CHILDREN OF THE EMPEROR
Barrington J Bayley

HOARSE SCREAMS AND the screech of tortured hot metal filled the air. Massive laser blasts were punching into the spaceship. They superheated the air that men breathed, set fire to everything that could burn and sent fireballs exploding through the crowded passageways.
Imperial Guardsman Floscan Hartoum found himself in a crowd of jostling, panicking men. Minutes before, the men of the Aurelian IXth regiment had been ordered to the armoury to collect their lasguns and short-swords in case the enemy should manage to teleport aboard. They would never reach the armoury now. The crippled troopship Emperor's Vengeance was in a state of absolute chaos. Suddenly a great howl of collective terror rose up. Down the corridor a glowing, writhing red mass had appeared, rolling down the passageway towards them.
Like the others, Floscan turned and ran. He had been at the back of the crowd; now he was at the front. Pushed from behind, he fell, then managed to get his legs under him and leaped. Behind him he heard an automatic emergency bulkhead descend with a thump.
Staggering to his feet, he found that he was alone in an empty section of corridor. He had been the only one to slither under the bulkhead as it came down. Everyone else was trapped on the other side. Floscan stood, shaking, hearing the fireball slam against the steel partition, accompanied by the agonised shrieks of his comrades who were being incinerated. He pressed his hands to his ears to shut out the cries.
The Emperor's Vengeance was old, centuries old. Guardsman Hartoum firmly believed that only the holy rituals carried out daily by the ship's priests kept it in one piece. But it was meticulously tended. The burnished

metal ribs of the arch-roofed passageway gleamed. Effigies and efficacious runes, etched at various times by mechanics and priests, adorned the walls. But right now Floscan was blind to all this. The dying screams of his comrades fading behind him, he stumbled to an oval porthole set in a brass surround, and stared blindly out.
He was looking into the star-strewn blackness of space. Unknown miles away, the sharp outlines of the attacking ships were visible. Even at this distance they were an extraordinary sight, a motley collection had set, of mongrelised and ramshackle craft, looking for all the galaxy as though they had each been constructed from two or three spacecraft crudely welded together. They had set upon the flotilla of troop transports, clumsy barges only lightly armed, as it emerged from the warp to take its bearings. The result was utter carnage. The makeshift character of the ships identified their crews as orks, who did not build spacecraft themselves but used whatever they could capture or scavenge from other races. How they must have roared with savage delight to see units of the Imperial Navy materialise unsuspectingly before them!
Now the flotilla's escorting battlecruiser Glorious Redeemer hove into view, a massive structure with baroque, gargoyle-encrusted spires and weapons turrets which were gouting plasma as it attempted to defend the troopships. But it was heavily out-gunned and had been taken by surprise. Half a dozen ork ships had surrounded it and their armament was tearing it to pieces, great crenellated chunks spinning off into space.
From another of the ork craft something came flimmering. It was followed by a juddering shock that went right through the vitals of the Emperor's Vengeance with a roaring noise. The passageway buckled. From all around came the cacophony of a ship breaking up. They had been hit by a plasma torpedo!
'ABANDON SHIP! ABANDON SHIP!'
The order crackled ffirough the antique ceiling speakers. Guardsman Hartoum however, needed no prompting. He was already dashing for the nearest escape pods, scrambling over the newly-made folds and rents in the floor.
'Belay that order, Guardsman! Fight to the end against the vile enemies of the Emperor!'
Floscan pulled up sharp. An intimidating figure in a black, square-shouldered longcoat was standing stiffly at the corridor's next bend. It was the commissar, Leminkanen. The grim expression beneath his peaked cap was nothing new. He wore it all the time, but especially during the fanatical morale-boosting lectures Floscan had been required to attend.
The order to abandon ship had come from the captain. Floscan had no idea who ranked higher in this situation, captain or commissar, but he did know that if he obeyed the latter he was unlikely to still be alive one minute from now. Instinctively he moved to the nearby pod.

You will not ran in the face of the enemy, Guardsman. Where is your lasgun?'
The last words were drowned out by an enormous squealing of metal being torn apart, followed by the terrifying hiss of air escaping from the ruptured hull. A lasgun suddenly appeared in the Commissar Leminka-nen's hand. Its lethal beam zipped past Hartoum's ear as he hurled himself into die lifepod, in the same motion striking the rune-encrusted button fhat closed the hermetic seal. His hand trembling with panic, he pulled the lever to eject.
Fragments rattled against the pod as it rocketed away from the disintegrating troopship. The fierce acceleration drained the blood from Floscan's brain and he blacked out.
WHEN HE CAME TO, the total silence of fhe pod's close confines, in which there was barely room to move, was frightening. Even the sound of Floscan's breathing seemed unnaturally loud. He dragged himself to the tiny porthole and peered out.
If there was anything to be seen at all, it consisted of spread wreckage which occasionally drifted between himself and the stars, making them twinkle. The flotilla was destroyed, and with it the Aurelian IXth Regiment. Of the ork ships there was no sign.Guardsman Hartoum fell back on the pod's couch, unable to bear the devastating sight.
Aurelia, where Floscan had been raised, was an agricultural world. He had joined the founding Imperial Guard regiment voluntarily, hoping for challenge and adventure. Now that he had found them, he was wishing for his quiet life back on the farm. He firmly believed in the Emperor, of course, but now he was beyond even His help. He was alone, and lost. Rescue was impossible. The navy would not even know where the flotilla had emerged from the warp. The pod would keep him alive for a few days, and then...
It would have been better to have died alongside his comrades.
Overcome with despair and even shame at his escape, Floscan buried his face in his hands and sobbed for a while. Then he took a grip on himself. He was an Imperial Guardsmen, he told himself. The Emperor would expect him to keep up his courage, no matter how bad things became. He steeled himself to face death calmly. Eventually, some dread curiosity drew him back to the porthole. He felt compelled to look again into the void which was to be his grave. When he did, he gasped, his jaw hanging.
There was a planet below him.
FLOSCAN HARTOUM'S HEART was beating wildly, thoughts racing through his brain. The planet might have a poisonous atmosphere; it might hold deadly horrors - or it might offer a chance of survival, though he would

