade.

  The guards in the tower talked and laughed. Daviland could smell lho smoke.

  She crept up the tower’s plasteel stairs. Her movements flowed smoothly into each other to evenly distribute her weight with each step, ensuring her approach was nearly silent. Her mind and body harmonised, slowing her respiration to make the least noise possible. It was as natural to her as breathing, or killing.

  Daviland approached slowly. Four steps separated her from the guards. They faced north, away from her, but were more engaged in passing the time telling stories than manning their post. She focused on the one on the right, at the area at the back of his neck between helmet and flak collar. He was half a pace behind the storyteller, chuckling as he exhaled a plume of lho smoke.

  She crossed the gap in an instant, instinctively driving the point of her blade between the second and third vertebrae, as she had done many times before. She had already withdrawn it before the guard on the left knew she was there, plunging the blade beneath his jaw and sweeping it forward through his throat in a spurt of crimson. She grabbed him as he clutched at the gaping wound, dragging him down to the metal decking. She held him tight, restraining him until he was dead.

  Rising, she signalled Bissot, slipping back down the stairs as quietly as she had stolen up. She lost nothing by stealth.

  From the west, the ringing crash of metal on metal shuddered through the still. Across the compound, Traxel ascended the guard tower’s stairs three at a time. He had not drawn his chainsword, but held his Scion blade in his hand, the dagger flashing as it reflected the glow of the searchlumens.

  Up in the guard tower, Daviland could see Akraatumo reeling against one of the steel walls, the vox-operator knocked back by a blow struck with tremendous force.

  Bissot and Daviland pelted towards the north-west tower, stealth ignored in favour of speed. Another clang was followed by a solid, cracking crunch. They were still fifty yards away when Traxel bowled head over heels back down the stairs.

  A figure loomed over Akraatumo, his brutish profile bulked by armoured shoulder pads and a crudely patched helmet. The attacker’s face was masked by a steel ring mesh, and bladed spars jutted from where it had been bolted to his right pauldron. He raised his heavy club above his head as he readied a crushing, killing blow.

  The blow never fell as the brute’s head detonated, his battered helmet flying as the whip-crack of Atebe’s long-las snapped through the air.

  More las-fire cracked from the south a moment later, flashing in the dark. The charge and release of a plasma gun and the sharp bark of a bolt pistol answered.

  Emergency klaxons wailed and rotating red emergency lumens flashed to life around the perimeter. Daviland staggered, momentarily blinded as the lumens on the fence pivoted inwards, the sharp white light momentarily overloading her optics’ night vision.

  ‘Thy munificent wrath!’ Bissot hissed, shielding her eyes against the sudden glare.

  More las-fire popped to the south as Daviland and Bissot reached Traxel. Rising, the Tempestor waved them off, sending them after Akraatumo with an impatient gesture, and drew his chainsword and plasma pistol.

  Akraatumo slouched against a tower wall, his cuirass cratered and his helm cracked open along the left side. Quickly opening her medi-kit, Daviland unsealed his face shield and optics, prying his eyes open to examine them. Without a word, she removed his helmet and fastened a small, concave disc resembl­ing a white skullcap to the top of his head. A series of wires extended from the device, which Daviland plugged into the medi-slate mounted to her left vambrace.

  ‘Emperor’s grace, it had to be the vox-operator again,’ Bissot muttered, covering Daviland as she worked. ‘Durlo’s right – that vox-set’s accursed!’

  Headless, Akraatumo’s attacker was splayed on his back, the tank’s gear shaft he had been using as a club still clutched in his lifeless hands. The other guard was slumped over the tower’s wall, his throat cut by Akraatumo’s Scion blade.

  ‘Team two, status,’ Traxel called from below.

  ‘We’re being overrun. A platoon just came at us from the central building,’ Quisse reported, his lasgun cracking over the vox.

  ‘Go with the Tempestor,’ Daviland told Bissot. ‘We’ll be along shortly.’

  Bissot ran down the stairs, her steps vibrating the guard structure. She joined Traxel behind the cover of a low rockcrete barricade.

