'They are coming to Kellenport, Sonne. I sent over fifty thousand men to d.a.m.nos Prime and Secundus, and all the stations in-between. All of them, our fleet at anchor in the Tyrrean dead, all of them.'

Adanar nearly choked. 'What?'

Karnak advanced into Adanar's eye-line, the whirr of his tracks drawing a scowl from the lieutenant.

'That scrambled piece of binaric was a data-burst,' the magos explained. 'There was a message encoded within it. Based on a proto-Gothic linguistic system, it was easy to discern the meaning. My xeno-linguistic savants took approximately thirteen point two-six minutes to decipher it.'

'Are you looking for praise, magos?'

'No, I am merely suggesting that the simple encoding was deliberate. They wanted wanted us to hear it.' us to hear it.'

'Hear what?' asked Adanar.

Colonel Tarn activated a different message spool on the vox-unit. After a few seconds of charged silence an unearthly voice issued from the speakers. It resonated with age and archaic menace, as if drawn from the grave or the depths of a planet-eating black hole.

We are the necrontyr. We are legion. We claim dominion of this world... Surrender and die.

'Throne of Earth,' Adanar could only rasp. He found his composure again after a few more seconds. 'Surely, it means surrender or or die?' die?'

Karnak uttered a sombre reply. 'No, Lieutenant Sonne, the translation is accurate.'

'In the Emperor's name, what are these things?'

'Death, lieutenant they are death. Adanar,' said the colonel, getting to his feet at last. 'Take your family and get out of Kellenport. Go south. Do it quickly, before it's too late.'

020.974.M41.

Aboard the n.o.bilis n.o.bilis THE BRIDGE WAS frantic with activity. frantic with activity.

Captain Unser barked orders at his command crew from a gilded throne inlaid with operation-gems and picter-slates. 'Get me firing solutions on those war cells, now!'

Naval ratings scattered as Unser's flag-lieutenant cracked the whip of his tongue in relaying the captain's commands. Far below the sub-command dais, servitors slaved to control-pits worked tirelessly to manoeuvre the ship, responding to the dictates of their helmsman; others processed and relayed back firing information, making minor weapons adjustments that would be fed down to the gun-decks.

'Melta torpedoes at forty-four per cent, my lord,' said the flag-lieutenant, Ikaran.

Unser's eyes flashed in the sepulchral gloom of the bridge. The long scar he'd earned whilst posted in support of the Plovian VI Imperial Guard looked like a vertical grin on the left side of his face. 'Give 'em another dose, sir.'

Ikaran relayed the orders and the message bled down through the ship to the gun-decks.

Unser smiled, his mouth pulling at the injuries that chronicled a life that had only ever known war.

He loved this. He absolutely... Loved. It. Loved. It.

The n.o.bilis n.o.bilis was invincible. A capital ship, the largest in the line, Dominator-cla.s.s it was an expression of Unser's undeniable will and righteous anger. Dread enemies had come to d.a.m.nos, unearthed from the very bowels of the world. Though he had not seen them up close, Unser was determined to send them back to whence they came, turning them into the corpses they already resembled. was invincible. A capital ship, the largest in the line, Dominator-cla.s.s it was an expression of Unser's undeniable will and righteous anger. Dread enemies had come to d.a.m.nos, unearthed from the very bowels of the world. Though he had not seen them up close, Unser was determined to send them back to whence they came, turning them into the corpses they already resembled.

'Torpedoes away, lord,' said Ikaran.

'Bring it up.'

The bridge picters delineating the forward arc of the command dais came online. They showed a view of reals.p.a.ce and the half hemisphere of southern d.a.m.nos. Bright, blazing contrails invaded the vista as the torpedo payload sped earthwards.

Unser leant forwards, revelling in the power. 'And in three... two... one'

A series of bright blooms lit the world's surface from the ma.s.sive impacts. The n.o.bilis n.o.bilis was at the cusp of the mesosphere and close enough to see the effect of the incendiaries on the ground. was at the cusp of the mesosphere and close enough to see the effect of the incendiaries on the ground.

Ikaran had his hand to his ear, a comms-officer on board ship reporting back to him.

'Hits on eighty per cent of targets, lord.'

Unser allowed himself to sit back. He gripped the arms of his command throne like a triumphant king. 'Another barrage, if you please.'

