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Embers of Extinction – Brandon Easton

About the Author

An Extract from ‘The Solar War’

A Black Library Publication

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EMBERS OF EXTINCTION

Brandon Easton

After the Battle of Phall…

Perturabo stared at the tactical displays with a sense of disbelief as Captain Vort relayed the names of their capital vessels struck down by the cowardly manoeuvres of Polux and his now shattered Retribution Fleet. The charred, battered husks of the best of the Iron Warriors’ destroyers drifted lazily past the hull of the Iron Blood, their ghostly remnants briefly illuminated by plumes of plasma fire.

The Imperial Fists’ desperate gambit had succeeded – Polux had commanded his engineering corps to detonate the plasma reactors on the Victory-class battleship Tribune as the Iron Fleet was on a path to absolute victory. A victory that would have sent shockwaves throughout the Astartes Legions, eventually reaching the ears of the primarch Rogal Dorn. The thought of Dorn and Polux’s prized vessel being taken by Iron Warriors had promised Perturabo a sense of validation that he could cherish like a precious gemstone. With his hand at Dorn’s throat, Perturabo would dangle the loss of the Tribune before his vanquished foe – like wasting fresh water in front of a man dying of thirst at the edge of a vast desert.

The Tribune erupted in a flash of golden fire akin to the exposed core of a yellow dwarf star. Tendrils of fiery white-hot gas lapped against the reinforced hulls of multiple Iron Warriors ships in a split second. Most were instantly reduced to cosmic ash; the vessels that survived the initial blast had their shields and navigational systems fried beyond repair.

Perturabo silently unleashed a torrent of violent condemnations towards the delusional followers of the Emperor’s will. Not because of their convictions, but because he’d allowed them to inflict a considerable amount of damage against his fleet. He’d considered multiple combat strategies and implemented those he believed would deliver a ruthless, ferocious victory.

That’s what he was known for. His trademark. His legacy. His pride.

Perturabo was also known for his unassailable logic. Not the textbook definition of logic – but Perturabo’s logic: an almost purely mathematical application of brutality, bloodshed and slaughter bolstered by a fearlessness of consequence. Perturabo was not careless, he simply believed in winning at all costs. Some dubbed it ‘The Art of Siege’.

He preached the doctrine of bullets and armour; of the total annihilation of his foes; of the humiliation of the Emperor’s Legions and the unadulterated thrill of marching through the crimson-stained streets of Terra, with the Iron Blood drifting high above in orbit relaying their victory to Horus. Factoring in this problematic loss to the Imperial Fists, Perturabo calculated low odds that he’d lose the confidence of his legionaries. Yet the Battle of Phall would conclude with a mighty dent in his visage of invulnerability.

It was statistically improbable for any creature to be truly infallible, but there was high value in the commodity of perception.

Perception as propaganda. A tactic as old as human conflict, Perturabo thought as he imagined Neanderthals painting unflattering and bigoted depictions of the Cro-Magnons on cave walls shortly before triggering their extinction.

‘None of that matters now,’ Perturabo whispered to himself as the Iron Warriors’ casualty lists swiftly blossomed to unacceptable numbers.

At that moment, Captain Vort’s eyes shifted to Perturabo. Because Vort’s cybernetic body was mainly subsumed into the navigational command station of the ship, his head movement was limited to an angular swivel. If you wanted to read Vort’s mind, his eyes were the proverbial windows to his emotional state.

They showed a mixture of shock and anxiety.

‘Do you have something to report?’ Perturabo said.

Vort nodded, his eyes resting on a tactical display before him.

‘Lord, three Lunar-class cruisers from the enemy fleet did not escape with the bulk of the survivors. It’s the Pylades, the Ramses and the Devastation.’

Perturabo’s eyebrow raised at the mention of the latter ship.

‘Status?’ he said.

‘All three vessels are heavily damaged with limited navigational capability. Their proximity to the warp storm rendered them temporarily invisible to our sensors.’

‘In their zeal to escape, they unwittingly stumbled onto the pathway of ruin,’ Perturabo snorted dryly. ‘Is the Iron Blood capable of pursuit?’

‘Yes, my lord…’ Vort replied as if uncertain of his next words.

‘Where are they headed?’

‘A planetary system known as Tarkovsky Epsilon. Comprised of rogue planetoids and dead moons orbiting the gas giant Tarkovsky II.’

Perturabo’s face brightened with a glint of dark anticipation.

‘Time to intercept?’

Vort’s eyes shuffled side to side, a furrow of discomfort settling upon his brow as Perturabo stared impatiently.

‘I require an answer, captain,’ Perturabo said.

‘At best speed, within the hour. However… we have orders from–’ Vort began to say before Perturabo’s voice firmly echoed through the bridge with a note of finality.

‘Who commands the Iron Warriors?’

The bridge fell silent. The only sounds were the ubiquitous creaking of metal and the distant moan of the engines.

Vort leaned forward as far as his cybernetic assembly would allow. ‘Lord, our engines are operating at ninety-four per cent with all weapons systems fully charged and loaded. Per your orders,’ he said with a reassuring timbre.

‘Plot a course. Only the Iron Blood will engage these stragglers. The rest of the fleet will regroup at these coordinates. This foolishness has cost us time and resources and we must conduct an assessment of our current firepower. Until then, maintain a communications blackout. Is that understood?’ Perturabo said.

‘Yes, lord,’ Vort said as he relaxed into his typical stationary position.

Perturabo smirked as he felt the nearly imperceptible shift of the Iron Blood’s mass as the battleship broke from the protective formation of the fleet. Regrettably, this was not the day he’d have the satisfaction of grinding Rogal Dorn’s jaw beneath his boot or ripping Captain Polux’s still-beating heart through his armour, yet Perturabo took solace in the fact that a good number of Imperial servants would die screaming in horror with his face emblazoned in their fading consciousness.

