[Rogue Trader 02] - Star of Damocles Read online

  A WARHAMMER 40,000 NOVEL

  STAR OF DAMOCLES

  Rogue Trader - 02

  Andy Hoare

  (An Undead Scan v1.1)

  It is the 41st millennium. For more than a hundred centuries the Emperor has sat immobile on the Golden Throne of Earth. He is the master of mankind by the will of the gods, and master of a million worlds by the might of his inexhaustible armies. He is a rotting carcass writhing invisibly with power from the Dark Age of Technology. He is the Carrion Lord of the Imperium for whom a thousand souls are sacrificed every day, so that he may never truly die.

  Yet even in his deathless state, the Emperor continues his eternal vigilance. Mighty battlefleets cross the daemon-infested miasma of the warp, the only route between distant stars, their way lit by the Astronomican, the psychic manifestation of the Emperors will. Vast armies give battle in his name on uncounted worlds. Greatest amongst his soldiers are the Adeptus Astartes, the Space Marines, bio-engineered super-warriors. Their comrades in arms are legion: the Imperial Guard and countless planetary defence forces, the ever-vigilant Inquisition and the tech-priests of the Adeptus Mechanicus to name only a few. But for all their multitudes, they are barely enough to hold off the ever-present threat from aliens, heretics, mutants—and worse.

  To be a man in such times is to be one amongst untold billions. It is to live in the cruellest and most bloody regime imaginable. These are the tales of those times. Forget the power of technology and science, for so much has been forgotten, never to be re-learned. Forget the promise of progress and understanding, for in the grim dark future there is only war. There is no peace amongst the stars, only an eternity of carnage and slaughter, and the laughter of thirsting gods.

  CHAPTER ONE

  Lucian Gerrit, rogue trader and master of the heavy cruiser Oceanid, stood before the wide viewing port of his vessel’s bridge, his arms crossed behind his back.

  “Any minute now…” Lucian muttered, scanning the black vista. “Any minute.”

  Without warning, the low growl of labouring plasma drives rattled the deck plates and the bridge lights dimmed for just an instant, before flickering back to full power. Lucian grunted his satisfaction as a turquoise and jade orb swung into view across the viewing port, to settle in the dead centre as the Oceanid’s helmsman steadied the ship’s course.

  “Sy’l’Kell in range, sir. Closing as ordered,” the helmsman called out, working the great levers and wheels that controlled the Oceanid’s bearing, speed and altitude.

  “Thank you, Mister Raldi,” replied Lucian, turning his back on the viewing port and striding across the bridge. “Continue as planned,” he said, sitting down in the worn leather seat of his command throne.

  With the press of a control stud on the arm of the throne, the area in front of Lucian was filled with a static laced, greenish projection. The holograph, a priceless example of nigh extinct technology, projected a three dimensional image into the air, a grainy, flickering representation of the space around the Oceanid. Lucian’s vessel was at the centre of the image, and a shoal of other icons formed behind him, each representing another starship.

  “Station three,” Lucian called, addressing the half-man, half-machine servitor hard-wired into the communications console. “Open a channel to the Nomad.”

  In response to his order, the bridge address systems burst into angry life with white noise, before the servitor slowly nodded to indicate that the communications link was established with the other vessel.

  “Nomad,” said Lucian, “this is Oceanid. Do you read?”

  “Aye, Lucian,” came the reply over the address system. “This is Sarik, and I hear you loud and clear. Are you sure you’re ready?”

  Lucian chuckled out loud, refusing to be baited. “Yes, Sarik, I’m ready. Just don’t bite off more than you can chew. Lucian out!”

  As the communications servitor cut the link, Lucian grinned as he imagined the expression on Sarik’s face. Sarik was a Space Marine, and Lucian did not doubt he would be outraged at having been spoken to in such a manner. But Sarik could take a joke, of that Lucian was sure.

  “Sir?” Helmsman Raldi interrupted Lucian’s chain of thought. “The Nomad is accelerating to attack speed. Match her?”

  Lucian glanced out of the viewing port as his helmsman spoke, catching sight of a distant point of light speeding ahead. The Nomad was a frigate, far smaller than Lucian’s heavy cruiser, but being a Space Marine vessel it was far more deadly than the average ship of her displacement.

  “Well enough, helm. Offset by one-fifty as planned.”

  The speck of light that was the Nomad sped off towards the rapidly enlarging globe that filled a large portion of the viewing port. The planet was called Sy’l’Kell, but the vessels were not headed towards the world itself. Studying the holograph, Lucian saw that his vessel was still a good distance from its target. He scanned the other ships holding formation with his. The Rosetta sat at three kilometres astern, a rogue trader cruiser captained by his son, Korvane, and another two kilometres further on, the cruiser Fairlight, commanded by his daughter, Brielle. He was gratified to see that both were exactly in position, for he had cause to keep a close eye on Brielle’s actions, following her increasingly unpredictable behaviour of late. Dozens of other vessels were spread out across an area of space spanning fifty kilometres port and astern. Battle-cruisers, cruisers and escorts arrowed towards a single point in high orbit around Sy’l’Kell, while half a dozen smaller vessels, frigates of a class similar to the Nomad, formed up with Sarik’s vessel, more Space Marine frigates, each carrying a deadly cargo of the Emperor’s finest.