be marooned for life. It was beautiful, too, with dazzling blue oceans and shining white clouds.
The pod could already be falling towards the planet, or it could be in orbit around it, but most likely it was on a course that would take it out of range and unable to reach the shining world. Hartoum would have to act quickly. He studied the simple controls. Escape pods were manufactured cheaply, in huge numbers, and were best described as crude. Floscan's training in their use had lasted less than twenty minutes, and he barely knew what to do. Luckily, there was little to understand. There were none of the glowing icons and shining runes that would have embellished more sophisticated equipment. Instead there was, included in the moulding of the control panel, a simple prayer to the Emperor:
Fotens Terribilitas, adjuva me in extremis!
Mighty Terribilitas, aid me in my plight!
Fervently muttering the prayer, he took hold of the control levers. The gyro whined, rotating the pod to point its snub nose at the luminous world. The small rocket engine fired again, drawing on the scant amount of fuel. Floscan was sent hurtling into the planet's atmosphere.
DESPITE IT BEING his only way to see outside, Floscan dogged down the porthole's cover once the buffeting began. He wasn't sure the glassite would be able to withstand the heat that would be generated by the friction of the atmosphere.
The rocket engine had soon ran out of fuel and was silent. Escape pods were supposed to be able to land on a planet automatically, but like everything else about them the arrangements were rudimentary at best, escape for defeated Guardsmen was scarcely high on the Imperium's list of priorities, and Floscan began to feel there was something wrong. Strapped into the acceleration couch, he was being spun around wildly, tossed up and down and jerked from side to side. It was getting very hot, too, making him wish he had cut off the rocket engine sooner. He had hit the atmosphere at too high a speed. The pod's outer layer was supposed to absorb heat and then shed it by peeling away in fragments, but how thick was it? When it was all gone he would be roasted alive. So violent became the descent that Floscan passed out again.
When he next opened his eyes, he did not know how much later, everything had become still. A breeze was on his face. He could hear a distant chirruping sound, as of unknown animal calls.
He had landed.
The acceleration couch had been torn from its moorings and his face had struck the control panel. He threw off the restraint straps and felt his aching cheek. It was bleeding. Automatically he consulted the survival meter under the mangled panel. It told him that the planet had a

breathable atmosphere but then he already knew that, because he was already breathing the local air. Evidently the pod had cracked open on impact. He could see daylight through the gaping rent.
His limbs seemed to be made of lead and he was finding it difficult to move, making him fearful of having internal injuries. Several times he struck the rune-inscribed button that should have opened the hatch, but it was stuck. Then he tried to undo the hatch manually. The frame was warped and he was unable to shift it.
Finally, panting with effort, he attacked the rent in the pod's side, placing his feet on one edge and bracing his back against a stanchion. The surprisingly thin shell of the pod moved, making a gap large enough for him to squeeze through.
He tried to stand up and found that he couldn't. He had no internal injuries. It was simply that his body weighed three or four times more than it normally would. He was on a heavy gravity planet. How could he survive if he couldn't even stand up? Guardsman Hartoum struggled to come to his feet. Using his arms, he managed to push himself to a squatting position. Then he heaved with all the strength he could muster in his legs, until he thought the blood vessels would burst.
'God-Emperor, aid me!' Grimacing with effort, Floscan came upright, shaking, feeling the gravity drain him of muscle power and try to drag him down. How long could he maintain himself like this?
He looked around him. The sky was a shining, metallic blue-grey, casting the landscape in a sinister glow. The terrain consisted of rocky crags and low hills to which clung shrub-like trees and crimson reeds. Altogether it was a dismal, depressing environment, over which there seemed to hang a feeling of menace.
The escape pod had cracked open on striking a rocky outcropping. Thick white parachute cords straggled from it but the parachute itself had been torn off sometime during the descent, though presumably not far from the surface or the impact would have killed him.
A stiff cold wind was blowing making Floscan shiver. Grey clouds raced overhead. He felt dizzy, whether from the blow to his head or because the heavy gravity made it difficult for blood to reach his brain he did not know. And he felt frightened, filled with foreboding. It was hard to believe that only yesterday he had been cursing the monotony of the space journey to an equally unexciting posting.
He was about to sit down again and rest when a hoarse shout made him turn round. He was standing at one end of a shallow valley. Charging along it towards him was a troop of about twenty men. They were massively muscled, evidently well adapted to the heavy gravity, with shaggy hair which streamed behind them in the wind. Some brandished spears, others raised bows and were whipping arrows from quivers strapped to their backs. And. they were heading straight towards him.

Death now seemed both certain and sudden, and all of Guardsman Floscan Hartoum's gloom and uncertainty cleared from his mind. He was defenceless; escape pods carried no lasguns, which were too expensive to waste on men with little or no chance of survival. He doubted if he could run at all, let alone outdistance his pursuers, and if he took refuge in the pod he would only be left trapped like an animal.
He took a deep breath. Best take it like a soldier of the Aurelian IXth. He would go down fighting with his bare hands. But perhaps there was better than that. A flung spear clattered on the rock to his left. He managed to take a few steps, squatted down and lifted the thick wooden shaft off the ground. It was incredibly heavy in his hands, but somehow he heaved himself erect once more and turned to face the enemy, the spear-point held before him. If he could take just one of the attackers with him, he would have died with honour.
Anomer spear came hurtling by, together with a flock of arrows, but the aim was poor and all missed him by a wide berth. There seemed to be something strange about the oncoming natives' gait. As they came close enough for him to make them out clearly, he saw that he had been mistaken about them.
They were not men at all, they were four-footed aliens! Seen from the front diey looked human enough, clad as they were in short smocks of coarse cloth belted at the waist, but from the side or the rear it was a different matter entirely. The lower back and rump were sloped and extended, and were supported by a second pair of legs. These were just like the front legs except that they were shorter, almost stubby. Both pairs seemed to work in unison, so that the creatures ran with a swift but swaying gait.
The strange spectacle startled Floscan. The induction address at his regiment's Founding flashed through his mind: 'You will be fighting aliens, mutants, monsters, heretics, all things abominable to the Emperor!' Now he was to die in fulfilment of those words!
But instead of rushing straight at him, the troop thundered past. It was charging, not at Floscan, but at something else. Floscan turned to look -and dropped his spear, paralysed with shock.
The quadruped aliens had been shouting warnings, not threats. The valley ended in a craggy hill, like many littering the broken landscape. Emerging over the brow was a monster combination of lobster, crab and armoured centipede - but of stupendous size. It almost covered the hill over which it was clambering, its bossed shell scraping on the rock, hissing sounds issuing from its oscillating mouth parts. As it descended, a giant claw reached out to seize the escape pod, crashing it like an eggshell before dropping it again.
The same claw reached for Floscan. He staggered back, straggling to maintain his footing. Yelling battle-cries, the natives sent spears and