Such feelings stirred deep reservoirs of nostalgia within Perturabo’s mind. Memories of places he hadn’t revisited in a very long while. Perturabo thought of the forge he had constructed deep within the lower decks of the Iron Blood, an almost perfect replica of his private forge back on his home world of Olympia – one of the few locales in the known universe that offered him a sense of balance and clarity.

He closed his eyes, recalling a past era when the barriers between order, chaos, righteousness and regret were more clearly defined. When the wicked and ignorant knew their place in the social fabric of the galaxy…

While Perturabo commanded the IV Legion, battling an insidious xenos invasion by the hrud, the elites ruling Olympia withered away. Their social order had collapsed quickly after a series of deaths, assassinations and a declining population of youth to rebuild the fractured political infrastructure. Without a figurehead regime in place, Olympia descended into a global civil war that had no organising principle or end in sight. All semblances of civilisation deteriorated into mass panic and anarchy.

Upon their return, Perturabo and the IV Legion scoured Olympia’s cities of rebels and malcontents one by one, delivering swift justice in the form of total extermination for all those considered to be criminal in nature and behaviour. Only after the cities were procedurally cleansed, and the few survivors placed into the most brutal system of slavery imaginable, did Perturabo take a moment to survey the carnage he had inflicted upon the people who once considered him a hero.

Perturabo did not subscribe to self-flagellation or any unnecessary moralistic criticism of past actions or attitudes. He reasoned that needless re-examination of his past atrocities and Imperial defamation could not reverse time, reanimate the dead or eradicate the bottomless, blinding stupidity of the average citizen of the Imperium. He reflected upon his actions in the manner a coroner would following an unsuccessful autopsy. It wasn’t the dissection that troubled him, it was the lack of results. In this case, the desired result eluded him. He wanted to ensnare the galaxy with his brand of order and impenetrable logic. Then demand fealty and compliance with a steady fist to build an empire that conformed to his vision of justice.

His perception. His will. His intellect.

That’s all that would matter in Perturabo’s fiefdom of discipline, logic and technology.

Fully aware that the Emperor would never forgive him for the crimes of genocide and enslavement, Perturabo’s conscience had been soothed by the unlikeliest of scenarios: Horus delivering the thunder hammer formerly possessed by Fulgrim. Symbolising the eternal alliance between Perturabo and Horus, the weapon had become a true extension of everything Perturabo believed about war, the base nature of humanity and the absolute necessity of fealty to iron itself.

In the weeks following Horus’ departure, Forgebreaker did not offer solace or comfort to Perturabo – it had the opposite effect. The hammer had all the benchmarks of Imperial military perfection. When Perturabo held it, he could sense the kinetic energy field imbued within the metal like a coiled electrical serpent ready to release its venomous lightning upon impact. As one of the most powerful weapons in existence, Forgebreaker could smash through Astartes armour as if it were composed of a moth’s wings, and leave a smoking hole in any number of armoured vehicles. In a primarch’s hands, Forgebreaker was the closest a mortal could get to directly experiencing the anger of a god.

It was everything a true warrior could want in a weapon. Yet Perturabo did not believe the hammer was ready for warfare. Not yet. A soldier’s weapon was often the determining factor between life and death.

Perturabo needed to enhance the hammer through an elaborate process of refastening and reforging. When complete, Forgebreaker would be the harbinger of Perturabo’s wrath, instilling fear and dread the moment it entered the battlefield. With this in mind, Perturabo had retreated into the seemingly bottomless depths of the Iron Blood, where his forge lay.

Perturabo carefully lowered the thunder hammer onto a massive black anvil scorched by centuries of use. He watched as the molten iron slowly spilled into the forge, casting everything in a harsh red hue. Between the smoke and the liquified metal, one could be fooled into believing they’d stumbled through the gates of the ancient mythological depictions of the underworld most Terrans described as ‘hell’. Perturabo angled the stream of liquid metal to flow to the rear head of the hammer. He slowly sculpted the blunt object with a combination of thongs and welding lasers while reinforcing the edges with a special combination of alloys.

Perturabo raised an oversized blacksmith’s hammer above his head and, with the strength of a thousand men, he slammed it onto Forgebreaker. The blistering clang reverberated through the complex, to be heard kilometres away.

Embers floated in the air like a million red-hot fireflies searching for a mate. The burning particles landed on Perturabo’s flesh. If they singed his skin, the primarch showed no discomfort. His eyes narrowed like those of a predatory hawk as the rear head of Forgebreaker was reformed into a slight angle, which shifted the weight to the front head of the hammer. Perturabo clenched his jaw tighter than a vice, revealing grimy teeth stained with a layer of metallic soot.

‘Your modification will increase the combat effectiveness of the thunder hammer,’ a voice said from the smoky shadows of the room. Perturabo didn’t turn towards the darkness for he already recognised the voice of one of his younger sons, Arhalin.

‘That was my goal,’ Perturabo replied, in a dry, flat tone.

Arhalin wore a standard version of Terminator armour. Perturabo noted that his son’s warplate had not been customised – a striking contrast to his own armour, which was sculpted in the Cataphractii pattern.

Arhalin stepped into the red-orange glow from the smelting furnaces. He was by far the palest of Perturabo’s legionaries, his skin reflecting the dim light like a small moon sharing the shine of its distant parent star. His visage was dotted with tufts of inky black hair protruding from his scalp and chin.

‘I knew you did not wish to be disturbed,’ Arhalin said gruffly, with a hint of apology buried beneath his words.

‘Then why are you here?’ Perturabo asked sharply. ‘In spite of my decree to remain undisturbed, you act in clear defiance.’