The air was hot and sweaty on the gun-decks. Thousands of crew and hauler-servitors scurried in packs as the order came down from the bridge.

Overseer Caenen applied the lash to increase their efforts.

'Sweat and blood, dogs,' he drawled, bawling above the heavy drone of the engines and loading machinery. His h.e.l.lish gaze followed the ammo hoppers, hoisted by teams of swarthy, soot-stained men, and glowered. 'The cap'n wants another, we give him another!' The lash cracked out again and the crews of torpedo tubes five through ten picked up the pace. All down the port-ventral aisle of the n.o.bilis's n.o.bilis's gun-deck, the scene was the same. Overseers urged their crews with threats and cajoling, just like any good Navy men. gun-deck, the scene was the same. Overseers urged their crews with threats and cajoling, just like any good Navy men.

In less than three minutes the next barrage of torpedoes was prepared, the tubes locked, their deadly cargo primed for launch.

A wave of green 'ready' runes flickered down the hot darkness of the gun-deck. Vox communication went to the gunners who angled the tubes mechanically from their firing nests according to solutions provided by the bridge. All was in harmony, the perfect machine with the men of its crew its blood and sinew.

Caenen leapt down from his pulpit, stepping on a servitor's bent back so he didn't have to use the stairs. He grunted when his boots met the deck in a heavy thunk thunk, berating a man for getting in his way and punching out another as he moved to a viewport.

The tiny aperture afforded a limited view of reals.p.a.ce, but enough to witness a torpedo barrage. Tearing open the iron hatch, Caenen wiped the grime and warp-frost from the many-layered plascrete protecting them all from the void and simply looked.

To the overseer, a bombardment was a thing of beauty. Even the many slummer-wh.o.r.es he had bedded, in spite of his scars and his lack of hygiene, paled. She, the n.o.bilis n.o.bilis, was his true mistress... and the b.i.t.c.h had quite a slap in her.

When the launch tubes failed to vent, Caenen frowned. He wiped at his heavy breath where it had fogged the viewport, but he hadn't missed it. The tubes were still full. He was about to start shouting and bawling again, ready to apply his boot to the fegger who'd screwed him, when a dense, ultra-concentrated beam speared from the surface.

'What the shi'

We are invulnerable.

The thought was a comfortable one and Captain Unser was enjoying this feeling of pre-eminence when the weapons failure rune on his command-slate spoiled it.

'Mister Ikaran, report!'

The flag-lieutenant had his hand to his ear again, getting information from the comms-officer. 'A jam, lord. We'll have to repack and acquire new firing'

The ma.s.sive energy spike raging across all of the pict-screens on the bridge arrested Ikaran's recommendations.

'Lord, our shields will be'

'Impossible,' breathed Unser, sitting up so he might defy his imminent death more staunchly. 'They don't have... Up here... we're invinc'

A bright flare of emerald light filled the bridge, blinding the crew and scorching their flesh despite the plascrete shielding on the viewports. The n.o.bilis's n.o.bilis's shields capitulated in seconds, one after the other, and the once mighty vessel's armour was sheared away like parchment by the necron beam. It impaled the bridge and lanced the heart of the ship. Plasma drives erupted in conflagration, sending roiling firestorms across all decks. Munitions and artillery cooked off in the blast, killing thousands. The main breach caused by the beam's hungry trajectory resulted in several more sub-breaches crewmen, equipment, entire bulkheads and sub-decks were vented into the void, flash-frozen. shields capitulated in seconds, one after the other, and the once mighty vessel's armour was sheared away like parchment by the necron beam. It impaled the bridge and lanced the heart of the ship. Plasma drives erupted in conflagration, sending roiling firestorms across all decks. Munitions and artillery cooked off in the blast, killing thousands. The main breach caused by the beam's hungry trajectory resulted in several more sub-breaches crewmen, equipment, entire bulkheads and sub-decks were vented into the void, flash-frozen.

In the gun-decks, Overseer Caenen didn't even have enough time to curse before the torpedo wall was ripped away and the entire gunnery crew, all two thousand, three hundred and fifty souls, burned to death before being expelled into the cold night of s.p.a.ce.

