Vangorich raised his hand, as did Wienand, Anwar, Zeck, Verreault and, after a cocked eyebrow from Vangorich, Lansung.
‘Carried!’ said Ekharth angrily. ‘What do you want to table, Vangorich?’
‘Not me,’ said Vangorich. He held out a hand to Wienand.
Wienand hesitated. Veritus was staring at her so hard the blue veins in his temple pulsed.
‘I move that we appoint Maximus Thane to the head of this Senatorum as Lord Guilliman,’ she said.
Her words were met with resounding cheers from the lesser lords that almost drowned out Vangorich’s seconding of the motion, despite the voxmitters amplifying his voice.
Ekharth went purple. He really has had no idea, thought Vangorich. ‘Vote then!’ he said, cracking his spherical gavel petulantly. ‘For.’
Vangorich, Wienand, Zeck, Verreault, Lansung and Anwar again voted. After a moment’s consultation, so did Gibran and Sark. Kubik raised a mechanical hand in silence, then went back to whatever it was that really interested him.
‘Against!’ said Ekharth. He raised his own hand quickly, then snatched it down. He stared at the table in defeat.
‘Welcome to the Senatorum Imperialis,’ said Vangorich to Thane. He bowed his head. ‘My Lord Guilliman.’
The chamber shook to the cheers of the massed lesser lords as Maximus Thane took his seat at the head of the table.
Chapter Three
Exemplars of the Imperium
Zerberyn ran at the ork blocking the companionway down to the enginarium, bowling it over the railing and into the churning machinery below. He fired into the face of the one behind, blasting the back of its skull apart. Vaulting over its tumbling corpse, he buried his chainsword in the head of a third. A burst of heavy bolter shots felled three bigger orks coming up the steps.
‘There it is!’ voxed Sergeant Solomon Torr. ‘I have the xenos mechanician in sight.’
Runes flickered over Zerberyn’s faceplate. A red signum dot pulsed on the miniature cartograph of the spaceship’s interior. The ork commander was in a large room suspended above the thundering ship’s engines.
‘Squad Torr, follow!’ he ordered.
Squealing ork slaves scattered before him. He did not waste his ammunition on them, and they died under his boots. He rounded a corner to see a heavy blast door grinding into place. His hand went to his belt and came away empty. His last melta bomb had been spent three bulkheads back. ‘Melta!’ he called.
Space Marines clattered down the stairs behind him, taking up fire positions along the rickety safety rail. Their weapons panned back and forth, laser targeters gleaming in the dark.
‘Melta!’ Zerberyn called again, his patience gone.
Brother Rosdane shoved his way down the stairs, banging into the backs of his brothers in his haste. ‘Here, First Captain.’ His plain, unmarked armour was covered in dark ork blood, bright grooves scratched into the surface where enemy fire had been deflected.
‘Burn us a way in,’ Zerberyn ordered. ‘Squad Torr, firing lines!’
He took a step back as Rosdane adjusted the focal length of the melta and levelled the slotted muzzle of the gun at the door. The rest of his squad formed up, bolters level. The foetid atmosphere of the ork hulk shimmered in front of the meltagun, then with a whooshing roar the door burst into flame. Thick gobbets of burning steel ran from the breach, draining in lethal drips through the mesh of the catwalk. The bright spot of heat spread, until the whole of the door glowed white. All of a sudden, it collapsed wetly, spraying sparks and droplets of molten metal.
‘Fire!’ shouted Zerberyn.
His warriors let loose together, sending a barrage of bolts through the door before the smoke of its destruction had cleared. Zerberyn leapt through.
‘Follow the First Captain!’ shouted Sergeant Torr.
They emerged into a storm of bullets. Rounds screamed off Zerberyn’s armour in a blaze of sparks. Orks came out of the smoke and dark, and he cut them down. Behind them was a huge, squat-bodied ork engineer, the mockery of a Space Marine’s servo-harness attached to its back.
Boltguns barked around him, felling the xenos, as Zerberyn charged to attack. This fleet’s strange vessels and bizarre weaponry were the creations of this monster. He was the lord of the armada. Kill him, and what little cohesion the force had would collapse.
There was no point, Zerberyn realised. They had chased him from his bridge, he was cornered. They could have set the charges and left. The orks lacked the organisation they had shown only weeks ago. But he wanted to kill it. He needed to.
It raised a blocky pistol and fired. A round as big as a human fist punched a fresh dent into Zerberyn’s plastron and knocked him off his feet. A tall ork reared over him, a growling chainaxe raised over its head. Before it could strike its chest blew out and it fell down dead. Zerberyn recovered and got back to his feet, bolt pistol spitting.
His rounds smacked into an energy field surrounding the ork engineer and exploded harmlessly. It bared its massive yellow fangs at him and raised its weapon. Zerberyn dodged, taking a hit on the greave as he dived aside. The strength of the weapon was so great the plate buckled. On his faceplate, a warning rune blinked. A tiny schematic of his armour flickered up, his lower left leg glowing amber.
The ork mechanic roared. The last of its bodyguard died, blown apart by seven simultaneous bolt hits. Squad Torr trained their weapons on the engineer, advancing on it as they fired. The creature’s energy shield flared under the strain and gave out with a bang. Zerberyn jumped at it, his sword swinging. The ork roared and hammered down with the whirring attachments of its harness. Zerberyn parried one with the flat of his blade and sheared the other away. Black oil pumped from the harness’ hydraulics.
The ork swung its pistol around. Like so many of its monstrous kind its strength was undone by sluggishness, and Zerberyn chopped hard, separating its hand from its body. Howling in outrage, the ork threw itself at Zerberyn, bearing them both to the floor. Zerberyn’s boltgun was knocked from his grasp. His chainsword was no use and he dropped it to grapple with the monster. His eye-lenses filled with the slavering jaws of the ork as it bit furiously at his face. His fingers slipped on waxy skin. The thing grabbed him around the throat and squeezed. The pressure was immense, crushing his neck through his softseal. Zerberyn scrabbled for his combat knife. He unsheathed it, fought it past the ork’s flailing stump. The ork batted at his hand. Ivory fangs snapped on his forearm.
With muscle-cracking effort, Zerberyn bucked under the creature, shifting it enough to drive the point of his blade into its eye. The ork mechanician continued to roar for a second. Zerberyn saw his death in its face, but then the light went out in its remaining eye, and it slumped.
His brothers heaved the dead beast off him. Sergeant Torr extended a hand.
‘Have you worked out your anger, brother-captain?’ he said.
‘Watch your tone, brother,’ said Zerberyn. He allowed himself to be hauled back up.
‘Perhaps you are still in need of battle,’ said Torr. ‘But we are done here and should leave.’
‘I thank you for letting me slay the beast alone,’ he said.
‘A worthy opponent,’ said Torr. ‘Your order, First Captain?’
‘Cripple the engine. Krak, meltagun, anything we have left.’
Zerberyn opened a line to the other Fists Exemplar upon the ship. He scrolled through the icons of the five squads. Most were green, a couple tending to amber. Casualties were light. ‘The ship’s captain is dead. All squads fall back to extraction point. Hail Shipmaster Marcarian. We are returning to the Dantalion.’