‘We’ve received reports from Horus regarding the movement of Dorn’s forces. The communication system on this level of the ship is disabled, but we assumed you would want that tactical update immediately. There was no spite intended, nor was it a motivating factor in my decision to interrupt your work. Although I must admit, my lord, to wanting to observe your incredible handiwork first-hand,’ Arhalin said, stepping back as if expecting his father’s wrath.

Perturabo was certain his words weren’t an attempt at flattery but a sincere declaration.

‘Speak your mind,’ Perturabo said.

‘Your modification of the thunder hammer grants a higher level of destructive impact, increasing your tactical advantage,’ Arhalin said.

‘Everything I do creates a tactical advantage,’ Perturabo replied as his already sullen expression contorted into a narrow scowl.

The primarch spun Forgebreaker by the handle, and a cascade of gnat-sized embers twirled across the anvil like a whirlpool of lava. He raised the weapon to his chest, the molten metal pulsing like the surface of a star.

‘The hammer was already perfectly balanced. I choose to unmake said “perfection”, as one man’s vision of excellence can be the seeds of destruction for another,’ Perturabo said, his eyes transfixed upon the newly moulded edge of the hammer head. ‘My aspirations are greater – therefore, I must shape this weapon to be the ultimate extension of my will.’

‘Leaving no variable uncalculated,’ Arhalin said, looking on with increased interest as Perturabo dropped the hammer onto the anvil.

‘If an enemy were to attempt to use Forgebreaker against me, the first moments of that encounter would be their last.’

‘They would spend precious seconds struggling with the unfamiliar weight and balance, allowing for another opportunity for us to strike,’ Arhalin said.

Perturabo returned to his labours. The reforging process had only just begun. There were countless adjustments and refitting to every last millimetre to complete before Perturabo would be satisfied. Minutes turned to hours. Hours stretched into days. Arhalin remained by his father’s side, studying the primarch’s movements, the manner that he struck the hammer, the duration of the liquid metal pour, the length of time spent moulding the intricacies of the handgrip and haft.

On the fifth day of Arhalin’s vigil, he broke the contemplative silence with a query.

‘Why iron?’

As if on cue, an explosion of sparks and embers erupted from the anvil upon Perturabo’s last strike. The searing particles orbited his torso like a cluster of tiny asteroids. Perturabo admired his handiwork for several minutes before carefully placing Forgebreaker onto a cooling rack.

‘There are innumerable ways to answer you,’ Perturabo said, his already thin patience on the verge of evaporating into pure irritation.

Arhalin’s posture stiffened. Perturabo knew that all of his sons possessed the same trait of intellectual curiosity mixed with impatience. The combination of these attributes led to a level of defiance requiring immediate discouragement. Once the seed of arrogance was planted, certain interpersonal boundaries were obliterated, leading to a slippery slope of provocation, open hostility and – eventually – someone’s death.

Perturabo preferred not to kill any of his troops. It was an impractical waste of resources, but he spent several milliseconds calculating the long-term impact of Arhalin’s demise.

‘I am unsure of your meaning,’ Arhalin said with no trace of hubris.

‘There are many ways to answer your question,’ Perturabo continued. ‘Ironwork has been a consistent staple in human development, coming into existence not long after the dawn of life on Terra. One could say I was paying homage to our earliest ancestors by honouring their forward evolutionary momentum.’

‘But that would be untrue.’

‘Correct. Or I could say that the commitment to iron is a commitment to the universe itself. For iron is one of the most common elements across the galaxy, born of the heartbeat of stars,’ Perturabo said, his voice rising from an excitement about the subject matter.

‘Poetic. But also, false,’ Arhalin said.

Perturabo’s fingers traced the length of the hammer’s grip, his eyes becoming slits of appreciation.

‘Iron is the nature of our existence. We are but soldiers in a grand game of territorial expansion and conquest. We face threats never seen or imagined by humankind. We can inflict terrible damage upon each other without nary a cry for mercy. The galaxy is malleable, containing an array of indescribable and undomesticated forces, and if we expect to tame this unpredictable expanse we must be equally as malleable. Ready at all times to shift and rearrange our strategies to contain whatever we encounter.’

‘Without losing our innate strength,’ Arhalin said, nodding.

‘And therein you have the answer to your query. Our threats run the gamut from the catastrophe of human avarice to the savage violations of encroaching xenos, to disillusioned legionaries incapable of independent thinking. Resulting in their bottomless fealty to the Emperor,’ Perturabo scoffed.

He reached for a longsword hanging on the wall in a dusty scabbard. Pulling out the rustic-looking blade, he swung it in tight arcs over the anvil. He tossed the sword to Arhalin, who mimicked his father’s actions with the weapon.

‘What can you tell me about the blade?’ Perturabo asked.

Arhalin twirled the longsword around his body in a wide figure-of-eight pattern with flawless speed and agility.

‘It’s well made. But dull on the tip and edges. Fully capable of inflicting damage upon a target,’ Arhalin said. Satisfied with his display of sword-handling, he handed it back to Perturabo, but the primarch raised his palm.

‘Now, strike my hammer with all of your might,’ Perturabo said.

Arhalin reluctantly stepped forward. He looked at his father with a questioning glance, but Perturabo gave a reassuring nod.

‘I don’t wish to damage Forgebreaker,’ Arhalin said.

‘Strike it! Now!’

Arhalin took a breath, readjusting his feet and torso to accommodate a wide overhead swing with the longsword. He bore down on the anvil with unprecedented velocity; a swiftness that made his entire upper body appear wraithlike in a blur of fatality. When the blade struck the hammer, it produced a weak glint of sparks accompanied by the short whine of tearing metal. The sword splintered into a multitude of jagged shards that clattered harmlessly into the bed of thick metallic soot at the base of the anvil.

