Chapter 27

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The steam locomotive, freed from the bonds of the multi-ton train, rushed forward like a heavy bird that rushes off a cliff to gain speed and catch the wind with its wings. Human language is too poor to describe the range of emotions that the machine spirit experienced in its last moments of existence... or life. And even though - again, from a human point of view - it was more emulation of the feelings in the self-generated construct - they were real, with an inexpressible tension and exhilaration. The mechanism, born in fire and for war - in the middle of a battle - left in the fire, suddenly and brightly serving its deity, its memory, its long-standing glory.

When the 'Twelfth' and the locomotive were separated by a hundred yards or so, the Materium finally lost power over the locomotive, and the singular point of energy that had replaced the boiler exploded. To the great good fortune of those around, the blast was directed at itself, or the effect would have been greater than a nuclear 'tactic'.

Luckily, having disconnected the coupler, Luct turned his back to the locomotive, waiting for orders - whether by vox from the tech-priestess or words from Kryptman - so when the mechanical beast headed for Omnissia, the servitor didn't burn out his optics with a flash. The shockwave hurled the Inquisitor's servitor right through the vestibule hatch, puncturing a centimeter-long sheet of metal with his body, then rolled through the 'Twelfth' as it had in the collision a few minutes before, but in the opposite direction.

The steam locomotive itself literally evaporated, disintegrating into atoms, or perhaps leaving Materium. No one could know that. The snow and ice within a half-kilometer radius were blown away, the rails under the tractor survived, but melted. The decoupled Twelfth and Sixty-fourth flew at over two hundred kilometers through a protuberance of blindingly yellow, furious flame. Thank the Emperor, the catastrophe happened on a straight stretch, or the long track would have gone off the rails at the weakest corner.

Luct stood up, clutching at the walls with his hands. A self-diagnosis showed multiple, but not critical damage, with a loss of about thirty percent of its overall combat effectiveness. Staggering because of the malfunctioning gyroscopes, the servitor staggered back to the HQ wagon, wobbling his feet.

"This is too much," muttered Bertha, licking the blood from her lips.

The second jolt finally broke and ripped off everything loose in the headquarters, fortunately, there weren't many of those things. It was worse for the men, and Wretched Man broke a couple more ribs and couldn't walk properly.

"The Emperor protects," the Priest tried to shout, but his voice came out as a croak, and the monk was also hurt.

"We're on fire," Jennifer informed her dryly. The bruised head gurgled with a damaged loudspeaker, but the words were quite intelligible.

Kryptman again looked at the periscope and predictably found nothing good there. The aft wagons were burning, and the 'head' of the train was smoking. The Inquisitor quickly considered the prospect of burning and assessed it as rather low. The oncoming wind was certainly fanning the flames, but there wasn't much combustible material left in the armored wagons. These were not passenger wagons, which were full of flammable plastic and burned up in twenty minutes on the move.

Fidus stepped to the row of intercom tubes, jerked the bell just in case - in vain, the shock skewed the system permanently.

"Well," said the Priest. "It's about time for the Implicator. And let everyone do what they have to do."

The purificators shot at the heretics with excitement, but not with the cheerful glee of the victors, but rather with the grim determination of the doomed. Set on fire one by one - as the enemies advanced - the four tail wagons gave a good barrier and took quite a few enemy lives, but the flames were beginning to subside. The fire no longer roared in a solid wall, but burned quietly and evenly, weakening as the fuel burned out. The Inquisitor's trick bought the squad some valuable minutes, but there was no light in the hopeless situation; the 'Twelfth' was still pushing by the enemy train forward, which had no intention of slowing down or retreating.

Behind the curtain of fire loomed distorted figures, very similar to the ghosts of the 'pocket' from which the purificators had miraculously escaped by the grace of the Emperor and the sacred flamethrowers. Only these creatures were quite material, and their outlines fluctuated due to the flow of hot air-mostly. The first wave of attackers was stopped by the flames, but time after time one or another heretic, or maybe already an unholy mutant tried his fate, trying to run through the fire on the roof or climb over the sides. Holy Man and Sinner poked out of the hatch above, Crybaby and Savlar took up positions near the sides, securing themselves with slings and a carbine so that another gust of evil wind wouldn't pull them out into the half-darkness.