arrows clattering against the shiny carapace. They were aiming at the monster's soft parts: waving eyestalks and the broad, dripping mouth that could have taken them all in one go. Stone axes hacked at the claw that was about to pick up Floscan. Chitin splintered, purple ichor flowed and gouted, the limb was severed and lay twitching.
It was incredible to Floscan that the natives would take on this gigantic, fearsome beast with their primitive weapons. And yet they were winning. Two staring golden eyes were transfixed by arrows, a third by a spear. Hissing and screeching, the monster retreated and crawled back over the hill to whoops of victory from the four-footed warriors.
Now their attention turned to Floscan. The leader, a fierce-looking individual with fiery red hair and beard, pointed to him and bellowed an order in a guttural, unintelligible language. A second quadruped dashed forward and seized Floscan, flinging him violently across his well-muscled, smock-covered back and holding him there in a vice-like grip. The whole troop turned and raced back the way it had come, knocking the breath out of Floscan with every pace.
Once again he had been snatched from the jaws of death. Once again, most likely, to face something worse. He was in the hands of aliens.
ONCE THROUGH THE valley, Floscan managed to raise his head and was able to see just how strange and dangerous a world he had come into. It was a nightmare world with its glaring sky, tumbled landscape and gigantic lifeforms. The crab-centipede monstrosities seemed to be everywhere, ambling aimlessly in search of food. The quadrupeds managed to avoid them, but apparently there were more terrifying threats to their existence. They slowed before they had got very far, spreading out and jinking nervously.
Floscan spotted what he thought at first was a factory smokestack rearing high in the air in the distance, such as might be seen in Aurelia's industrial zone. It even belched smoke, or perhaps it was steam, and gave off vague hooting sounds. But it was not a factory chimney. It was alive. It was flexible. And it was bending over, its reeking mouth swooping across the terrain towards the troop. The quadrupeds scattered, taking cover in rock crevices. From there Floscan watched in fascination. Briefly he saw a ring of eyes around the 'chimney's' circular rim as it picked off a crab-centipede. The monster was sucked straggling into the tube as it whipped upright once more, presumably to be drawn into an enormous stomach.
Cautiously the quadrupeds set off once more. Once out of reach of the stack-beast they sought high ground. Floscan was puzzled as to why they would expose themselves so, but from the vantage point of a craggy ridge he got the answer. The low ground was dotted with a terrifying type of plant-like animal: a house-sized bulb, vaguely resembling a cactus, from

which spread dozens of wriggling, searching tentacles, radiating in every direction. Any edible animal they found was whipped back to be devoured.
A quadruped, or anything roughly the size of a man, would have stood no chance trying to cross that deadly network. Floscan's mind whirled. Just how many alien horrors did this planet have to offer? Suddenly the quadrupeds seemed out of place, as if they did not really belong here. They were like hapless insects, ready to be picked off by a host of larger creatures.
But he could think no more, only concentrate on the agony of his rough ride on the back of the native. Though he dreaded what awaited him, it was almost a relief when the quadrupeds' village came in sight. It was fortified with a twenty foot tall hedge bristling with thorns and sharpened stakes. At a shouted signal, a section of hedge was dragged inward allowing them to enter.
The scene within was tumultuous, a throng of four-footed aliens surging among huts thatched with crimson reeds. A blazing fire burned in the centre of the compound, some sort of animal roasting over it on a spit. Floscan was tossed from his carrier and set on his feet, again straggling to stand against the dragging gravity.
Great excitement greeted his arrival. The natives jostled with one another, rearing on their hind legs and uttering exultant cries. Hands grabbed Floscan and pulled him towards the fire. He shrank back, his face slack. Terror coursed through his every nerve. He was destined for the spit! He lost control of himself and began straggling desperately as the flames scorched his face.
Suddenly he was released. A chunk of smoking cooked meat, torn from the roasting carcass, was thrust into his hand. For all the ecstasy of relief he felt, Guardsman Floscan Hartoum discovered that he was hungry. He sniffed the meat. It smelled good. He bit, chewed, then began to eat ravenously. The aliens cheered. While he satisfied his hunger, Floscan glanced from side to side. What was in their minds? Were they toying with him, treating him well, before killing him? He had heard that primitive tribes did that.
How strangely human mese aliens looked, if one did not look below the waist. True, they were of fierce appearance, and were very broad-set. Floscan, who thought of himself as a burly youth, felt positively slim beside them. And of course he was weak as a child compared with their rippling muscles.
As he swallowed the last fragment of meat, the natives suddenly fell silent. Their ranks parted to allow the passage of one who had emerged from a nearby hut. He walked slowly and with dignity on his four legs. His face was craggy with age, and his hair and beard were white.
He halted before Floscan, regarding him with steady eyes. Then, to the Guardsman's total surprise, he spoke, not in die unintelligible local speech Floscan had heard earlier, but in a strangled version of Imperial