Lord Governor Arxis had not always been in the business of politicking. Unfortunately, it was a necessary evil when running a world of the Imperium. Such a task required a strong hand and a firm belief in the Emperor. Deviation from the Creed could not be tolerated; the people lived to serve His greater glory and the glory of mankind.

Arxis was once Imperial Guard, a general no less, and now he sat amongst his generals, the trappings of politics forgotten and the familiar mantle of soldier resting firmly upon his shoulders.

It was comforting.

The news he'd just received about the n.o.bilis n.o.bilis was not. was not.

'Throne, the entire ship? In one attack?'

Field-Marshal Lanspur nodded sombrely. 'Captain Unser bought us some ground, possibly even some time with the barrages the n.o.bilis n.o.bilis was able to make, but the ship is dead, my lord all twelve thousand, three hundred and eighty-one souls.' was able to make, but the ship is dead, my lord all twelve thousand, three hundred and eighty-one souls.'

'Merciful Emperor...' Arxis was staring into s.p.a.ce, finding it hard to comprehend what the necrons had done. He looked up at his commanders. The sixteen men arrayed around the metal table in the Proteus bunker looked back with carefully neutral expressions.

'The astropathic message?'

'Has been sent,' replied the governor's choirmaster, a robed adept called Fava who was in charge of all interstellar communication to and from d.a.m.nos. 'We got it out just before the blackout.'

Though most short-wave vox transmissions were still in effect, anything longer range, certainly off-world communication, was utterly dead. The necrons had some kind of jamming shroud fouling it.

'Then we should pray to the Golden Throne that it reaches allies quickly. For now, we marshal what defences we can.' Arxis was about to address his master of ordnance, a short, pugnacious man who was loyal like a bloodhound, when a dull sc.r.a.ping sound stopped the words in his throat and altered them. 'Did you hear that?'

The sc.r.a.ping was getting louder, resonating against the metal inner walls of the bunker.

Several of the governor's military staff nodded.

Sytner, his chief bodyguard, drew a pistol. 'Sire, we have to move you. Now.' He said it forcefully but without panic. Sytner had been a storm trooper, serving in the same regiment as Arxis back in the day. The lord governor trusted the stocky man, recognised the urgency in his tan face, and nodded.

Beneath them, the ground trembled. Sytner stepped in, pushing the lord governor behind him and tipping the table back with one hand. Like the pillars of termites that formed in d.a.m.nos's arid zone, a column of metal-flecked earth spiralled upwards from the ground. The bunker floor was several-centimetre-thick ferrocrete, but the tunnellers bored through it anyway.

A beetle-like creature, silver-backed and dirty with earth, poked out at the apex of the pillar. Sytner shot it with his laspistol, pitching it onto its back, legs twitching.

'By the ice-h.e.l.ls, what...' Gaben-dun leaned in for a closer look. The pillar erupted in front of him and in seconds the master of ordnance was swarmed with the beetle creatures. He fell writhing, the weight of the diminutive necrons bringing the big man down, and screamed.

'Throne of Earth,' gaped the choirmaster, seeing moist bone poking up from the chitinous ma.s.s a.s.sailing Gaben-dun. 'They're eating eating his flesh!' his flesh!'

'Out! Out!' shouted Sytner.

Lanspur and four of the other commanders had also drawn sidearms and put themselves between the carnivorous beetles and the lord governor.

'Open fire!' snapped Sytner and the crack of las filled the chamber along with the stink of fyceline.

Silver beetle-creatures split in half and spun off the corpse. A few las-bolts even pierced poor Gaben-dun, though the master of ordnance was little more than a sack of slowly dissolving meat by now.

When they were done with their first kill, the swarm converged on the rest.

Sytner and his fellows were soon shooting at the ceiling and the walls as the beetles scuttled towards them without impediment. A larger tremor shook the chamber and the room just as they were retreating into the bunker's annexe.

A vox-unit switched to open frequency crackled to life, adding to the confusion. Frantic reports came over the speakers from the outside: of the walls being compromised; of the enemy inside the defences, seemingly appearing out of thin air; of high-pitched beam weapons and the screaming of their victims.

Arxis clenched his fists impotently as the floor caved in completely, taking Lanspur with it, and a much larger insectoid lumbered into view.

Men were being flayed alive outside...