The bright flashes of laser beams alternated with the angry yapping of machine guns. Nearly every second, another dark figure broke off and fell, disappearing into the half-light with a wild, inhuman screech. The Holy Man exclaimed "Emperor, fuck!" at every hit, Crybaby and the Sinner worked silently, Savlar fired mostly 'somewhere,' but then the Wretched Man joined him. Though the Wretched Man squinted, writhing in pain, he shot much better than the convict, and things began to go well. The enemy fought back, but sluggishly, as if they'd suddenly forgotten how to use a human weapon, or at least how to reload it. It was as if those who had some kind of weapon in their hands at the time of the disaster were trying to use it according to the orcish principle of 'point about there and pull the trigger all the way'.

In the meantime, dawn was creeping steadily over the horizon. The surrounding tundra appeared in gray and white from the darkness, with industrial buildings, cranes, and warehouses on either side of it. Many were burning, and in some places there was fighting. In the distance a glow pulsed, like the northern lights, only low and scarlet and scarlet, like an incessant bombardment. The Purificators had seen something like this before, and that's when the Squad came into its sad state of disastrous incompleteness.

They'll get through," the Holy Man said through gritted teeth as he inserted the last clip. The metal clanked audibly, confidently, as if to say: It's all right, master, as long as I don't run out of ammo, you're safe. Alas, it was the last clip. Two of the wagons were almost burnt out, the third and fourth were smokier, though they still served as a barrier.

"What's in there?! What is it!!!" Savlar howled, shouting out even the noise of the trains, the roaring sound of the flames, and the howl of the cold wind.

The Holy One didn't know what he was talking about at first, but then he squinted and saw. Among the wavering figures of the heretics, two shadows were sneaking around. Or rather, not sneaking, but walking quite openly, but their movements were both light, cautious, and impetuous, like those of predators. That gave the impression of cautiously hiding their prey. Features of creatures were lost, blurred in the shadows and shivering hot air, but it was clear that their height is more than a human half and a half, knees curved backward, like birds, and this further strengthened the impression of a dangerous impetuosity. And their fingers, supple as tentacles, ended in no ordinary fingernails. The other enemies fled in a hasty retreat as if startled by the approach of the creatures. The heretics screamed in thin, chirping voices, pushing each other overboard to avoid the half-birds' path.

"Eh, we would like to have more ammunition, promethium, and everything else," the Holy One whispered wistfully and thought that in the bad hour the leadership decided to disarm the armored trains...

Both figures halted before the fading veil of fire, bright purple perfectly round eyes glinting in the midst of their horned heads. Savlar shrieked like a man whose mind had been blown away by animal terror. The Sinner shook his head with sullen determination as if that would help him take better aim. The badly healed holes in his pierced lips were bleeding again, and the mute purificator looked like a ghoul with his mouth sewn shut.

The Holy One took a gulp, feeling his throat thirsty to the point of pain, and aimed at one of the figures, somehow confident that ordinary bullets wouldn't hurt it. The demon on the left crouched on trembling legs, clearly preparing to leap through the fire. The right one retreated a few paces as if it were taking a run-up. A sluggish heretic appeared in his path, and the dark, bright-eyed figure waved his octopus-shaped limb carelessly. The heretic's head flew off with surprising ease, like a ball, demonstrating the terrifying strength of a seemingly thin-skinned creature.

The Holy One exhaled through his mouth, not feeling his numb lips, his fingers trembling on the stock, stubbornly refusing to squeeze the trigger. At that moment there was a bang, loud and dry as if a thick, dried-out, frozen-through branch had snapped behind me. A lone tracer whistled over their heads. The Sinner ducked and pinned the Holy One's helmet, and right after that, a fiery knife swept over the roof.

It wasn't easy to get the machine gun upstairs, but Fidus and Bertha managed it. The Inquisitor pulled the belt so it wouldn't jam, and the commandant jerked the bolt and slammed it down the barrel, which was hand-signed in stubby but carefully written letters: 'The Implicator'.