Gothic, so that he had to repeat his question twice before he made himself understood.
'Have you come to us from the Emperor?'
Floscan blinked. How could these primitives on an out-of-the-way planet speak Imperial Gothic and know of the God-Emperor? Aware that his life might well depend on his reply, he thought for a moment and then spoke in a clear voice. Yes! I am a warrior of the Emperor!'
The elder was clearly not impressed by these words. He looked Floscan up and down. 'You? Warrior? Warrior has weapons. Where are yours?'
Too late, Floscan realised he hardly counted as a fighting man by these natives' standards. He waved his arms defiantly and became theatrical. The Emperor sent me through the sky to fight his enemies. I was cast down to this land... but lost my weapons.'
Then you were defeated,' the aged quadruped grunted. He beckoned. 'Follow.'
He turned and walked with his ambling gait back to the hut. Floscan tried to follow, but after only a few steps needed to be helped by another quadruped who put out a beefy hand to support him.
Inside the hut the elder gestured to a reed pallet on the floor. 'More comfortable lying down.'
Thankfully Floscan lowered himself to a sitting position. The old alien did likewise, folding both pairs of legs under him. 'I am Ochtar, the Remembering One of our tribe. My duty is to remember the ancient histories, make sure they are not forgotten.' Floscan could understand his thick accent a little better now. But the next words left him dumbfounded. 'Do you bring us a message from the Emperor? Is he going to take us into the Imperium and make us his children?'
To Guardsman Hartoum such an idea was not only bizarre and sinister, it was also impossible. He had been raised in the Imperial cult, and his childhood beliefs had been given additional fire during his short time in the Imperial Guard. Already the Aurelian IXth regiment had helped in the extermination of an alien race who for a while had shared their world with human colonists. Humans could not be expected to live indefinitely on a contaminated planet. He was grateful to the aliens for saving his life, but they were aliens.
'It is the Imperium of Man, no?' Ochtar insisted, when Floscan failed to answer. 'We are men.'
Floscan looked at the animal-like appearance of Ochtar's lower body. 'Men have two legs!' he burst out without thinking. 'You have four!'
Ochtar sprang to his feet, glaring angrily. 'We are humans with four legs!' Seeing that he had frightened Floscan he calmed down and seated himself again. 'Forgive my anger, Emissary. It is right that you should probe and question. Let me explain. Our ancestors were like you - two legs. Like you, they travelled the sky, searching for new

worlds on which to live. Instead, they crashed here and became stranded. That was many, many years ago.
'You have seen what sort of world this is. Where you come from, objects do not weigh very much and one needs only two legs to stand up. Here, everything is heavy. Not only that, but our world is hostile to human life. The ancients who crashed here realised that they would not survive long. But they had powerful magic, and they used this to give their children four legs so that they could stand up. And they gave them stronger muscles so that they could fend for themselves. By this means, our people have conquered adversity and have lived for countless generations, even though we have lost the ancient magic. Surely the Emperor will be pleased with us, and bring us into his family?'
Floscan thought hard. If there was any truth in this tale then the quadrupeds' ancestors would have come from Mars, whose tech-priests sent countless ships out into the galaxy during the Dark Age. And yes, they would have had the ability to alter genes in the way Ochtar described as 'magic'. But the tale was wildly improbable. 'How did you learn the Imperial language?' Floscan asked. 'How do you even know of the Emperor?'
'You are not the first two-legs to come here recently. Magson came. He wanted gemstones. In return, he gave us this. Try it on. It will help you.'
Ochtar stood and drew aside a curtain. He brought out something made of a rubbery material. Floscan's eyes widened when he saw it. It was a heavy-gravity suit, designed to make life tolerable on just such a planet as this.
'Magson stayed long enough for me to learn his language.' Ochtar continued. 'He told us about the Imperium, and about the Emperor who is our God. All our legends were confirmed! We entrusted him with a petition to the Emperor, asking for his rule and guidance. That was years ago. Since then, we have been waiting for you.'
From the sound of it, this Magson was a Free Trader. It was most unlikely he had even reported the existence of the quadrupeds to the authorities, let alone forwarded the petition to the Administratum on Terra. Usually such traders heeded no one but themselves.
Floscan guessed he had the explanation of Ochtar's claim to be human too. Ochtar was obviously highly intelligent - to have learned Imperial Gothic from a passing stranger was no mean feat. But he must have concocted the myth on hearing of the marvels of the Imperium, perhaps confusing the Imperial Cult with some tribal beliefs and so believing it himself.
'I can prove what I said.' Ochtar added then, as if reading his thoughts. 'I will take you to the holy shrine of our ancestors. We will travel at night, when it is safer. Put on the cloth that takes away weight.'

Floscan accepted the h-g suit Ochtar handed to him. Inspecting the runic icons on the shoulder tabs, he could see why the trader Magson had been so ready to trade it. The suit's power was low. Also it seemed to be damaged, no doubt ready to cut out at any time. Just the same, he pulled it on and immediately felt relief from the crippling gravity. He stood up, stretched and smiled.
His smile vanished as he remembered that he was going to have to spend the rest of his life here.
OCHTAR LEFT HIM alone to let him rest. Floscan spent the hours before darkness deep in thought. For about an hour he became very depressed, realising that he was never to see another human being again. Whatever life was left to him would have to be spent with these four-footed villagers. Without them, he had no chance of surviving at all.
Then, once again, he rallied, and became determined to see things through. Some said the Emperor watched over all that he thought was worthy of the title Guardsman. He would prove his mettle.
He was going to have to humour Ochtar for the time being. It was essential that the quadrupeds accepted him. For the time being, he switched off the h-g suit to conserve its power. Besides, he needed to build up his muscles; eventually he would need to withstand the dreadful gravity.
Night fell abruptly, like a curtain. Soon Ochtar returned and explained the journey that lay ahead. 'We are going to visit the Temple of the Ancient Relics.' he said. 'It is deserted now, and we shall have to travel with caution, for it lies within the territory of the enemy.
Tou have enemies?' Floscan replied curiously.
Ochtar nodded curtly. The worshippers of the evil God of Blood. Once they were our friends, but now...'
He would say no more, and Floscan turned on the h-g suit once more. Guards pulled the hedge-gate open. They crept out, Ochtar looking to the left and right.
Within the defensive circle of the hedge, the fire was kept burning at all times so that even at night the village had a cheerful look. Outside was an eerie darkness relieved by a dim, silvery light cast by massed stars, though the sky boasted no moons. Floscan soon learned that Ochtar's description 'safer' at night did not mean 'safe' when a living tangle of hooks and barbs the size of a small armoured vehicle flew at them. Ochtar proved himself a master spearman, despite his age. Instead of trying to evade the barbs he lunged straight at them and struck home. The raving mass jerked wildly from side to side, then slumped. He had penetrated the creature's tiny brain.
Ochtar brushed a dozen sharp hooks from his skin, ignoring the trickling blood. They wait around villages hoping to catch children who stray.' he said. They're not much to worry about.'