Perturabo kneeled to retrieve one of the broken shards. He examined it closely, then placed it on the edge of the anvil.

‘The sword was ornamental while it rested in the sheath. Believed functional until tested. This is the nature of men in the Imperium. We adorn ourselves in the robes of remarkable achievements only to squander our collective acumen on the worship of a man – an aristocratic hermit who cares nothing for the expansion of our technological supremacy,’ Perturabo said, flexing his massive arm, a barely restrained fury causing his lip to quiver.

‘You spoke of malleability,’ Arhalin said.

‘Humankind,’ Perturabo continued, ignoring his son’s statement, ‘the Imperium, everything we’ve conquered, every vile creature or malcontent we’ve silenced… it was supposed to unfurl the blanket of creation beneath our heels. It’s gone to ruin as humanity dances under an umbrella of idolatry.’

Perturabo poured molten iron onto the shard, which upon contact contorted and withered like a dry leaf submerged in flames. With heavy thongs, Perturabo twisted the red-hot alloy as he struck it repeatedly with a large hammer.

‘The Imperium. Ornamental. Barely functional. Until it is tested. Reforged. Pushed to the edge of its inherent limitations,’ Perturabo said.

When the metallic shard was fully annealed, Perturabo skilfully carved grooves into one side. In its current state it resembled viscous plastek more than a piece of a shattered longsword. He then turned his attention to the base of Forgebreaker’s haft, scoring a matching set of concentric grooves through the core of the lower portion.

For the next few hours, Perturabo poured liquid iron onto the shard while hammering it down to a cylindrical dagger shape – like the fang of a carnodon. He dipped the metal spike into a small pool of water. A blast of steam and boiling water splashed in his face, but again, he showed no sign of distress.

Perturabo lifted Forgebreaker high, twisting the weapon until the bottom of the haft was centimetres from Arhalin’s face.

‘With patience, skill, planning and fortitude, even the weakest of elements can be reshaped into something useful,’ Perturabo said.

‘Malleable,’ Arhalin replied, a wave of understanding washing across his face. ‘Do you consider your faith rewarded, father?’

‘Faith?’

‘Yes. In that some may argue that your trust in iron is similar to humanity’s unblinking belief in the righteousness of the Emperor.’

Perturabo laughed, but it wasn’t based upon humour or merriment; it was an executioner’s laugh – a rumbling, devilish howl emanating from a place of condescending pity.

‘I’ve adhered to the irrefutable laws of space, time and mathematics. The locomotive energies of the cosmos. I say nothing I cannot prove. The Imperium is packed to the brim with soothsayers, mystics and charlatans banking upon man’s nearly infinite levels of ignorance. Why place your life in the hands of simple parlour tricksters when a well-placed shot can permanently remove a problem from your path?’ Perturabo said.

‘What of the Legions under the Emperor’s control?’ Arhalin asked.

‘They will die painfully,’ Perturabo spat, ‘because they place their faith in a narcissistic idol while we have iron.’

Perturabo swung Forgebreaker in a wide, brutal arc before replacing it on the cooling rack.

‘Iron is eternal. It is strong. It lacks the weakness of flesh and the compromises of temptation. It represents the cold truth of our universe,’ Perturabo said.

‘What would that be, in your estimation, father?’

‘Destruction,’ Perturabo replied. ‘The one intractable rule of the universe is that things must be destroyed in order to make room for the stronger generation. Stars go supernova, they wipe out entire civilisations in the blink of an eye without the merest taint of sympathy. That destructive explosion eventually gives birth to brand new planetary systems with abundant life forms who may one day claim dominion over the cosmos. Iron is the key to conquest.’

Perturabo blinked hard as an unsettling thought settled into his mind.

‘Some fear destruction in the manner they fear iron. Simpering cowards like Rogal Dorn. They’ll all die in abject ignorance because they remain stagnant in prostration. Incapable of growth. Incapable of understanding that myths and legends are but shallow opiates used to suppress free will.’

‘The Iron Blood will make contact with the Imperial vessels within moments, sir,’ Captain Vort said.

‘Prepare the port- and starboard-side batteries. No need to waste Stormhawk squadrons,’ Perturabo said, his mood improving as they bore down upon the Ramses and Pylades.

The two Lunar-class cruisers were on a direct course into a zone of asteroids comprised of the remnants of two dead moons cracked in half, still in orbit around a Jupiter-sized gas giant. As the moons’ orbit deteriorated, massive chunks of planetary crust flaked off into space, leaving a trail of interstellar breadcrumbs the size of major continents. Perturabo had no doubt that the commanders of those vessels hoped to use the proximity to the warp storm and the huge pieces of cosmic flotsam to confuse their sensors. He also realised that the third ship, the Devastation, was still out there, its captain perhaps hoping to use his comrades as a distraction to lure the Iron Blood into a trap.

Perturabo calculated the odds that he was being led into an ambush. He concluded that the chances were less than thirteen per cent that the Imperial Fists were planning a trap. Further mental computation revealed that the Iron Blood could easily withstand a combined assault from the three cruisers even if they emptied their batteries at his ship. Ninety-seven per cent chance of survival if directly engaged.

Calculus. Logic. Fearlessness. The formula of victory.

Perturabo studied the telemetry of the star system. There was a floating cluster of debris forming an arch between the two moons. It was the only direct path through the system without getting caught in the gas giant’s gravitational field. It was a tight passageway: only one cruiser could fit through at a time. This was to be their undoing.

‘Arm all plasma torpedoes. The Iron Blood will buffer and trap them between the asteroid arch,’ Perturabo said.

As the Iron Blood dipped into a short arc, Perturabo ordered a wide spread of plasma torpedoes to be launched from the port batteries. The huge warship covered thousands of kilometres in a few short minutes. The torpedoes darted through space with dizzying speed, quickly encroaching on the Pylades, which was bringing up the rear behind the Ramses.