  ‘Atebe, what do you see?’ Traxel asked.

  ‘Confirm Quisse’s assessment, Tempestor. Looks like two squads headed your way. Mortar and heavy bolter teams setting up.’

  Panicked cries burst from the centre of the complex as Atebe opened fire, her long-las momentarily throwing the advancing enemy into disarray.

  Daviland had cleared out a large blood clot forming on Akraatumo’s brain and installed a steel plate to replace the shattered section of skull above it. She had been forced to administer a second dose of vitalotox, as simple stimms were insufficient to revive him. With two doses in such short order, she risked severely overtaxing his system, to say nothing of the psychological effects.

  Akraatumo’s eyes snapped open, gleaming feverishly. He shivered, as if from cold, though his skin was flushed and sheened with sweat. ‘Let’s go,’ he said, practically leaping to his feet.

  ‘Wait,’ Daviland said. ‘Give yourself a moment to adjust.’

  ‘I’m fine,’ he said. He swayed dizzily and threw out his arms to steady himself.

  Daviland handed him his helmet. ‘Put this on and get a hold of yourself.’

  Akraatumo turned his helmet over in his hands. ‘Damn,’ he said, looking at the fracture in its side. ‘Got me good, eh? No wonder I feel a mess.’

  He kicked the headless corpse of his attacker.

  Beneath them, Traxel, Bissot, Norroll and Durlo had already departed to engage the enemy. The stuttering shriek of Bissot’s volley gun echoed back to them.

  ‘Just put your helmet on, screw your head on straight and follow me,’ Daviland snapped, leaping back down the stairs.

  VII

  An uncanny silence, gravid with myriad possibilities, had fallen over the garrison complex. All sounds of battle ceased, from shouted commands and the cries of the wounded to the relentless discharges of lasguns as they crackled like fire in the air. The world around seemed frozen, a moment to be admired, suspended in resin fashioned into a keepsake by the hands of gods.

  Dust clouds bloomed, rapidly gestating from the seeds of mortar shells in sprays of sparks and shrapnel. Crimson blossoms burst to life in the air from flesh turned over by las-fire. Flashes of light and heat flared all around, each pulse a brief, new dawn.

  This was always Norroll’s favourite part – how time crawled treacle slow as battle was joined, each moment an eternity to be savoured. He let slip his conscious mind, riding a wave of perfectly harmonised instinct forward into the enemy. His awareness expanded, gleaning the angles of the lasgun muzzles arrayed before him and the position of the gunners’ fingers on the triggers, slipping between streaks of las-fire as he advanced. That he was unable to avoid them all was of no concern to him – his faith in his armour was absolute as las-bolts splashed across his carapace. He rolled with each impact, heedless of pain as he reached the enemy’s front line.

  This was life as it should be lived – a pageant of instinct, action and reaction, devoid of fear, remorse and doubt. There was neither future nor past in this moment, only the crystalline clarity of the here and now.

  Norroll grinned behind his faceguard, relishing the shock on the Traitor Guardsmen’s faces as he ploughed through their fire. He ducked beneath the fusillade, bringing them down with his laspistol as he slid across the pavement. Another instant and he was amongst them, cutting, kicking, killing.

  Not far away, Norroll noted that Traxel had not been so reckless. He kept himself a hard target, holding to cover as he sprinted between barricades and barriers. Traxel crashed into the traitor line some ten yards to Norroll’s right, his entire focus on hampering the enemy’s ability to regroup and respond. His chainsword growled, severing limbs and opening throats as his Wrathfire-pattern plasma pistol discharged streaks of white-hot fury, hissing as it vented steam between each lethal round.

  Bissot and Durlo remained in cover, each holding position behind the low barricades that blocked vehicle access to the compound’s interior. Wordlessly, they operated in tandem, Durlo covering the space to Norroll’s right while Bissot’s volley gun chewed through troopers to Traxel’s left. Flak armour proved scant protection from hotshot rounds, making nearly each shot a kill.

  Despite the punishment, or perhaps due to the layout of the garrison complex, the traitors refused to fall back. They took cover behind their fallen comrades, the rear ranks moving forward to engage the Scions. Chunks of carapace armour burst outwards as the enemy laid down withering fire.