  Lucian spared a thought for their target, but only a brief one.

  “Comms,” he called, “give me the Rosetta.”

  The bridge address system burst into life once more, the white noise even greater than before, the channel laced with a harsh, almost sub-sonic growl.

  “Korvane?” Lucian called, “Korvane, do you read me?” The channel hissed and growled, before a voice cut in suddenly.

  “…ferance from the outer belt, attempting to compensate. I repeat. This is Rosetta. I read you, father, but the planet’s outer rings are playing havoc with our transceivers and primary relays. Over.”

  “I read you, Korvane,” Lucian replied. “I’m picking up the interference too, and I can only see it getting worse as we close on the target. We’ll just need to let the Astartes carry out their mission and cover as best we can. Oceanid out.”

  Lucian glanced out of the viewing port once more, noting that Sy’l’Kell almost filled the armoured portal. Its glittering, icy rings scored the blackness of space, causing Lucian to wonder what manner of substance or reaction might be generating the interference they seemed to transmit across a wide area of the void.

  “Fairlight,” he said, the communications servitor at station three patching him through to his daughter’s vessel at once. The channel opened, the interference bursting through the address systems before the Oceanid’s machine systems curtailed the signal.

  “Duma’s rancid left foot!” Lucian cursed. “If you can’t invoke the buffers I might as well work the vox myself.” The servitor nodded in mute response, incapable of taking offence at its master’s scorn. Before Lucian could continue his invective however, another voice emerged from the howling comms channel.

  “Oceanid! Oceanid, this is Fairlight. I repeat, do you read me, father?”

  “Receiving, Brielle,” replied Lucian. “Proceed as planned. No deviation. Do you understand?”

  The comms channel howled its cold white noise for long moments, before the reply cut through, Brielle’s tone as chilled as
the interference plaguing the communications system. “Understood. Fairlight out.”

  Lucian sighed, but put aside his frustration at his daughter’s continued obstinacy. He looked instead to the flickering holograph, the device, or more accurately, the sub-space sensor banks that fed it, evidently beginning to suffer from the same interference plaguing the communications systems. Amid the grainy, imprecise projection, he finally saw the target. Looking up, through the wide viewing port now entirely filled by the globe of Sy’l’Kell, Lucian could just make out a tiny, blue pinprick of light.

  Lucian felt his pulse race as adrenaline flooded his system. These were the moments he lived for.

  “Begin approach, my lord?” Helmsman Raldi enquired, Lucian noting the sardonic tone in the man’s voice. Evidently, the master of the Oceanid was not the only man to enjoy the rush of ship-to-ship combat.

  “Mister Raldi, you have the helm.”

  Lucian leaned back into the command throne as he felt the pitch of the Oceanid’s mighty plasma drives deepen. The bridge illumination switched to a bloody red, and the apocalyptic wail of the general quarters’ klaxon sounded throughout the vessel. The tone of the ancient drives grew lower as their volume increased, and every surface of the bridge shook visibly as virtually immeasurable power was bled from the plasma core and squeezed through the engines.

  Lucian smiled as he watched the holograph, the relative positions of the other vessels swinging wildly as Raldi brought the Oceanid into a stately turn to starboard. Only the Nomad was ahead of Lucian’s vessel, the small frigate all but lost against the lurid glow of the planet’s oceans far below.

  “Shields up,” Lucian ordered. “Frontal arc, minimal bleed.”

  Memories of his last space battle still only too fresh in his mind, Lucian determined not to take any risks against this foe. He looked at the holograph to check that the master of the Nomad had done likewise, when a curse from a sub-officer caused him to look up.

  “What?” Lucian demanded of the man seated at the astrographics station.

  “It’s hard to tell with all the interference, my lord.”

  Lucian rose to his feet and crossed the bridge to loom over the man’s shoulder. “Let me see.”

  Lucian stared at the man’s console, reams of data scrolling across its banks of flickering screens. His mind raced as he tried to piece together exactly what he was seeing. Interference, certainly, and there was something else, but what?

  “Station nine!” Lucian called. “Give me a near space reading, now.”

  The servitor stationed at the adjacent console nodded, machine nonsense squealing from the speaker grille crudely grafted into the flesh of its neck. The main pict-slate at the centre of its console lit up with a representation of the gravimetrics readings of the area of space around the Oceanid.

  Once more, Lucian’s mind raced as he attempted to assimilate the information presented on the screen. No wonder he needed so many servitors, he mused, dismissing the thought as his eyes fixed on an anomaly.

  There, in the lee of the target, into which his vessel’s active sensors could not reach, there was a ripple in the fabric of the void, a signature he had seen before.

  “Sarik!” He bellowed, the servitor at the comms station opening the channel immediately.

  Through the wail of interference, Sarik’s voice came back over the bridge address system.

  “Gerrit? Go ahead, but make it quick. I’m somewhat busy.”