The first torpedoes penetrated the Pylades like bullets through an unarmoured human skull, slamming into the stern and unleashing precious atmosphere into space in a bouquet of blazing plumes. The Iron Blood launched another torpedo volley – these ripped through the guts of the Pylades, the ship vomiting the flaming bodies of Imperial Fists legionaries alongside components vital to the operation of the ship.

The combination of relentless torpedo volleys and explosive decompression caused the Pylades to implode in a vortex of plasma, shredded metal and space rocks. Pieces of superheated metal and flesh drifted aimlessly in the weightless void, like tiny embers hovering above an obsidian anvil.

Perturabo clenched his fist, considering what to do with the Ramses.

‘The minimum safe distance to avoid gravitational entanglements with Tarkovsky II is five thousand kilometres,’ the primarch said, turning his head towards Captain Vort. ‘Aim a low-yield melta torpedo at the Ramses’ engine room. Decrease distance between the Iron Blood and that ship to three hundred kilometres. Angle our forward batteries at two hundred and eighty degrees, then fire the starboard-side plasma torpedoes in a wide detonation spread. We don’t want to hit them. Not yet.’

Vort inputted Perturabo’s instructions, and the Iron Blood fired a large volley of plasma torpedoes as it leaned into a wide tactical crescent. The warheads detonated in a loose halo just beyond the arches of moon debris. As expected, the Ramses adjusted its course to avoid the ring of plasma bursts, which pushed it further away from its escape vector and closer to the atmosphere of Tarkovsky II.

The Iron Blood tore through the arch of debris, the chunks of errant space rocks deflecting off the hull like hailstones bouncing off an armoured tank. The Iron Blood chased the Ramses like a shark hunting bleeding prey, following in a broad ‘S’ pattern, slightly altering their trajectory to compensate for the gas giant’s increasing pull.

‘When they are within six thousand kilometres of the atmosphere, fire the melta,’ Perturabo said with a frigid anticipation in his voice.

As instructed, when the Iron Blood pushed the Ramses within six thousand kilometres of the gravitational well, Vort fired the melta torpedo at the doomed vessel’s engine assembly. Per the primarch’s orders, the melta warhead’s destructive potential had been reduced, so while the impact was considerable, the resulting explosion left the majority of the ship intact and functional.

Short pillars of plasma flame erupted from the engines of the Ramses. The ship began listing, twisting seventy-five degrees off its axis into a gradual drift towards Tarkovsky II. Perturabo imagined the mental state of the crew – all Astartes, born and bred to fight to the last breath. All perfectly willing to die in service of a false idol. All seeking a glorious end in the centre of a maelstrom of warfare with the ability to stare their enemies in the eye.

Perturabo imagined how the Imperial Fists would die knowing they’d succumbed to an enemy not of flesh and blood, but spun from the fabric of the universe itself. No legionary could shoot or stab or punch their way through the force of gravity.

His mind’s eye placed him on the bridge of the Ramses as Tarkovsky’s unstoppable gravity well pulled the ship into the gaseous atmosphere. Initially, the Imperial Fists would be treated to a kaleidoscopic array of vibrant colours along the blue and violet bands of the spectrum. Tarkovsky II was a blue-green emerald of hydrogen, nitrogen, methane and carbon dioxide. Before these gases penetrated the interior of the vessel, the entire ship would be bathed in a wispy veil of aqua.

As the Ramses dropped down to the next atmospheric layer, the pressure would begin to squeeze the hull like a festering rat smashed under an armoured boot. One by one, the Emperor’s minions would suffer an ignoble death of suffocation, explosive decompression or falling into a tempestuous atmosphere. The combination of intense heat, superpowered gusts and oppressive gravity would simultaneously reduce bones to dust as flesh was burned off in a cascade of charred flakes.

‘Lord, the Devastation has appeared off our stern, approaching from a port vector,’ Captain Vort said.

Perturabo narrowed his eyes, nodding. He’d calculated that the Devastation would attempt an attack after their compatriots escaped. There was a level of predictability when considering the tactical strategies of the Emperor’s minions; they locked themselves into restrictive shackles of banality. Perturabo wasn’t afflicted with the disease of normalcy. His intelligence was unmatched and he relished toying with the insipid hordes of grunts incapable of basic analytical reasoning.

When the Iron Blood managed to destroy both vessels in a short span of time, the crew of the Devastation had had to improvise a new strategy and decide if they would attempt to flee or commit to a suicide attack. They had chosen the latter.

Perturabo had no respect for these weak-willed sycophants who’d hope their virtuous sacrifice could boost the morale of the soldiers of the Imperium. He refused to give them the gift of a swift death, but there was little time to engage in torture, so Perturabo settled with the simplest of attack plans.

‘Vort, bring the ship about and place us directly in their path. Increase speed by sixty per cent for a full-bore ramming sequence,’ Perturabo said.

Vort’s eyes focused upon the Iron Lord as he inputted the commands. Vort fully understood what Perturabo intended. The Iron Blood was a Gloriana-class battleship, capable of reducing a large number of lesser vessels to ashes within a matter of minutes. A single Lunar-class cruiser stood no chance of surviving a head-to-head collision. Vort briefly wondered if the Devastation’s commander had a last-minute trick up his sleeve, a surprise manoeuvre that would rewrite the history of Imperial naval tactics.

Such thoughts evaporated along with the internal atmosphere of the Devastation when the colossal bow of the Iron Blood cleaved through their hull, effectively splitting the cruiser in half. With a name that matched its fate, the Devastation was obliterated; the flagship of the Iron Warriors tore through the cruiser like an insatiable carnivorous beast driven by a bloodthirsty madman.