"Fire," the mentor whispered to herself and pulled the trigger.

The first, single shot was a warning shot, for friends, not enemies. The friends understood instantly and ducked their heads in their yellow helmets, so Bertha immediately opened fire to kill.

Most of the weapons in the Squad were good old-fashioned firearms. Energy weapons were thought to be less reliable in an Immaterium breach, even though they were more powerful. But now, looking at the performance of a heavy machine gun, hardly anyone could say it was 'ineffective'. Bertha concentrated on the crouched creature, firing short - three to five rounds each so the barrel wouldn't be driven away by the recoil - but frequent bursts. The mentor rarely missed. The hits weren't as bad as they should have been, the 11-millimeter bullets producing bright purple flashes instead of fountains of blood as if they were drowning in a lean body. But the monster was visibly and palpably bad anyway, and it retreated staggering under the hail of projectiles, losing its shape like a plasticine toy blown by a hot hairdryer.

At last, apparently desperate, the monster jumped awkwardly, without the grace and plasticity, and collapsed heavily onto the roof of the burning wagon. Tearing through the scorched metal with its tentacles, it plummeted down, hissing and hissing. Heaving through the wreckage of scorching metal, burning and splattering drops of ichor, which evaporated in the heat, the demon made its way to the vestibule. And clutching at the suction cups on his flexible 'fingers', he tore open the solid door, opening the way to 'Radial-12'.

"Śubha dina!" greeted him the Priest in his native language. With a smirk on his bloody lips, he pulled the trigger of the acid cannon. Behind the monk stood Servitor Luсt with a sledgehammer at the ready.

The Priest reasoned that one way or another it would come hand-to-hand and, while the Inquisitor and the Commandant were setting up a machine gun, ran across the train to the 'tail' to cover the gunners on the front line. And, by the Emperor's grace, he guessed, just like a real prophet.

The screeching that erupted from beneath the armored walls was another cruel test for the fighters, who had already partially lost their hearing for the most part. You didn't have to look to know - the creature was finished. Fire, of course, is gracious and cleansing, but true liberation from the bonds of defiled flesh can only be granted by holy acid blessed by a holy father and seasoned in a temple for at least five days. Only the howl of a dying demon could compete in volume with the war-cry of the Priest, who felt that the Emperor himself was now leading him with his hands and giving the acid the power to destroy even the partially ghostly.

The second beast clearly felt insecure and yet retreated a few more steps, preparing to rush in.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

"Ai-yi-yi-yi!!!" The Holy Man shouted, expressing all at once in a simple way: ecstasy at having defeated the spawn of Evil, bitterness at having probably run out of bullets in the machine gun, and the realization that the Priest would not have time to get to the roof and stop the other one.

The Sinner, sniffing through his sewn-up mouth, pulled himself up on his hands in one fell swoop, climbing out of the hatch, probably to fight the demon chest-to-chest and, no doubt, to die. But at least with honor and without shame before the All-Seeing One. Bertha, swearing, reloaded 'The Implicator', Kryptman helped, but frozen, despite the gloves, palms slid on the icy metal like unfeeling wood. The machine gunners couldn't keep up.

The demon swiftly flicked its multi-jawed paws and leaped much farther than its predecessor in a short burst, leaping across the fire at once. The second leap took the creature halfway across the long wagon, and a tall figure darted toward the vicious creature. The Sinner charged at the enemy like a living battering ram, shoulder outstretched. The man weighed considerably less than the demon but caught the moment when the landed creature was balancing, not yet stable. Both hovered on the edge of the wagon.

"Brother," the Holy Man whispered, already realizing what the comrade was up to

The Sinner silently wrapped his arms around the demon and pushed off, dragging his foe with him. Overboard, into the half-darkness, where the snow swirls howled. Only for an instant did the Holy One see the pale blur of the second flamethrower's face, but he could have sworn that the Sinner was smiling with unearthly happiness, like a man who had done something wicked, but who suddenly had hope of sincere forgiveness.