Ochtar knew his world well. He took Floscan on a wandering route that avoided the haunts of night predators, though Floscan shivered to hear a chaos of grumbling, hissing and clacking noises all around them. After a while he evidently became dissatisfied with his companion's progress, and invited him to climb onto his back. With Floscan clinging to him he set off at a tireless gallop, the great shaft of his spear resting on his shoulder. Eventually he slowed, setting Floscan on his feet again. From then on he proceeded carefully, sliding from cover to cover and looking carefully about him as he went.
They came at last to a natural amphitheatre. At its bottom, a ruined stone temple glittered faintly in the starlight. Its shape was hard to make out. There was a circle of broken pillars, and within it the remains of a round building which might once have been domed. It must have been thousands of years old.
Alert for any savage beast which might be using the temple as a lair, Ochtar approached carefully, but all was quiet. They stepped within lichen-covered walls. The roof had gone long ago. Light from the star-clouds streamed into the circular enclosure, revealing an unexpected, wondrous display.
Strange machines! Ochtar stood in silence, allowing Floscan to take in the wondrous view. This was indeed a holy place! Floscan felt as though he had been transported to the ancient, ancient past, to the Dark Age of Technology and the days of the Cult Mechanicus. Plainly the machines had once been arranged with reverence so that they could be worshipped as a sacred shrine, but now they were scattered across the ruined chamber, some of them smashed to pieces while others had simply fallen apart. A few, however, appeared to be still intact, matt black surfaces gleaming, rectangular display screens reflecting the starlight. They were like no machines Floscan was familiar with, and their purpose was a mystery, but there were plain signs that they were designed to be operated by humans, in the form of keyboards, knobs and slides.
'The ancient ones from the sky came to our world with these sacred objects,' Ochtar told him in a hushed tone. 'By these means they could work magic, though how we do not know.'
Presumably the quadrupeds had thought better than to reveal the shrine to the trader, Magson. He would certainly have wanted to take them away with him. They represented arcane sciences superior even to those of the present-day Imperium. The shrine-machines might even contain examples of Standard Template Construction, sought throughout inhabited space!
And all this meant that Ochtar's claim was true. The quadrupeds were of human stock! During the two campaigns in which he had served, Floscan had seen abhumans. He had seen ogryns and beastmen, degenerate forms of human of low intelligence. He could not help but compare

them with the noble Ochtar. But for his weird lower limbs, he was much more human than they had been. Furthermore, the physical difference had been arranged by the arts of the ancient tech-priests, not left to the vagaries of evolution. Did they not, then, deserve the Emperor's recognition? Yes they did!
While these thoughts whirled through his brain, a drumming sound came to Floscan's ears. Ochtar heard it too. He capered round on all four legs, glaring, spear at the ready. 'Worshippers of the Blood God! We were seen, emissary! Hide yourself!'
A savage roar rose up all around them. Swarming down the slope of the amphitheatre was a spear-bearing, axe-waving mob of quadrupeds clad in shaggy animal skins or armour fashioned from the shells of the crab-monsters. On their heads were helmets consisting of the emptied carapaces of smaller armoured creatures, complete with claws - or, in some cases, what appeared to be human skulls!
By the silvery starlight Floscan saw all this clearly through the gaps in the temple wall. When the quadrupeds got closer he saw, even more clearly, why they could not be of Ochtar's tribe. Their faces were tattooed, transforming them into hideous masks. The good-natured ferocity of Ochtar's people was completely absent; instead were the bestial snarls, hate-filled grimaces and blood-curdling shrieks of those bent on wanton murder and destruction. Floscan shrank back at first, thinking to hide as he had been instructed, but when he saw the old Remembering One dash from the temple, apparently determined to defend the Emperor's emissary to the last, he could not help himself. He looked around for something to use as a weapon.
Now the attackers were within the circle of pillars. Ochtar thrust his spear into the chest of the first to reach him, bringing the savage down. Floscan grabbed up a piece of fallen masonry, hefting it despite its weight, and ran to his aid. Ochtar had his back to one of the pillars, surrounded and sorely pressed. Floscan did not think he could throw the rock - it would simply fall from his hand. He ran forward and struck with all his might against a crab-protected head, aiming for the exposed cheek bone. The quadruped merely staggered a little and turned to give Floscan a look of outrage. Sour-smelling breath washed over Floscan from a snarling, tattooed and scarred face. He glimpsed a stone axe flashing down towards his skull.
Then the axe was miraculously stayed; another warrior had deflected it. Instead, rough hands seized him. In that same moment, sheer weight of numbers overcame the straggling Ochtar, three spears lunging into him at once, his legs buckling, so that he was brought down like some magnificent animal by a yapping pack of predators. He turned piteous eyes to the straggling Floscan.
'Tell the Emperor... we are human...'

