Secreted in the deepest caves, the gargoyle brood-mothers had obeyed the overmind's command to nest and produce more of its kin. Driven into a frenzy of reproduction, the brood mothers had since expired, but not before giving birth to thousands upon thousands of offspring.
As the assault began on the wall, an implacable imperative seized the nesting gargoyles who took to the air in their thousands, and a black tide of monsters screeched from their hiding places to attack.
'You got them, lieutenant?' asked Captain Morten, tensing his fingers on the Fury's control column.
'Yes,' snarled Keill Pelaur. The attack logister can't keep up with all the signals it's getting. 'The bio-ships are altering formation to face us, but they're slow. We'll be on them before they're properly aligned.'
Morten grinned beneath his oxygen mask.
The target information on Pelaur's slate was being echoed on his own display and the sheer numbers they were about to face were beyond anything in the squadron's history.
Fitting then, that this should be its last battle.
A rune on Morten's armaments panel flashed, indicating that he was within his missiles' optimum kill range.
He opened a channel to the aircraft he led.
'All craft open fire!'
He pulled the trigger on the control column twice in quick succession, shouting, 'For the Vincennes'
Scores of missiles leapt from beneath the wings of hundreds of aircraft, streaking upwards towards the tyranid fleet. They had to punch a hole through the screen for the Thunderhawk. All other concerns were secondary.
The gap was rapidly closing between the two forces and Morten knew it would get real ugly, real quick. Even as he watched, the enemy creatures smoothly moved into blocking positions, scores of smaller, faster creatures moving to intercept them.
'Stay sharp,' called Morten, 'the enemy is turning into us.'
The initial volley had cut a swathe through the outer screen of tyranid spores, but hundreds more remained, all closing on his aerial armada. A lesser man might have been cowed, but Owen Morten was a born and bred Fury pilot who lived for combat.
He pulled into a shallow climb and armed his last missiles.
Almost as soon as he'd done so, he and his squadron were tangled up in a madly spinning dogfight with dozens of fleshy, spore creatures that spun and wove almost as fast as the Furies. Morten rolled hard left, catching sight of a speeding organism and followed it down.
'I'm too close for a missile shot!' he yelled, switching to guns as the creature tried to shake him.
Every move the creature made, the Fury was with it, spinning around like insects in a bizarre mating ritual. The beast flashed across his gunsight and he pulled the trigger.
'Got you, you bastard!' he roared as bright lasbolts ripped the tyranid beast in two.
'Captain! Break right!' screamed Pelaur as a spuming bolt of light speared past the Fury's canopy.
He pulled around and breathed deeply, amazed at how close their near miss had been. He eased back on the throttle and switched back to missiles.
A warbling tone in his ear told him the missile's war-spirit had found a target and he pulled the trigger again.
'Captain!' called Erin Harlen. 'You've got one right behind you!'
Morten hauled right and checked his rear, twisting his Fury in an attempt to shake the pursuing organism.
'I can't get rid of it!' swore Morten as the beast matched his wild manoeuvrings.
'It's firing!' shouted Pelaur.
'Breaking left!' answered Morten, rolling hard and kicking in the afterburner. He felt his flight suit expand and his heartbeat race.
A bolt of crackling energy spat below him and he spun the plane round in a screaming, tight turn, chopping the throttle and almost stalling the engine.
The creature tried to match his turn, but was too slow.
Morten rolled inverted and pulled in behind the pulsing organism, lining it up in his sights and firing.
Bolts from the lascannon shredded the creature and it exploded in a bloody spray.
Listening to the vox-chatter, he heard screams and imprecations from the rest of the aircraft. The tyranids were slaughtering them, but he couldn't think about that just now. Not while there was a battle still to be fought. But as he scanned the space before him, he could see they'd blown a gap. The Thunderhawk was streaking through it, the blue glare of its plasma engines bright against the darkness of the massive hive ship's stony carapace.
Then he saw a giant, winged creature with spitting, electrical mandibles powering after the Space Marine gunship. Arcs of crackling energies lashed the Thunderhawk again and again, and Morten could see it wouldn't survive much longer.
His flight suit was soaked with perspiration and he knew he was at the edge of exhaustion, but he pushed out the engines to follow the Thunderhawk.
Uriel felt the gunship lurch, and leaping streaks of blue energy sparked from the fuselage. The pilot threw them in a series of wild turns, but Thunderhawks had never been designed for dogfights and Uriel knew it was only a matter of time before whatever was pursuing them was able to destroy them. Weapons and ammo packs tumbled from the lockers above him.
He pushed clear of the restraint harness and rose to his feet, turning to retrieve the weapon Inquisitor Kryptman had given him. To lose it now would end their mission before it had begun. He staggered as another impact smashed into the gunship. Flames erupted from a shattered fuel line and warning klaxons screamed.
Yet another hammer-blow struck the rear quarter of the Thunderhawk and one of the vision ports blew out with a decompressive boom.
Rushing air howled from the gunship, and Uriel felt his rage growing. They could not fail. Not after coming so close.
But as further impacts rocked the Thunderhawk, he knew they could not survive another.
Captain Owen Morten pushed the Fury as fast as it could go. His fighter streaked past the tyranid organism pummelling the Thunderhawk as he armed the last of his missiles.
A flickering blue glow illuminated the interior of the Fury as bolts of lightning lashed from the mandibles of the creature. Fully six times the size of the Fury, Morten knew that only a direct hit on its most vulnerable location would destroy it.
'Captain!' shouted Pelaur, 'ease back on the throttle or we won't have enough fuel to get back to the planet.'
'We're not going back,' said Morten calmly as he neatly slotted the Fury between the giant tyranid beast and the Thunderhawk.
'What the hell are you doing?' screamed Pelaur.
'What needs to be done,' answered Morten, cutting the engines and spinning the Fury on its axis until it had turned a full one hundred and eighty degrees.
The crackling maw of the tyranid beast filled his canopy. Giant arcs of lighting enveloped the Fury. Sparks and flames filled the cockpit.
Captain Morten pulled the trigger, sending his last missile straight down the monster's throat.
Uriel felt a huge detonation behind the gunship, and awaited the inevitable destruction of the Thunderhawk. But the fatal blow never landed and the Thunderhawk levelled out, weaving through the hail of spores that gathered around the monstrous hive ship.
He made his way up the central aisle of the gunship towards the cockpit. All he could see ahead was the craggy cliff of the hive ship's hide. Inquisitor Kryptman had shown them the most likely locations of possible entry points, and he scanned the grey moonscape before him for one.
The aerial armada had got them through and now it was time to make good on that sacrifice.