"Brother," the Holy Man repeated with cold, disobedient lips, feeling a frantic joy that his comrade had succeeded and at the same time a burning shame that he had not done it.

"Brother, farewell, meet me at His Throne."

"We're going to die," Bertha stated as she finally slammed the shutter lid shut and pulled the lever. "Half a cartridge. That won't be enough. But even if by some miracle we make it, we'll crash at the station."

She looked at the Squad's banner, which the wind was stubbornly and unsuccessfully trying to tear from the flagpole.

"Yes," Fidus agreed, struggling to pronounce the words with frozen lips. "But at least we'll die fighting, and the souls won't go to Evil."

"That's right," Bertha hesitated for a moment and then clapped the inquisitor on the shoulder in a way that looked almost friendly. "You're insolent, but you're brave."

"Brave," Fidus grinned wryly in agreement and finished to himself. Only not too clever. Rejoice, Schmettau, now your dreams will come true.

The red sun was already a quarter of the way over the horizon, and the tundra was painted in watercolor blurred shades of white and pink. It would have been beautiful without the black columns of numerous smoke rising into the sky. Judging by them, the fires in the area numbered in the dozens.

"Then we finish the cartridge and..." Bertha hesitated.

"Yes," Fidus repeated. "The banner must be taken down while they wait."

The enemies were indeed hesitant, not hurrying to run through the fire, though the fire was, in truth, more symbolic. But most likely, the spectacular deaths of the two leaders had tempered the offensive impulse. Not for long, though.

"Do you think so?" Bertha asked as an equal.

"You'll wrap it around you," Kryptman expertly explained. "If they find us... then the flag will be sprinkled with the blood of a hero."

"Heroes," the commandant sternly corrected. "Take it off, I'm at the machine gun. Can you do it?"

"Yes," Kryptman mumbled once again, thinking that the main thing was to have time to shoot Olga. If he could not protect and save her, at least let her die at once and not painfully. Then he stepped to the telescopic bar with the red and white cloth, trying to figure out how to take it off quickly, but not to be dragged overboard like a sail with a man.

I wonder if it's possible to hide out in a tank? he asked himself and answered himself. No, I can't...

He made it surprisingly easy and came downstairs

"Hey, we forgot all about you," Kryptman told the techno-priestess wearily.

"I see," Wakrufmann said. "Judging from what my audio sensors register, you have something to do. What are the prospects?"

"We're going to die now," Fidus replied, folding the banner. It was wide but surprisingly light and thin, so it wasn't a neat but liftable bale. "Well, maybe not now, but soon."

"It's sad."

"I thought you'd participate," Fidus chided the Martian, rubbing his frozen fingers. There was a short burst of fire from upstairs, apparently ending the enemy's brief period of idleness.

"I have my own war," Wakrufmann said flatly, rising from her chair. "The intensity of the information exchange did not allow to participate in the battle. I'm requesting help, and communication requires too much computing power."

"Successful?" Fidus asked without much hope.

"No. At least not yet."

"It happens. Well, we're retreating to our wagon, and there we'll fight to the last man. Then we'll lock ourselves in 'Chimera' and wait for a miracle. Are you with us?"

"I'm in."

First came the thunder. It was so terrifying that it overpowered even the heretical train siren that never stopped. It sounded more like the rustle of tearing cloth but multiplied a thousandfold. Thunder and vibration rippled through the train, echoing the rattling of nuts and the whine of teeth.

"What else is there..." Kryptman thought aloud and looked through the periscope again, but in vain. The sound was coming from somewhere above, above the periscope view. But the commandant machine-gunner was visible, waving her arms frantically and pointing upward.

Cursing everything under this sun, Fidus handed the folded banner to Jennifer and climbed back up the ladder to the hatch. The piercing wind didn't even rush into the headquarters but pressed in, hard, hard, freezing faces and hands. The roaring sound grew even louder and as if it had shifted. Snowflakes danced in the icy swirls, surprisingly white and clear for the outer ring of the industrial zone. Kryptman froze for a few seconds, only his feet in fur-lined boots stomping on the ladder rung as if the inquisitor were dancing with impatience. And then Fidus stumbled back in, brushing the frost off his thick stubble. He sat down by the muddy steps and laughed like a lunatic.