One creature, its carapace glistening silver and suggestive of an arachnid construct, became three. Sytner's las-bolt caromed ineffectually off the hide of the first. Its mandible claw snapped out and severed the man in two. To his credit, Sytner didn't scream.

The choirmaster did, just as his face and torso were melted off by the second spider's beam-spike. It started as a death-shriek then ended in a wet gurgle of sloughed flesh and matter.

The rest of the command staff didn't last much longer. Scarabs claimed them the lord governor could think of no better way to describe the beetle swarms or the arachnids butchered them.

Arxis was alone, surrounded by foes, trapped by the illusory protection of his own Proteus bunker.

He had time to kneel before he died; a prayer to the Emperor on his lips and the barrel of a laspistol to his temple.

When he squeezed the trigger, the weapon groaned and failed. Exhausted during those first frantic moments, the power pack was out.

Arxis closed his eyes before the claws took him.

CHAPTER TWO.

It was good fortune that placed the Ultramarines within the vicinity of d.a.m.nos. Although it would later be questioned what exactly was good good about it. The desperate astropathic message delivered with Lord Governor Arxis's seal of verification was deciphered quickly by the sightless adepts aboard the about it. The desperate astropathic message delivered with Lord Governor Arxis's seal of verification was deciphered quickly by the sightless adepts aboard the Valin's Revenge. Valin's Revenge.

Its captain, the dauntless Sicarius, had no compunction about ordering the vessel and his vaunted 2nd Company to the beleaguered world with the utmost haste.

The strike cruiser translated in-system amidst a debris field. Tracking augurs identified the stricken sh.e.l.l of the n.o.bilis n.o.bilis, a vast Navy capital ship. The Valin's Revenge Valin's Revenge was undoubtedly smaller and lacking the same level of firepower, but it was also more manoeuvrable and boasted one of the most lethal payloads known to the galaxy. was undoubtedly smaller and lacking the same level of firepower, but it was also more manoeuvrable and boasted one of the most lethal payloads known to the galaxy.

Helmsman Lodis, long-serving of the Chapter, drew the vessel in close. In the void, the engine surges, the slight amendments to heading and bearing, might have seemed glacially slow but they were not. Whickering gauss-beams from the necron arc-obliterators on the ground, many kilometres long, tried time and again to skewer the strike cruiser. Each time Brother Lodis manoeuvred the Valin's Revenge Valin's Revenge out of harm's way or used the debris to ward them. Shields flickered with the glancing impacts, several minor hits were confirmed by the damage crews but still the ship drew closer, coming in line with Sicarius's perfect a.s.sault vector. out of harm's way or used the debris to ward them. Shields flickered with the glancing impacts, several minor hits were confirmed by the damage crews but still the ship drew closer, coming in line with Sicarius's perfect a.s.sault vector.

Hunks of the n.o.bilis n.o.bilis, floating listlessly through the void, presented a serious threat to the strike cruiser's integrity. Volleys from the vessel's laser batteries sheared the larger sections in half. The lesser pieces of debris merely rebounded off the Valin's Revenge's Valin's Revenge's armour. armour.

It was a feat of bravura that finally allowed the exact attack point to be reached. Ventral drop pod bays vented in seconds, like tiny arrowheads launched from an unseen bow. They sped towards d.a.m.nos in formation, bearing Angels of Death and slim hope to the populace.

Finally capitulating under the necron gauss barrage, the shields broke down and the Valin's Revenge Valin's Revenge sustained a critical blow. Its payload delivered, Helmsman Lodis was content to retreat into the void, beyond the range of the guns, and lick his wounds. sustained a critical blow. Its payload delivered, Helmsman Lodis was content to retreat into the void, beyond the range of the guns, and lick his wounds.

For now, at least, Sicarius and his brothers were on their own.

Deep percussions shuddered through the walls of the drop pod.

The gauss-streams were getting closer. Warning runes flickered across the control console, urgent and red. Despite the thickness of the ceramite arrowhead in which the s.p.a.ce Marines were coc.o.o.ned, the internal temperature was rising, not just with the heat of re-entry but from the proximity of the necron's anti-aircraft cannonade.

Sicarius was unmoved.

'Hold to your purpose, Lions,' he addressed his command squad. Except for Veteran-Sergeant Daceus, the rest of the nine-man retinue was masked by their cobalt-blue battle helms. 'We roar!'