Perturabo turned from the auspex scans and tactical displays with a slight frown on his face. Vort knew better than to question the primarch about his emotional state, so he asked a much safer question.

‘Lord, would you like to look over the casualty lists from the Tribune? Many of our Iron Warriors perished because of their cowardly action.’

Perturabo grabbed Forgebreaker, which rested upon a rack next to his command chair. The primarch twirled the handle of his customised weapon between his fingertips, his eyes admiring his own handiwork and precision.

‘And there’s still the matter of our orders,’ Vort stammered cautiously, extremely aware of how to keep his tone as level, calm and respectful as possible. Vort had seen what happened when Perturabo perceived disrespect from his legionaries. Such moments were permanently seared into the imagination.

‘What are our “orders”?’ Perturabo asked with open derision.

‘We are to report immediately to the Hydra Cordatus System. An Imperial Fists garrison is our target. Designation – the Cadmean Citadel.’

Vort’s head tilted towards Perturabo with a look of surprise. They knew that Rogal Dorn was instrumental in the development of Hydra Cordatus as a major world for the Imperium. Tearing it asunder would be like stabbing Dorn straight in the heart. Now the primarch could settle the score with the Imperial Fists. The loss at Phall was but a prologue to Dorn’s eventual humiliation at Perturabo’s hand.

‘Proceed to Hydra Cordatus,’ Perturabo ordered.

The primarch strode off the bridge, Forgebreaker’s grip producing a tiny metallic ping whenever it made contact with the floor.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Brandon Easton is a professional writer, screenwriter and educator based in Los Angeles, California. He is mainly known for his work on the Warner Bros. Animation reboot of the ThunderCats series, as well as his critically acclaimed work in the comic book industry. ‘Embers of Extinction’ is his first story for Black Library.

An extract from The Solar War.

Terra

On the first of Primus the sirens rang across Terra.

On the myriad worlds conquered and ruled by the Imperium of Man, they talked of year divisions, of time sliced into a thousand equal slivers. First division, second division, third, and so on, without variation or character, until the weight of counting reached a thousand, and one year tipped over into the next. On worlds of endless night or blinding days, a year was the same. In an empire spanning a galaxy, anything else would have been meaningless.

0000014.M31 was how surviving records would mark the first moment of that day, stamped and corrected for temporal accuracy, standardised and stripped of any meaning. But, here, on the world whose night and day and seasons had given mankind its concept of time, the old counting still meant something and so did the moment that one year died and another was born: the Feast of Two Faces, the Day of New Light, the Renewal – on and on went its names. But for longer than memory it had been the first of Primus, firstborn of the three hundred and sixty-five days that would follow, a day of hope and new beginnings.

The turning of that year began with snow on the northern battlements of the Imperial Palace, where three brother demigods watched the night skies above. It began with the dawn light and icy chill reaching into a tower-top chamber and stirring the painted cards dealt by a man who was older than any knew. It began with the sirens calling out, one at first, high on the Palace spires, before the cry was picked up by others, on and on across the turning globe. The sound echoed through the mountain-sized space ports and rasped from vox-horns in the deep strata of the Atlantean Hives.

On and on it went, stilling the hands of people as they ate and worked. They looked up. In caves beneath the earth, and hive vaults, and under the smog drifts, they looked up. Of those that could see the sky, a few thought they could make out new stars amongst the firmament and froze at the promise of each pinprick of light: a promise of fire and ash and an age of loss. And with the sound of sirens, fear spread, unnamed but still spoken.

‘He is here,’ they said.

Prison ship Aeacus, Uranus high orbit

‘I understand you have a story…’ she said. The wolf stood before her, the fur of its back silver beneath the moonlight. ‘A particularly entertaining one. I’d like to remember it, for posterity.’

The wolf turned, its teeth a smile of sorrow.

‘Which story?’

‘Horus killing the Emperor.’

Mersadie Oliton woke from the memory-dream with sweat on her face. She breathed, and pulled the blanket over her from where it had slipped onto the floor. The air was cool and dank in the cell, scented with the tang of air that had been exhaled too much. She blinked for a second. Something was different. She reached out a hand and touched the metal wall. Moisture clung to the rivets and rust scabs. The thrum of the ship’s engines had gone. Wherever they were, they were stationary in the void.

She let her hand drop and let out a breath. The tatters of the memory-dream still clung to her eyelids. She focused, trying to pull back the threads of the dream even as they slid into darkness.

‘I must remember…’ she said to herself.

‘The prisoner will stand and face the wall.’ The voice boomed out of the speaker set above the cell door.

She stood instinctively. She wore a grey jumpsuit, worn and faded. She put her hands on the wall, fingers splayed. The door unlocked with a clang, and footsteps sounded on the grated floor. The guard would be one just like the rest: crimson-clad and silver-masked, the humanity in its voice concealed by vox distortion. All the gaolers were the same, as constant as the ticking of a clock that never struck the hour.

Small spaces, locked doors, questions and suspicions – such had been her world for the seven years since she had come back to the Solar System. That was the price for what she had seen, for what she remembered. She had been a remembrancer, one of the thousands of artists, writers and scholars sent out to witness the Great Crusade as it brought the light of reason to a reunited humanity. That had been her purpose: to see, to remember. Like many clear purposes and shining futures, it had not worked out that way.

She heard the footsteps stop behind her, and knew the guard would be placing a bowl of water and a fresh jumpsuit on the floor.

‘Where are we?’ she asked, hearing the question come from her mouth before she could stop it.

Silence.

She waited. There would not be a punishment for her asking, no beatings, no withdrawal of food or humiliation – that was not how this imprisonment worked. The punishment was silence. She had no doubt that other, more visceral methods were used on other prisoners – she had heard the screams. But for her there had only been silence. Seven years of silence. They did not need to ask her questions, after all. They had taken the memory spools out of her skull, and those recordings would have told them everything they wanted and more.