"Inadequate reaction," Wakrufmann said. "Have you also succumbed to the pernicious influence? Do you wish me to terminate your existence and save your soul while you retain your human form and remnants of sanity?"

"No..." Fidus asked, continuing to burst out with semi-hysterical laughter. "No. It's just the 'Fear Claw' that's flying over us. The 'Anvilus' model."

"An orbital landing ship," Jennifer chided. "The Claws are currently operated exclusively by Chaos Space Marines. Well..."

The techno-priestess paused, put the folded banner on the operator's desk, and finished in a very human way, even mimicking a sad sigh: "So, indeed, our time has come."

"No," Fidus burst out laughing again. 'You don't understand. It's Anvylus, but it's not heretics."

Kryptman stood up wearily, heavily, shivering, partly from the cold, partly from nervous exhaustion. The Inquisitor's face was already rectangular, with sharp features, and now it seemed carved out of stone or hard wood - not a smooth line at all.

"In my father's diaries it was called 'cavalry over the hills,'" said Fidus. "Though I have no idea what the hills have to do with it..."

"Keep your head down!" shouted the Holy Man and set the example himself.

The howling thing, which looked like a huge pole with claws, hovered for a moment, spewing a column of fire, and then, thrusting its thrusters, came in confidently from the double formation's 'head', like an attack aircraft preparing to 'comb' its target with cannons. Whoever was sitting at the levers of the Chaos machine, his pilot's skill was great, because not every atmospheric pilot could maneuver at such a speed at an altitude of not more than fifty meters, and certainly not a landing capsule.

The 'Claw' performed a classic slide, hovered for a moment, and began to descend vertically, very quickly, literally falling. The Holy Man shrieked with delight as he realized what the unknown pilot was about to do. The capsule was equipped with a cannon system, which allowed to bombard the train, but the unknown man (or not a man? who knows...) decided the issue differently and more radically, not dispensing with artillery.

The ship descended strictly over the tail wagons of the 'Twelfth,' with the precision of a jeweler or a Martian, leveling the speed so that the difference was no more than five or six kilometers. And, as the final point in a beautiful and surprising combination, the seemingly harmless, dazzling white lights of the melta lit up at the aft engines of the capsule. The enemy locomotive and the 'Sixty-four's wagons passed under a rocket torch of about four thousand degrees and the fire of torches designed to crush the multimeter armor of open-space warships.

One could say that it was 'bright', 'spectacular', 'scary', and many other epithets, but all of them would be only a pale shadow of what happened in reality. The technique of space boarding, transferred to a different environment, worked extremely effectively. It was no longer a noise or even a rumble, but a full-fledged acoustic shock, itself capable of killing and smashing. Fire rose into the brightening sky in a solid wave for dozens of meters, pieces of red-hot metal flew like the explosion of a superpowered bomb, and splashes of molten steel erupted like magma from a volcano's mouth. Surprisingly, the heretical banner lasted a few moments, the unholy symbols glowing a piercing purple, like writings scorched in all worlds at once. Yet even evil sorcery surrendered to the cleansing flames.

After letting the 'Sixty-four' pull itself through the killing fire, the 'Claw' rose a little higher, and finally, it was time for the guns, and in the ideal position for firing, when no correction for lateral displacement of the target was necessary. Only two of the five guns could fire the train because of the vertical position of the capsule, but it was enough. In other circumstances, the armor would have argued with a shell, but the steel plates were torn off and melted by the greedy claws of the exhaust and torches. 'Radial-64,' the unfortunate train victim of Evil, was over in every sense in less than half a minute.

The Holy Man picked up his sagging jaw and thought that the Emperor's angels must be strong and powerful if they were fighting... on these things.

Behind the triplexes, the industrial-city buildings were already glimpsed. Bertha lowered the machine gun and jumped down heavily, hanging onto her arms and bypassing the ladder, maybe out of badassness, maybe for fear of slipping.