Then Floscan, held in a steely grip, was forced to watch in horror as with jubilant screeches the killers continued to hack and stab at the body of the Remembering One until it was nothing but a bloody mass.
Eventually, leaving off their gruesome work, they turned to stare inquisitively at Floscan. As well as their elaborate tattoos, each face bore intricate tribal scars, so that it was difficult to discern any human features at all. Floscan stared straight back at the devilish masks, clenching his fists. For the moment rage burned all the fear out of him. Ignorant savages had murdered a brave worshipper of the Emperor. If only he could deliver the full vengeance of the Imperial Guard on them!
Mocking laughter arose among the quadrupeds. Did they perhaps regard him as a two-legged cripple, an object of mirth?
While this went on, something else was afoot. Roaring warriors charged into the temple and began smashing the precious ancient relics. Others collected bundles of a dry, mossy material that grew nearby, piling it over the mysterious machines. A spark was struck from two fragments of stone, setting the floss alight. Soon the machines themselves were burning, with a brilliant white, seething flame, forcing everyone out of the temple. Suddenly there was a loud explosion and an enormous glare, bringing down the remains of the ruin and hurtling stone chunks into the crowd. Something amongst the machinery - perhaps long-dead fuel cells - had ignited.
This turn of events seemed to scare the raiders. Floscan was dragged roughly on to a quadruped's back and the whole pack set off with alarmed howls, scrambling up out of the amphitheatre and streaming into the darkness.
The ride did not last long. The alien sun was rising when the village of the tattooed four-legs came into sight. Like Ochtar's, it was protected by a high thorn hedge, a section of which was dragged inward to allow them to enter.
Set on his feet, Floscan stared around him in fascination. There seemed to be a pattern to the quadrupeds' settlements. Within the compound was the same circle of reed-thatched huts and a central fire. But here the atmosphere vibrated with savagery and violence. Fighting was a way of life; several brawls seemed to be happening at any one time.
Except for females and the young, all faces were scarred and tattooed. Floscan's eyes were drawn to a huge totem pole towering over the huts near the central fire. Carved on it was a huge, crimson, maniacally glaring face, eyes bulging, teeth bared, seeming to radiate a lust for death and battle. The Blood God.
Floscan was dragged into a nearby hut and tied by his hands to a rough  wooden  post.  After  his   captors  left,   and  his  eyes  grew

accustomed to the gloom, he realised that he was not alone. A second prisoner was slumped on the ground, tied to a wooden post wearing a thick black greatcoat. It was Commissar Leminkanen!
FOR ALL HIS hunched dishevelled state, crushed as he was by the excessive gravity, Commissar Leminkanen was still formidable. His glinting, steely gaze directed itself at Floscan from beneath his peaked cap. Floscan realised that the heavy gravity suit hid his uniform.
'I am Guardsman Hartoum, commissar, from the Emperor's Vengeance,' he said quickly.
'Did you desert your post, Guardsman?' Leminkanen accused in a grating voice. Then, not waiting for an answer, he added, 'I, too, was on that ship. The last thing I remember is when the torpedo struck us. Someone must have put me in an escape pod. I was already falling through the atmosphere when I regained my senses - with my laspis-tol missing from its holster! Do you have yours, guardsman?'
It was a relief to Floscan that the commissar did not remember trying to 'absolve' a panicking trooper by executing him in the transport ship's last moments. 'No, commissar. I am unarmed.'
Leminkanen grunted. The commissar seemed eager to explain his presence on the planet. Could he have thrown himself into an escape pod out of self-preservation, just as Floscan had? But then he would still have his laspistol... unless the quadrupeds had taken it from him... in which case they would have searched Floscan for one too. So he had to be telling the truth. Floscan felt ashamed to have doubted him.
Leminkanen was frowning at him, perhaps puzzled to see him in an h-g suit. 'Did anyone but ourselves escape the battle?' he asked sharply.
Floscan shook his head. 'Not as far as I know The entire flotilla was destroyed. The Aurelian IXth is gone!' A sob came into his voice. 'I may be the only one left! And no one even knows where in space we came out of the warp...'
'You are an ignorant young fool, Guardsman. We are deep inside a planetary system! Ships cannot emerge from the warp this close to a star, except by means of a known and charted warp gate. The navy will be here to investigate when the flotilla fails to arrive. Not that you or I will benefit from it. We are in the hands of aliens, of the most savage and perverted type. In the next few hours they will torture us to death. You are lucky to have me with you. I will help you face the end with fortitude, keeping your faith in the Emperor.'
Floscan gulped, impressed though he was by Leminkanen's steadfastness. 'Are you sure, commissar?' he whispered.

'Of course I am sure! Have you seen that totem outside? I have seen that same image on half a dozen worlds. It is the emblem of a Chaos god, the god of slaughter and destruction. These aliens are its devotees.'
The Blood God.' Floscan murmured. That's what they call it.'
Then you have heard of it too. Yes, the Blood God! That's what it is called, all across the galaxy.'
'But surely the Emperor is the only true god?' Floscan had heard stories about the Chaos gods on Aurelia, but he had taken them to be fanciful superstitions. The commissar's words sounded strange to him.
The Emperor is the only true god, but the Chaos gods are real, too,' Leminkanen assured him. They oppose the Emperor, and are responsible for every evil and depravity. Here we have two enemies of the Emperor together - aliens and a Chaos god!'
Floscan could not contain himself. These people are not aliens, commissar - they are human!' he cried out. 'And some of them worship the Emperor!' In a rash of words he related everything that had happened since he was deposited on the planet: his rescue from the crab-monster, the gift of the h-g suit, how Ochtar had proved his claim to be human. The commissar listened closely, growing more and more astounded.
'Standard Template?' he breathed in excitement. 'Are you sure it is all destroyed?'
There can't be anything left after the fire and the explosion.'
4Ve shall see.'
Floscan was not really concerned with that. Will good tribes like Ochtar's be admitted into the Imperium?' he asked eagerly. After all, there are plenty of other abhumans.'
Leminkanen's voice rose in impassioned fury. 'How many times must I tell you that you are a fool, Guardsman; ogryns and the like are natural human types. A human being with four legs is an abomination! It is a mutant! And a mutant is a child of Chaos! It cannot be allowed to live!' His voice fell to an exhausted drone. 'It is a good thing we have discovered this. We must try to leave a record for the investigators. There is nothing here but twisted human mutation and the taint of Chaos. My report will recommend the cleansing of this entire planet.'
Floscan sank into an appalled silence. Had the quadrupeds been listed as aliens they would have been left alone - the Imperium could not exterminate every alien race in the galaxy, meritorious though that ideal was. But now he had doomed them to extinction!
The heavy gravity was clearly too much for Leminkanen. His frenzied speech seemed to have exhausted what was left of his strength. He fell into a fitful doze. Floscan was almost sorry he could not give him the h-g suit for a while.
The worshippers of the Blood God did not seem to be in any hurry. After several hours, the crude door opened and a bearded, tattooed quadruped,