  ‘Fall back!’ Traxel called, disengaging from the traitors beneath the aegis of Bissot’s covering fire.

  Norroll fell back as well, his right blade slicing free of a throat in a gout of blood as he retreated towards Durlo. He dived behind the barricade, rolling up onto a knee next to the demolition trooper.

  ‘Are you alright?’ Durlo asked.

  ‘Fine,’ Norroll answered, sheathing his right blade. He drew his laspistol and opened fire.

  ‘It’s just, well… your leg.’

  Norroll glanced at the deep gouge midway down the inside of his left thigh. Dark blood pulsed from the meat of the ragged wound, staining his fatigues as it sheeted down his leg.

  ‘What was in that injection Daviland gave us?’ Durlo asked, still firing into the enemy.

  ‘No clue, but I like it.’ Norroll slumped back onto his rump. He sheathed his left monoblade, transferred his laspistol to his left hand and applied pressure to the wound with his right. ‘Sorry. Little lightheaded.’

  ‘Daviland,’ Durlo called. ‘Where are you?’

  ‘Shepherding Akraatumo your way.’

  ‘Can you pick it up a bit? Norroll’s hit pretty badly.’

  ‘On it. Let’s go, Akraatumo.’

  ‘Team two, status,’ Traxel called from his position beside Bissot.

  ‘Not good, Tempestor,’ Rybak answered. ‘Commissar Fennech got us pushing forward, but they keep coming. Quisse is down. Phed is covering the commissar, but they’re about to be overwhelmed.’ The vox-link remained open, and he muttered a curse. ‘Where are these guys coming from?’

  ‘Commissar, Phed, fighting withdrawal to Rybak’s position and defend,’ Traxel ordered.

  ‘Acknowledged,’ Fennech confirmed.

  ‘Funny,’ Norroll said. ‘I thought telling a commissar to withdraw got you shot.’ He had set down his laspistol and was pressing on the wound with both hands. Blood oozed between his fingers.

  ‘Shut up and rote,’ Durlo said.

  Norroll thought better of arguing. Clasping both hands tightly over the wound, he began the Rote of Unimpeachable Calm, rapidly falling into a trance that would slow his respiration and reduce the flow of blood.

  It also made him useless in combat. Durlo ducked behind the barricade as las-fire cratered rockcrete inches from his head. He popped back up and resumed fire. ‘Any time now, Salenna,’ he muttered into the vox.

  ‘Pinned down, be with you in one,’ Daviland answered. ‘Akraatumo, drop!’

  A mortar exploded a few dozen yards behind Durlo and Norroll’s barricade. Norroll’s sense of time shifted again, but this time, instead of the world seeming to freeze, he did. His mind stilled, leaving him awash in an immaculately icy calm, an island of imperturbable serenity amidst a raging sea of madness.

  Daviland leaned over him, suddenly there, working on his leg as Akraatumo and Durlo kept the enemy suppressed. Norroll’s head lolled to the side, towards the Tempestor’s position in front of the next building. Bissot’s flurry of volley rounds ensured the enemy was reluctant to sweep in and overrun their positions, but she had become more methodical with her fire. Traxel was behind her, replacing her volley gun’s capacitor batteries with one of his own so that she could keep the traitors at bay. It was only a matter of time, Norroll knew. The enemy was probably repositioning, flanking around the buildings to catch them in a crossfire.

  Quite suddenly, Norroll wondered if this had been how it had ended for Tempestor Ezl – overrun, overwhelmed and outmatched by sheer force of numbers.

  ‘Fennech was right,’ he said to the servo-skull hovering left of Daviland’s head. His voice was still strong, which he took as a positive sign. ‘Easy to trick the augurs. Not your fault, Actis. Could happen to anybody.’ His field of vision had narrowed, so that it seemed he viewed Actis through a low-quality telescopic sight.

  Akraatumo’s lasgun whipped over his head as the vox-operator opened fire on the enemy approaching from the rear. Durlo maintained fire forward, and Norroll could hear the shriek of Bissot’s volley gun and the thump-hiss of Traxel’s plasma pistol.