‘We are still in the void, aren’t we,’ she said, still facing the wall. ‘The engine vibrations have stopped, you see. No way of missing it if you have spent any time on ships… I spent time on a warship once. You never lose the sense of it.’ She paused, waiting for a response, even if it was just the sound of retreating footsteps and the door shutting.

Silence again.

That was strange. She had tried talking to guards in the early years, and their response had been to leave her without reply. After a while, that had felt worse than if they had struck a whip across her back. They had never beaten her, though, or even touched her. Even when they opened her skull to remove the memory spools, they had sedated her, as though that made the violation that followed more acceptable.

She supposed that such small mercies had to do with Qruze or Loken. The former Luna Wolves had watched over her as much as they could. But that had still left her a prisoner of the greatest and darkest prison in the Imperium. Loken had said that he would free her, but she had refused. Even while it pained her, she understood why she had to remain locked up. How could she not? After all, had she not seen the true face of the enemy? Four years of life on the Vengeful Spirit amongst the Sons of Horus, in the shadow of their father, who now had set the galaxy alight with civil war. What other reward could there be for remembering those days? A galaxy shrunk to silence and plasteel walls, with only dreams and memories to speak to her.

She had begun to dream memories after a few months, dreams of her home on Terra, of the sunlight shattering across the edge of the Arcus orbital plate, her mother laughing and calling after her as she ran through the hydro-gardens. And she had dreamed of her time amongst the Luna Wolves, and the Sons of Horus, of people now long dead. She had asked for parchment and pen, but none had been given to her. She had gone back to the old games her mind-nurse had taught her, ways of tucking memories away when she woke from sleep, ways of remembering the past even as it fled into the distance. In the silence, she had found that memories and dreams were all she had, all she was.

‘Are we still somewhere in the Solar System?’ she asked, and twitched her neck to look behind her. Why was she still talking? But then why had the guard not left? ‘The ship doesn’t feel like it’s preparing for translation. Where are we?’

They had come for her in her cell on the Nameless Fortress three nights ago. They had loaded her into a box barely big enough to stand upright in. She had felt the box judder and sway as machines had lifted it and her. They had let her out into this cell, and she had recognised the vibration of a void-ship under power. It had been comforting at first, but her dreams had not been, and now the silence of this moment was feeling stranger with each elongating second.

‘Why was I taken away from the fortress?’ she asked. ‘Where am I going?’

‘Where we all wish we could go, Mistress Oliton,’ said Garviel Loken. She whirled, and the end of her cell was gone and a wolf was rising from a pool of dark water beneath the moon. Its eyes were black spheres, and its bared-teeth grin was wide as it spoke. ‘You are going home.’

In the dark of her cell, Mersadie Oliton woke to silence and lay still, waiting for the dream to fade or for herself to wake again.

Strike Frigate Lachrymae, Trans-Plutonian Gulf

The first ship of the onslaught died as it breached the veil of reality. Streams of plasma reached out from gun platforms. White fire smashed into the ship’s prow. Lightning and glowing ectoplasm streamed behind its hull. Macro shells detonated amongst the molten wounds already cut into its skin. Turrets and spires sheared from its bulk. Towers broke from its spine. It kept coming even as its bows were torn apart. The burning wreck struck the first of the mines scattered across the dark. Explosions burst around it. The front portion of the ship sheared from the back. Prow and gun decks hinged down. Atmosphere vented from the exposed interior. Debris scattered, burning for an eye-blink before the flames ate the air trapped in the wreckage.

‘Ship kill,’ called a sensor adept from across the bridge of the Lachrymae.

Sigismund watched the intruder’s death as it spread across the pict screens above the command dais. He was armoured, his sword chained to his wrist and resting point down on the deck at his feet. He did not blink or move as the dying ship tumbled across his sight. In the still depths of his mind he heard the words that had brought him to this place and time.

‘You must choose where to stand. By the words of your duty, or by your father’s side at the end.’

Around him the command crew was silent. Eyes fixed on instruments and screens. This was the beginning of the moment they had all known would end the years of waiting. Some, perhaps, had thought or hoped that it would never come. But here it was, marked with fire.

I chose, Keeler, he thought, and in his mind, he heard again the words that Dorn had spoken in judgement of that choice.

‘You will continue in rank and position as you have, and you will never speak to any other of this. The Legion and the Imperium will not know of my judgement. Your duty will be to never let your weakness taint those who have more strength and honour than you.’

‘As you will, father.’

‘I am not your father!’ roared Dorn, his anger suddenly filling the air, his face swallowed by dusk shadows. ‘You are not my son,’ he said quietly. ‘And no matter what your future holds, you never will be.’

‘I chose,’ he whispered to himself, ‘and here I stand at the end.’

The fire from the dead warship spread across the displays.

‘If they come at us like this, the slaughter will barely be worth the sweat,’ growled Fafnir Rann.

‘They will not give us that luxury,’ replied Boreas from further back on the platform. Sigismund did not look around at where the holo-projections of the Assault captain or his lieutenant hovered at his shoulders. Each of them stood on the command deck of one of the Lachrymae’s sister ships.

Rann wore void-hardened Mark III armour, with reinforcing studs bonded to his shins and left shoulder. The scars of battles fought here, at the edge of the system, ran beneath the fresh yellow lacquer. His tall boarding shield hung in his right hand, the twin axes mag-locked to its back echoed in the heraldry painted on the shield’s face. Sigismund imagined he could see the warped smile on Rann’s face as he turned to Boreas and shrugged.