smelling like a goat and wearing a jerkin made from a bristling porcupinelike skin, entered and raised a bowl of water to Floscan's lips. Glancing at the sleeping commissar, he merely grunted and went out again.
The next time the door opened, a throng of leering, mocking faces crowded around the opening, then drew aside to reveal the result of the morning's work. It was a large oval container, shaped from clay. Floscan easily recognised it for what it was: an oven, able to take two men inside it. Beneath it was a fireplace already piled with wood. Jeering laughter greeted the look on Floscan's face as he stared at the thing.
He and the commissar were going to be baked alive.
The closing door shut out the horrid grimacing faces. Shortly it began to grow dark again. The brief day was ending, and outside it was growing quiet as the worshippers of the Blood God retired to their huts. Floscan could guess that the grisly death-rite, undoubtedly a sacrifice to their foul Blood God, was scheduled for the next day.
Leaning trembling against the post to which he was tied, he began thinking with terror of the excruciating death which was shortly to come upon him. Then he started thinking of his comrades of the Aurelian IXth who had suffered hardly less painful deaths on the Emperor's Vengeance. Some had been personal friends back in his home district of Aurelia.
He stopped shaking. Resolve formed in him. He owed a duty to his dead comrades, to his superior officer Commissar Leminkanen, and a debt of gratitude to Ochtar and his people. He had to change Leminkanen's mind about them. And above all, he wished to avoid the clay oven.
All day long Floscan had been working on his bonds, with little effect. Now an idea came to him. The h-g suit had metal ribs with squared off edges. He worked the braided cord to one of these and began to rub.
It was slow work, but in the end his patience was rewarded. The hut was in near darkness when he had worn down the cord enough so that he could break it. Finally he stood unfettered, and glanced at the sleeping form of Commissar Leminkanen. Briefly he considered trying to take the commissar with him, before realising that it would be impossible. Leminkanen's only hope - and it remained a faint one - was for Floscan to bring help.
He slipped from the hut, moving with the stealm of a shadow. As he had expected the village was sleeping, with sentinels posted atop the hedge fortification. But he spotted only two, and neither was looking his way. Floscan sidled to the hedge. The foot-long thorns made it perfectly easy to scale, and in moments he was over the top and down the other side. Crouching, he took stock. Tonight the sky was cloudy and few stars were visible. Of the terrain, there were only vague humps in the darkness. Still, he thought he could remember which way to go.
He pulled at one of the sharpened stakes which made the hedge bristle.  It came  out easily.  Now he had  a weapon.  Silently,  Imperial

Guardsman Hartoum loped off into the lightless unknown, intent on retrieving the honour of the Aurelian IXth.
ALL THAT NIGHT Floscan travelled, trying not to stray from his chosen direction, trying to suppress his fright. Clicking, buzzing, rattling noises sounded all around him. All too often he thought he felt a chill touch - a claw, a feeler, a rasp, a feathery antenna - causing him to lash out with the stake in a sidewise swipe or a jab with the point, often followed by the sound of something scutding away. Dawn found him weary. Something else found him, too.
He first became aware of it as a sharp, acid smell. Then it charged from behind a rock to attack him. It was about twice the size of a horse, but in appearance like a cockroach whose head was a mass of razor-sharp sword blades sliding in and out with a scything sound, rubbing against one another. At tiieir full extent they were as long as his stake.
He took a lesson from Ochtar. To retreat was death - therefore, attack! He ran at the animal, which in turn was scurrying towards him, eager to slice him to bits with its battery of blades. Go for the brain. Ochtar had taught him that too. A bubbling, whisding noise came from the creature as he pushed the stake in as hard as he could. Then it turned on its back, a dozen stubby legs waving in deafh agony.
As he wididrew the stake, from which a purple goo dripped, a sensation of irresistible weight seized him. He looked at the icons, and groaned. The h-g suit had lost power.
Floscan sank to his knees. Where was the village? The creature was but the first and smallest of the monsters that were likely to find him. Others would be gigantic, impossible to fight even with a fully functioning h-g suit. Abandoning the stake, he was reduced to crawling on all fours as his own weight setded on him, dragging him into a pit of despair. Soon even this was too much. He was forced to lie down and close his eyes in exhaustion.
The sound of a human voice awoke him with a start. A quadruped stood over him, dad in a cloth tunic, lacking facial scars and tattoos, and with no daw-bearing helmet. One of Ochtar's people! Floscan struggled to sit up. Had he made it out of the territory of die Blood God? Or were die Remembering One's tribe looking for him after he had failed to return?
'Ochtar is dead! Blood God! They have messenger from die Emperor! Going to kill him!' Floscan pleaded. Had Ochtar been the only one understand Imperial Gothic? Had he taught it to any of the otiiers? The quadruped looked at him, frowning.
'Blood God? Emperor? Blood God kill Emperor?'
'Yes! Help Emperor!'
For the first time he noticed a large curved horn hanging from the four-leg's neck. The tribesmen raised it to his lips and blew a long, winding blast.