"Wakrufmann, how much?" Kryptmann called out.

"It's nine kilometers to the terminal station," the tech-priestess said after a short pause.

Either she understood what Fidus was thinking, or the inquisitor and the Martian's thoughts were moving in the same direction, because Jennifer continued:

"Our natural braking distance will be about three and a half kilometers. But in two kilometers there is an unloading station and a shunting branch."

"Is it possible to unload the 'Chimera' there? Is the height of the platform enough?" Fidus quickly clarified, counting in his mind how much time they had. It came out to something like two minutes, but Kryptmans were famous for their lack of capable mathematics.

"Yes. On command, you must use the emergency brake."

"We will," Bertha promised, feeling the tears welling up in her eyes. Truly, what more proof is needed that the Emperor is with them and His power is great? Bertha had removed the top half of her jumpsuit and was now hastily wrapping a folded Squad banner over her sweater.

In the meantime, the ship had gone somewhere else, high enough, judging by the fading rumble. Maybe the capsule had taken the crew on some business of its own, or maybe the pilot was looking for a place to land.

"But who could have flown in on the Chaos shit and saved us?" Bertha asked.

"There is one... Warrior of the Emperor. He gutted the Claw from a rebel conversion ship that had been shot down and drifted through space for thousands of years. Made a personal runabout out of it," Fidus replied, remembering where the first aid kit was. The Wretched Man was bracing and silent before he went to help his comrades, but he didn't look well. He needed at least an immobilizing bandage on his torso. He sure the others was hurt, too.

"And why?"

"Because he could."

"Whoever partakes of the heretical, even in a small way, walks on the edge and resembles a heretic himself. His moral qualities are questionable," said Bertha thoughtfully.

"Perhaps," Fidus agreed wholeheartedly. "But today he brought us salvation."

"Well, then we'll thank him for it if we can," the commandant decided with absolute seriousness as she buttoned up her overalls. The already tall, dense mentor seemed spindly when she was wrapped in the banner. "But I wouldn't turn my back on such a type."

Kryptman chuckled again, noting the surrealism of the moment - a theological discussion in a dilapidated armored train without a locomotive, among the rattling and grinding of crumbling elements, with blood splattering, sparking wires, and flashing red emergency lights. Well, inquisitors have had to debate the boundaries of good and evil in far more exotic places.

"It's time to grab the emergency brake lever," Jennifer's head recommended.

"Colleagues, who will take on the honor of completing our short but exciting run?" Kryptman inquired and answered himself. "I think it's the commander's honor and position."

Bertha squinted, wondering if she should punch the guy in the ear, but realized that Fidus was in an emotional tailspin with excessive verbosity. A normal reaction for a man - even if he is an inquisitor - after such adventures and in anticipation of new ones, not less, and probably even more exciting. So the Mentor limited herself to a gruff wish to turn the valve of verbal diarrhea and with both hands took hold of a large red lever with a lead seal on a steel string.

"Thirty seconds. We're losing speed quickly, but the shake will be noticeable," Jennifer warned.

"I'm starting to get used to it," Kryptman squeezed out. "You count very nicely."

"Don't piss!" sternly ordered Bertha, literally quoting the Priest. "The Emperor hasn't covered us so many times already, so we won't die for anything. We will die no sooner or later than He measured!?

"Twenty," Wakrufmann began another countdown.

Kryptman sincerely hoped that this time it would be easier. The jerks and blows endured by the armored train were surprisingly painful. The Inquisitor's bones ached, especially the bones that had already been broken at the Ballistic Station.

"Fifteen."

How's Olga? Fidus thought belatedly. I hope she overstayed her welcome in the vehicle.

The mutilated armored train, fuming and losing its falling off parts, rolled on its inertia in the densely built-up area. Concrete walls with barbed wire on rebar supports towered on either side of the double track, blocking the way for the pushy. But they did not prevent you from seeing what was going on in 'City-22'. And there, by all appearances, nothing good awaited the small group.

"Ten."

And Bertha grasped the lever tighter.

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