It couldn’t save them. Within the blink of an eye the Fists Exemplar were upon them, the mortals looking down the sights of pistols and boltguns. With cold certainty of purpose, the Angels of Death lived up to their name. Bolt-rounds came blasting at the Inquisitorial storm troopers with a speed and accuracy they could never match. With suprahuman reflexes and a lifetime of training, the Space Marines blew ragged holes through chests and skulls, turning carapace armour and helmets into bloody mulch. Rounds exploded out of the backs of the soldiers, spattering the floor and furniture with gore. The force of the impacts lifted them off their feet and slammed them into the bookcase-lined walls. Before they even had time to hit the ground the Fists Exemplar had turned, aimed and delivered another death-dealing blast at their next victim. All the while beams of energy seared the air about them and left scorched craters in their plate.
To their credit, the storm troopers did not break. They died as they had lived. Precisely. Economically. Sergeant Vasmir unleashed the devastation of his boltgun on full automatic, turning hiding soldiers into a mess that was barely recognisable as human. With the troopers in the hall dead, Vasmir ejected his empty magazine and slammed in a new one.
Beyond, orders had turned into panicked shouting. An Inquisitorial storm trooper ran out from an adjoining corridor, clutching a plasma gun, and Zerberyn and Reoch both turned their pistols on him. As bolt-rounds tore the trooper’s body apart, the globe of superheated energy blazing forth from the plasma gun streaked away from the weapon. Like a tiny, blinding sun it struck Vasmir in the throat, bubbling ceramite and vaporising flesh into nothingness. The sergeant dropped with an armoured clatter, his auspex sliding across the floor.
The First Captain and Reoch reached the end of the scriptorium, taking positions on either side of the end of the corridor. Zerberyn took a moment to replace the magazine in his bolt pistol. The Apothecary holstered his own weapon and drew his chainsword from where it sat across his back. Gunning it to life, he thrashed the monomolecular teeth. Looking down at the dropped auspex on the floor nearby, Zerberyn could see the Inquisitorial forces withdrawing up the passage at the sound.
The First Captain looked back down the hall. The thunder of Squad Vasmir’s bolters had fallen silent, the hall emptied of foes. Zerberyn held up three armoured digits at Reoch. Then two. Then one.
Surging around the corner with powered steps, the Space Marines were met with a storm of las-beams that cut up the length of the corridor. Their battleplate smoked with the seething caress of suppression fire. The beams kept coming, the gloom of the corridor flashing like a warning strobe. Zerberyn heard the repetitive snap of a volley gun and felt a succession of powerful las-streams take him in the cabling of his midriff.
Squeezing the trigger, Zerberyn sent bolt-rounds rocketing into the storm troopers holding the passage. His shots tore through carapace, flesh and bone, blasting Darghastri’s highly trained troops into flailing corpses. Advancing past his captain, Reoch brought his chainsword up with skill and determination and swept the razored teeth of the blade through the soldiers, who were desperate to get off a last few las-blasts before the Apothecary reached them. Even Inquisitorial storm troopers lost their nerve as this death came at them.
Reoch moved through Darghastri’s troops with the precision of the surgeon he was. He opened soldiers up from jaw to hip, the chainsword chewing through flesh. He struck heads from shoulders and cut down through the lines connecting weapons to power packs.
The mortals were no longer retreating, they were fleeing. Zerberyn continued his fire. As bolt-rounds punched through the Inquisitorial storm troopers, they dropped to the floor until a single soldier remained — the trooper carrying the volley gun. With the smouldering muzzle aimed at the First Captain, he pulled back on the trigger. The weapon was silent, however. Reoch had sliced through the gun’s power cabling during his devastating onslaught.
Zerberyn looked back down the corridor. He saw Squad Vasmir stepping over the body of their sergeant, and turned on the remaining trooper with sudden fury, a cold vengeance that was equal parts indignation and indulgence. He slammed his pistol into its holster and grabbed the soldier savagely by the throat. As his powered gauntlet closed on the storm trooper’s neck, Zerberyn leaned in. So close to the struggling soldier’s helm, the Space Marine could hear Darghastri still giving orders. The First Captain realised that the inquisitor had been watching the whole firefight through the glowing red lenses of his men. Zerberyn positioned himself in front of the trooper’s optics.
‘There is but one Space Marine for every world in the Imperium,’ Zerberyn announced, for the inquisitor’s benefit. ‘This madness has cost me another of my brothers. While we fight among ourselves, worlds are being lost to the invader. For my battle-brother and the worlds he might have protected, you must die, inquisitor.’
With that, Zerberyn crushed the bones in the trooper’s neck and tossed his body away like a rag doll.
Mendel Reoch came up beside his captain.
‘Where are the astropaths?’ the Apothecary asked.
‘If I must guess, Darghastri has them in the Black Ship,’ Zerberyn said, his voice a hollow rasp. ‘But we need them.’
‘The Athymian?’ Reoch said.
‘Yes,’ Zerberyn said. He changed the channel on his helmet vox. ‘Lasander.’
‘Here, captain,’ Lasander responded from the bridge of the Dantalion.
‘Send me two more squads, and your second-best sergeant,’ Zerberyn ordered. ‘We are going to storm the Black Ship.’
‘Yes, my lord.’
Zerberyn was silent as he made his way through the Arx Meridia station. While Apothecary Reoch kept his chainsword idling and Squad Vasmir moved from corner to corner, aiming their boltguns in advance of their progress, the First Captain didn’t seem to care. As they approached the reception antechambers of the Black Ship’s docking station, Zerberyn’s men were joined by Squads Torr and Escoban. Sergeant Solomon Torr was a veteran of Gamma-Hydrata and the Silent Wars. He had come ready with men and equipment to breach the airlock of the Athymian Astra. They didn’t need such measures, however, because as Zerberyn entered the antechamber for the starboard lock he found the barbican airlock to the Black Ship open.
Zerberyn held up a fist, bringing his Space Marines to a halt. The squads assumed positions on the airlock, their boltguns ready, while the First Captain slowed to a stop. The opening was not crowded with Inquisitorial storm troopers. Instead, three figures waited for the Space Marines.
The first was a robed, emaciated specimen of a man, raw-eyed and twitchy. His skeletal hands glowed with otherworldly energies. The second sat in a tracked throne, a shaved and muscular wretch. Despite his brawn, his face betrayed the simple wonder of a small child. Both bore the savage brand of the Inquisition on their foreheads — the mark of forced recruitment. Zerberyn knew that inquisitors often travelled on the Adeptus Astra Telepathica’s Black Ships, searching for psychic recruits to join the Holy Ordos. The third was restrained in an upright containment casket, criss-crossed with heavy chains, their face and form unseen within.
‘I advise caution, my lord,’ Reoch said. ‘They’re witchbreeds.’
Zerberyn nodded. He now had even more reason to regret having lost all of his Librarians.