More warriors appeared among the crags and began making their way down to them. Floscan's guess seemed to have been correct: they were searching for Ochtar, and must already have been to the destroyed temple. The quadruped with the horn began bellowing commands, flinging out his arm in the direction Floscan had indicated. In moments a small horde was racing for the village of the Blood God. A hand came down, helping Floscan up and on to a sturdy back. Heart exulting, he hung on for all his worth - and realised that his limbs no longer seemed so heavy. Glancing at the h-g icons, he grinned. The suit's photoelectric stripes had been soaking up sunlight. The h-g field was re-energised!
For ferocity the assault on the village would have done the Imperial Guard credit. Taken by surprise, the devotees of the Blood God forayed through the gate at first, attempting to defend their settlement outside its bounds, but they were soon driven back. The attacking warriors swarmed up over the hedge and down into the compound, climbing it as Floscan had. He mounted it too and watched from the top as axes rose and fell, spears jabbed, blood flowed.
The Blood God's followers were fighting for their homes, fighting for tiieir lives, fighting for their savage god, and they laid about them as if demented, their bestial roars filling the air. But Ochtar's people were fighting for a god, too - the Emperor! It was hard to say who would be the victor at this stage; it was as if the butchery would continue until there was almost no one left. Floscan chose his moment to drop into the compound and dodge his way to the prison hut near the newly-constructed oven, which he was glad to see had not been used yet.
In the dim interior, Leminkanen looked up at him in wonderment. He did not even speak as the Guardsman untied him and helped him to his feet, supporting his weight.
"We have been rescued, commissar!' Floscan yelled. 'By four-legged men who are loyal to the Emperor! Did I not tell you?'
Leminkanen's response was a look of sour disbelief and an emphatic shake of his head. Nevertheless, he allowed Floscan to guide him gingerly to the door.
There, an extraordinary sight met their eyes. The fighting had all but stopped. Someming had wrapped itself around the village. It was like a millipede, many hundreds of paces long, which had coiled around the circular hedge-wall, though it overtopped it by nearly half its height again. From each of its countless segments sprouted a pair of tentacles tipped with eyes, lashing down into the compound to pick up defenders and attackers alike, whipping them over the hedge to be devoured.
Perhaps the smell of blood from the battle had attracted it. The specta-de seemed to send Leminkanen into a frenzy. He pushed Floscan away from him and staggered through the doorway, forcing himself to stand erect.

'I must make my report! Order the Exterminatus! Guardsman, if I am martyred you must deliver it into the right hands!'
From within his greatcoat he whipped out a flat grey plate with a keypad. It was his personal log. Feverishly he began typing, oblivious of what went on around him.
'Look out, commissar!' Floscan lunged to knock the commissar aside, but it was too late. A slithering tentacle had seized him, pinning his arms to his body.
With a barely heard gurgle, Leminkanen was gone.
Floscan snatched up the log-plate as it fell to the dusty ground, nimbly avoiding a flailing tentacle as he did so. By now the tribesmen were dealing with the millipede in their own fashion. They had set the hedge alight, but so intent was the beast on its feeding that it ignored the flames until it was too late. It, too, caught fire, writhing soundlessly, crushing huts in its agony while an indescribably foul smelling smoke filled the air.
Everything in the village was burning now, everything was being flattened as the blazing monster flexed and rolled, forcing villagers and invaders to flee as one for the exit or trample their way through the glowing cinders of the collapsing hedge, the battle forgotten. Floscan too was caught up in the stampeding rush.
Out in the open the two sides drew apart, glaring at one another. It was doubtful if they even remembered what they were fighting over, but they were ready to begin again.
Then a glinting movement high in the air made Floscan look up. His heart leaped. His prayer to the Emperor was answered. All around Floscan, four-legged men dropped to their knees. A large, shining metal shape was descending. It was an Imperial shuttle craft.
'THE AURELIAN IXTH'S sole survivor handed this in, sir. It appears that Commissar Leminkanen was making his last report when he was killed.'
In his brass-ornamented cabin, Captain Gurtlieder, commander of the battleship Ravenger, took the commissar's data-slate from his officer's hand. He noticed that the log was not closed. Leminkanen had not even had time to finish the report or key in his code.
He tapped a key and began to read.
Emergency report by Commissar Lemuel Leminkanen LX.'38974B on unnamed planet in Cluster FR.'7891 in vicinity of Warp Gate 492.
This planet is of no value to the Imperium. It is a feral world of the most extreme violence and would he very difficult to colonise. It contains a primitive semi-intelligent alien species unlikely to advance further. Recommend no action particularly on account of
There it ended. 'Who is this survivor?' Captain Gurtlieder asked.

'Just a regular Guardsman, sir. He was with Commissar Leminkanen to the end. He appears to have acquitted himself well in difficult circumstances. I shall recommend his promotion when he is reassigned.'
The captain handed back the data-slate. Very well, see that this is passed on to the Administratum.'
DOWN IN THE crew quarters of the Ravenger, Guardsman Floscan Har-toum was feeling very nervous indeed. Once aboard the battleship, he had contrived to be alone for a while. He could not resist taking a look at Commissar Leminkanen's open log.
Leminkanen had opened the log using his personal code, but had got no further than the heading, stating time and place. The millipede-creature had eaten him at that point.
So Floscan, appalled at his own audacity, had made an entry of his own. He couldn't close the entry, of course, since he didn't know Leminkanen's code. So he had left it in mid-sentence, hoping that made it look all the more authentic.
He dreaded to think what would become of him if it was ever discovered that he had made a false entry in a commissar's log. But he had realised that neither Leminkanen nor any other agent of the Administratum would ever look favourably on the quadrupeds once their human ancestry was known.
A mutant is a mutant. They had altered themselves too much. Well, now they would be registered as aliens and left alone. Floscan had already heard that Warp Gate 492 was to be marked as unusable on the charts, a deadly trap now that it had been discovered by the orks, who must have been lurking nearby waiting for Imperial vessels to emerge. The planet would receive no more visitors.
For the hundredth time, he wondered if it was true that the Emperor saw everything. Did He know what Floscan had done? And did He approve or abhor Floscan for it? Floscan took it as a good sign that no one had questioned why he was wearing an h-g suit.
A war between good and evil was shaping up on the quadrupeds' planet. He hoped, of course, that the Blood God would be defeated. But whatever the outcome, it was going to be settled by the quadrupeds themselves. Though sadly, outside of the family of man.