Armoured plating hung like scabbed skin from its underside, and dribbles of hydraulic fluid and lubricant spotted the ice beneath its belly. A tow rig rumbled towards the planes from a hangar buried beneath ten metres of snow and ice.
She heard footsteps and Laquell’s voice said, ‘Took a beating, but she’ll fly again.’
‘You talking about the plane or me?’ she said without turning.
‘The plane, of course,’ said Laquell. ‘You look just fine.’
She turned and saw him, like her, wrapped in a thermal blanket. He sipped a mug of something hot that steamed in the cold air. He was striking in an Imperial-recruiting-poster kind of way: angular chin, high cheekbones and eyes that radiated trust and courage. His dark hair was cut close to the skull, and he was smiling at her.
‘You want one?’
‘One what?’ she said.
‘Soup,’ said Laquell, holding up his mug and making it sound like a joke. ‘You don’t want a caffeine, you’ll get the jitters, even though the Munitorum actually make a pretty decent brew around here. Soup’ll warm you up and won’t have you bouncing off the flakboard.’
Larice nodded, feeling the strain of her sortie settle upon her. ‘Sure, soup sounds good.’
He handed her his mug and she took a grateful sip. It tasted of hot vegetables and game.
It was the best thing she’d drunk in months.
‘Come on,’ said Laquell, leading her towards the buried hangar. ‘The mess facilities here don’t look like much, but you can get a halfway decent meal and a hot shower.’
‘Now that sounds better,’ said Larice, disarmed by his easy manner and winning smile.
They passed his plane, and Larice saw the kill markings painted on the nose.
‘You have thirty-seven kills,’ she said.
‘Yeah, it’s been a busy day.’
‘You’re a frigging ace,’ she said.
‘So they tell me,’ said Laquell, as if it was nothing.
‘How long have you been flying?’
‘On Amedeo? Two weeks, but I bagged my first kill about six months ago.’
Larice found herself re-evaluating the cocky young flyer, now seeing a combination of skill and natural ability in his flying.
‘And you’ve thirty-seven kills to your name? Confirmed?’
‘Every one of them,’ he said. ‘One’s even on pict-loop in the officer’s quarters.’
‘Nice work,’ said Larice, impressed despite herself.
Laquell nodded, pleased with her compliment, but too much of an aviator to look too pleased. They stepped into the hangar. Out of the winds whipping across the isolated base, the temperature was at least bearable. Inside, a dozen Thunderbolts in the camo-green paint scheme of the 235th sat in a herringbone pattern, attended by an army of servitors and fitters in orange jumpsuits. Gurneys of missiles and heavy boxes of shells threaded their way between the planes, and a robed priest of the Mechanicus, together with his cybernetic entourage, attended to the guts of a partially disassembled aircraft. Its nose was wreathed in fragrant smoke and hot unguents dripped from an exposed turbofan.
As they walked between the aircraft towards the crew quarters, Larice knew she was attracting stares. Word that one of the Apostles had landed at Rimfire had circulated through the base with a speed normally reserved for the pox after a tour of shore leave. Her jet-black flight suit, compact form and girlish good looks didn’t hurt either.
They looked at her and she looked back, counting no fewer than seven aircraft with kill markings indicating that their pilots were aces. And the rest weren’t too far behind. None of them had thirty-seven kills, though. She saw Laquell notice her appraisal, but said nothing.
There was clear order and discipline to the work going on throughout the hangar, a sense of purpose that was common to most air wings, but which was even more focussed than usual. This far out from support, everyone’s survival depended on keeping these aircraft ready to fly and fight at a moment’s notice. Far from being the dumping ground for reckless or deficient pilots, Rimfire was a base where only the best survived.
‘That was a hell of a piece of flying you did up there,’ said Laquell. ‘You and that other Apostle really pulled us out of it.’
‘Quint’s a hell of a flyer,’ she said.
‘That was Quint?’ said Laquell. ‘The ace of aces? Maybe I shouldn’t have cheeked him.’
‘Maybe not,’ agreed Larice, already wondering what Seekan would make of this young, cocksure colt of a pilot. She looked at him and he returned her gaze with a frankness she found unsettling, like she was a target in the reticule of a quad gun sight.
I remember that look, she thought, and that made her mind up.
‘So tell me about that kill, the one on pict-loop,’ she said.
‘Why?’ he said, faintly embarrassed. ‘It’s not that good, and it’s over too quick.’
‘Sounds like a lot of lovers I’ve had,’ said Larice.
‘Seriously, why do you want to see it?’
She smiled and said, ‘Because if I’m going to recommend you to Wing Leader Seekan, then I’ll need to know I’m not going to be making a damn idiot out of myself.’
They always pick the places that used to be magnificent.
The Aquilian had once been the toast of Coriana’s wealthy gadabouts apparently, a grand folly built in opposition to a rival’s hotel further down the city’s main thoroughfare. Which of the two had come out on top was a mystery now, for Archenemy shock troops had destroyed the other hotel in the opening stages of the war. High command had been using it as their lodgings and strategic planning centre, and only an accident of timing had seen them elsewhere when the blood-masked enemy troopers attacked.
Since then, the brass kept on the move.
Which meant the next grandest structure in Coriana was free for the taking.
Processional steps led up to its columned entrance, the space between each column draped with a gold and black flag of the Imperium. Larice led Laquell up the steps and through the cracked marble-floored vestibule, following the booming sounds of martial music. She recognised the tune, Imperitas Invictus, a rousing tune said to have been written for Lord Helican’s triumphal march through the Spatian Gate. It wasn’t a tune played much any more.
‘I can’t believe I’m going to meet the Apostles,’ said Laquell, and Larice was amused at the star-struck quality to his voice. His eyes were bright and his features eager.
‘Then be prepared to be disappointed,’ she said. ‘They’re just pilots.’
‘You don’t see it because you’re one of them,’ said Laquell. ‘They’re more than “just pilots”: they’re legends, warriors of the air, killers of enemy aces. They’re the best flyers in the Navy. And they want me. I think that’s pretty damn fine.’
‘Hold on there, pilot,’ warned Larice. ‘All I’m doing is putting you forward for consideration. It’ll be Seekan’s decision whether to take you or not.’
‘Come on,’ he said, puffing out his chest and tapping the service ribbons on his chest. ‘Look at me. How could they not want me? I expect they’ll offer me a place on the spot.’
‘I wouldn’t bet on it,’ said Larice as the music swelled as a door opened and shut.
‘Are we missing a party?’ asked Laquell, straightening his dress uniform jacket, a deep russet colour with tasteful silver frogging over the shoulders and a stiffened collar of lacquered leather.
Larice didn’t answer.
Her former commanding officer, Bree Jagdea, had told her about the habits of the Apostles, and she knew there was only one reason her new squadron mates would gather like this. She crossed the chequerboard floor and swept down a wide corridor towards a set of walnut-panelled doors. She pushed through them into what had once been a grand ballroom, but was now an echoing empty space hung with blast curtains. Almost every item of furniture was draped in dustsheets, cobwebs laced the spaces between the chandeliers and a faint smell of mildew lurked below the hot crackle of the fire and scent of burning sapwood.