The holo-image of the First Lieutenant of the Templars did not move. Unhelmed, his face was a single twisted scar, and if there was any emotion beyond cold fury behind his eyes, Sigismund could not see it. Boreas’ sword of office stood almost as tall as he did, its guard the cross of the Templars, its blade etched with the names of the dead.

‘All ships, stand by,’ said Sigismund softly, and heard the orders ripple out.

The vibration in the deck rose in pitch. The dull ache that had been building in his skull for the last hours was sharpening. He noticed one of the human deck crew shiver and wipe a hand across a bead of blood forming in her nose.

‘Hold to our oaths and the strength of our purpose,’ he called.

Whispers buzzed at the edge of his thoughts, razor tips scratching over metal. They had needed to sedate every astropath in the fleet two hours before, as a wave of psychic pressure had sent them babbling and screaming. It had become more intense with every passing moment, and it presaged one thing: it was the bow wave of a truly vast armada coming through the warp, bearing down on the Solar System like a storm front. Horus and the traitors were coming.

‘Etheric surge detected!’ shouted a sensor officer.

‘Here it comes,’ said Rann, and brought his fist to his chest. ‘Honour and death.’

‘For the primarch and Terra,’ said Boreas.

‘For our oaths,’ said Sigismund. The images of his two brothers blinked out.

He reached down and pulled his own helm from his belt and locked it in place over his head. ‘May my strength be equal to this moment,’ he said to himself as the helm display lit in his eyes. The data of the battle sphere overlaid his sight.

The Plutonian Gulf glittered with weapon platforms, torpedo shoals and mine drifts. Together they formed a great web, tens of thousands of kilometres deep, stretching from the very edge of night to the orbits of Pluto itself. Ships glinted amongst the defences: fast gun-sloops and monitor ships that were little more than engines and weaponry. They had been built in the orbital forges of Luna, Jupiter and Uranus and dragged to the edge of the sun’s light. Alongside them lay the fleet of the First Sphere: hundreds of warships, all in motion. And beyond the warships, the moons of Pluto waited. Studded with weapons and hollow with tunnels, each was a fortress that could have stood against a fleet.

The sheet of stars erupted with lightning. Rents opened in the vacuum. Nauseating colours and dazzling light poured out as ship after ship surged from nothing into being. Tens, and then hundreds. The sensor servitors in the Lachrymae twitched and gabbled as targets multiplied faster than they could vocalise updates.

Mines detonated, explosions leaping from one to another in chains that stretched across the dark. Gun platforms opened up. Macro shells, rockets and plasma struck metal and stone, bored in and exploded. Ships died even as they tasted reality, armour stripped by fire, guts spilled into the dark. In the first ten seconds, over a hundred vessels burned to wreckage. Most had been former warships of the Imperial Army, crewed by humans who had given their oath to Horus and been rewarded with the honour of being the first to draw their blades in this battle. They died for that honour, burning too in the ruin of their ships, hulls shredded around them.

But they kept coming.

Ship after ship, tearing reality like flags waving in front of a gun-line. The first Legiones Astartes warship surfaced from the warp. It was named the Erinyes, and it was a bombardment galleon of the IV Legion: a five-kilometre-long hull wrapped around a trio of nova cannon barrels. She loosed all three shots as the void kissed her skin. Each nova cannon shell was the size of a Battle Titan, its core filled with unstable plasma. They had no target, but they needed none. They ran straight into the heart of the defences and exploded with the force and light of a star’s birth. Gun platforms vanished. Mines lit off in spheres of red flame. Fire poured from the defences as more ships rammed past the debris of their dead kin.

The light of the blaze flooded through the Lachrymae’s screens and viewports. Sigismund’s helm display dimmed.

‘Engage,’ he said, and the Lachrymae leapt forwards. Twenty strike cruisers and fast destroyers followed in tight formation. Lance fire speared out from them, slicing into ships as they cut across the front of the enemy fleet. Plumes of ghost-light and ectoplasm stretched like arms through the dark as more ships punched through from the warp.

A backwash of etheric lightning struck the Imperial Fists cruiser Solar Son. It spun, its hull cracking and crumpling as the laws of reality went into flux. The Lachrymae and its sisters did not pause but plunged on. They had one purpose in this moment: to kill as many of the enemy as possible while they clawed from the warp onto the shore of reality. For the moment, the Imperial Fists’ prey was vulnerable, and the First Sphere fleet were predators.

The Lachrymae’s guns found the skin of the gun-barge Fire Oath before it could light its void shields. Macro shells punched through gun decks and exploded. Munitions cooked off in loading hoists. The Fire Oath’s hull bulged, then burst. Building-sized pieces of hull scythed out, caught the flank of a battle cruiser as it emerged from the warp and tore its command castle from its back. The warp breach it had emerged from pulsed and swallowed the wreckage.

‘Hold,’ called Sigismund, his voice passing through the ships of his command via crackling vox-link. ‘For our oaths, we hold true.’

The Lachrymae sliced on while its mortal crew screamed as ghosts and nightmares flooded their sight. Reality in the battle sphere was now little more than tattered scraps blowing in the night. The Lachrymae rolled, her guns finding enemy after enemy. But for each one that died, another three came from the warp.

Deadfall torpedoes set in the void triggered and speared forwards. Carcasses of ships split and burned. Pluto’s fortress-moons found their range to the first of the invaders and spoke. Newly lit void shields flashed as they collapsed. Volleys answered. The reserve fleets holding close to the moons powered forwards and began to kill and die. The light of battle swelled, blurring with the glow of thousands of warp transitions, until which side was firing and which was burning was lost in a rippling blaze tens of thousands of kilometres across. Hours later, the light of that fire would glimmer in the night above the battlements of the Imperial Palace as the sirens called and alarums rang to tell that Horus had, at last, brought his war to the birth system of humanity.

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First published in Great Britain in 2020.
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