  Streaks of red lanced through the smoke above, flashing on Actis’ gleaming cranium. Daviland pressed down on Norroll, shielding him with her body. He could feel her jolt against him with each las-bolt that struck her from behind.

  ‘Courage and honour,’ someone mumbled. Through consciousness dulled by shock and rendered placid by rote, Norroll realised he was the one speaking. ‘Courage and honour.’

  Mortar fire thundered all around, accompanied by the booming roar of heavy bolter fire echoing between the buildings. Time was up.

  Norroll closed his eyes. This wasn’t how he had envisioned dying, but he supposed it was as good an end as any. He smiled, prepared to meet his God-Emperor.

  Atebe sat on a heavily cratered rockcrete barricade, chewing on a lakrish root as she cleaned her long-las. The fog had mostly cleared, and the late-morning sun shone brightly overhead. She looked east, where the orbital ring curved out from the edge of the horizon to bisect the brilliant blue sky.

  She dragged the tip of her tongue between her teeth and spat out a tiny splinter before putting the length of root back in her mouth. It had a pleasantly sweet taste which increased as she chewed on it, and she had quickly learned that it gave her nutri-paste an almost palatable flavour. She understood why Durlo had nabbed a stock of them back at the Rilisian base.

  A bag of blood substitute and two other bags of some clear fluid or other lay next to her atop the barricade, their contents draining through tubes into Norroll’s arms.

  ‘You’re not the God-Emperor.’

  Atebe looked down at Norroll, who squinted up at her from the pavement at her feet.

  ‘What makes you say so?’ she asked.

  ‘Less golden radiance than I had been led to believe.’

  Atebe ran a dirty hand over her tightly braided blonde cornrows. ‘Are you sure?’

  Norroll shrugged. ‘And you look like Atebe.’

  She shrugged back.

  Norroll glanced around perplexedly. ‘So, we’re not dead?’

  Atebe scoffed. ‘Norroll’s awake,’ she announced over the vox.

  Norroll started to sit up.

  ‘No, no, no. That’s exactly what I was told to not let you do.’ Atebe got off her seat on the barricade and gently pushed Norroll back down. She rolled back on her haunches. ‘Being stupid bought you a reprieve, so stay there and enjoy it.’

  ‘Stupid, how?’

  ‘When is single-handedly charging a platoon not stupid?’ she asked.

  Norroll opened his mouth to say something, but didn’t answer.

  ‘Deny all you like, I watched you do it. Impressive display of violence. But these’ – she thumped on the barricade behind her – ‘are here for a reason.’

  Norroll sat up, waving Atebe off when she moved to push him back down. Akraatumo and Quisse both lay unconscious only a few feet from him, their intravenous feeds set atop a nearby window­sill. He looked around, taking in the extent of the damage. The buildings on either side of the avenue were ravaged, the drab grey of their rockcrete facing pockmarked by las-fire and cratered by heavy mass-reactives. The pavement to the north bore the scars of mortar fire, marred by shallow impact craters and the thin, shrapnel-carved lines radiating from their centres like tiny suns.

  Norroll began to stand up, and Atebe once again tried to push him back down.

  ‘I’m fine,’ Norroll said, though she knew he was lying. He wobbled unsteadily as he rose, his left leg refusing to move properly. Steadying himself on the barricade, he looked at the crust of rust-brown blood that had soaked all the way down the inside of his left leg and over his boot. He pulled open the tear in his fatigues to investigate.

  A large patch, like a sheet of black rubber, had been sealed over the wound, puckering the skin that surrounded it. His leg had been cleaned all around the patch, though blood still crusted the skin further down. He gave a low whistle. ‘How are we not dead?’

  ‘The other regiment, the one Colonel Zheev mentioned.’

  ‘They’re still here?’

  Atebe nodded, hitching a thumb over her shoulder. ‘Dining facility. Tempestor and Commissar Fennech are with the commander. The rest of us are gathering supplies or, in my case, babysitting you.’