  “Sarik, divert all power to your port shield, now.”

  “Are you…?”

  “Do it!”

  The communications channel went abruptly silent. Lucian held his breath, not realising he was doing so, before the holograph showed that the Nomad was rapidly bleeding power from its main drives while its shield was being raised. He let out his breath. He’d apologise later, he mused, if he got the chance.

  An instant later, and the viewing port was filled with a great, blinding flash of purest white light. Having closed his eyes by reflex, it took a moment for Lucian’s vision to clear. Nevertheless, flickering nerve lights rendered him almost blind.

  “Report!” He bellowed, not caring who answered.

  “Ultra-high velocity projectile, my lord. We’ve seen them before,” Lucian’s ordnance officer replied.

  His vision clearing, Lucian looked to the holograph. The projectile had struck the Nomad amidships, half way down her port bow. Looking up, Lucian saw from where the projectile had been fired, as a long silhouette glided into view against the turquoise oceans of Sy’l’Kell.

  “I knew it,” Lucian said. “I absolutely knew the camel toed bastards would try it on.”

  Exhilaration flooded through Lucian’s body as he sat in his command throne once more, gripping the worn arms as generations of his forebears had done before him.

  “Helm, twenty to port. Ordnance, prepare a broadside.”

  As the helmsman laboured at his wheel and levers, Lucian watched as the opening moves of the coming battle played out before him. The target, towards which the stricken Space Marine frigate still sped, was now visible. A mighty space station, shaped like some giant mushroom, blue lights twinkling up and down its stalk, wallowed at the centre of the viewing port, its bulk black against the lurid seas of the planet around which it orbited. A vessel emerged from behind that station; the same vessel that had come so close to destroying, in a single shot, a frigate of the White Scars Chapter of the Adeptus Astartes. Lucian’s grin became a feral snarl and his eyes narrowed as the tau vessel cleared the station it had been hiding behind.

  “Enemy vessel powering up for another shot at the Nomad, my lord,” called the ordnance officer. “She’s going for the kill shot, sir.”

  “That’s what she thinks,” replied Lucian. “Ordnance? Open fire!”

  “But, sir,” the ordnance officer sputtered, “I have no firing solution. We’ll…”

  “I said open fire damn you!” bellowed Lucian. “Do it, or so help me…”

  Lucian was glad to see that the officer had the presence of mind to order the broadside before his master could complete, or indeed enact, his threat. The Oceanid shuddered as the port weapons batteries unleashed a fearsome barrage towards the tau vessel. Lacking a solid firing solution for the war spirits of the super-heavy munitions to follow, the majority of the shells went wide, their fuses detonating them at random across the space between the two ships.

  No matter. If Lucian had meant to destroy the tau ship he would have waited, but had he done that, the Nomad would now be smeared across a hundred square kilometres of local space. The tau vessel aborted its shot against the Space Marine frigate, its blunt nose coming around to face the greater threat presented by the Oceanid.

  “My thanks, Gerrit. I am in your debt.” Sarik’s voice came over the address system.

  “You’re welcome,” replied Lucian. “Good hunting.”

  Now, he thought, I’ve got a tau vessel to take out before it rains everything. As the explosions cleared, the greasy black smoke left in their wake almost entirely obscured the other vessel. Lucian judged that the distance between the two ships would level at an impossibly close five hundred metres before they parted once more. Five hundred metres, he mused, remembering just how deadly another tau vessel had almost proved at such a close range in a previous engagement. There was too little time for an effective broadside, but he had other tricks up his sleeve that the tau had yet to see. Besides which, he thought, it doesn’t pay to let the enemy get too used to one’s tactics.

  “Ordnance, I want a focused lance battery strike on the module aft of the central transverse,” he said, indicating one of the many blocky, modular units the tau vessel appeared to be carrying slung beneath its long spine.

  “Aye, sir,” replied the ordnance officer, Lucian noting with satisfaction that the officer was plotting the lance strike against the exact point he had intended.

  At seven hundred metres, Lucian could make out the details of the flanks of the tau vessel
, though he could not fathom the meaning of the many symbols or icons applied to its surface.

  “I have a solution, my lord,” the officer said. “Fire pattern set.”

  Lucian knew that even now, the sweating crews in the lance batteries atop the Oceanid would be toiling at the traversing mechanisms of their turrets, cursing crew chiefs threatening them with eternal damnation should they falter in their work.

  At six hundred metres, the drifting smoke and debris of the broadside cleared enough for Lucian to pick out the point against which he had ordered the lance strike. At five hundred and fifty metres, he saw it clearly, and so did the ordnance officer, who communicated a series of final adjustments to the turret crews. A horizontal line of clear blue light appeared at the centre of the module, gaining in height as it was revealed to be an armoured blast door opening upwards. A row of armoured figures was framed against the blue light, the like of which Lucian had seen before, from a distance, the last time he had fought the tau.

  “You have fire control, Mister Batista.”

  “Thank you, sir,” replied the ordnance officer, adjusting his uniform jacket, straightening his back and clearing his throat.

  “Now would be good,” added Lucian.

  “Yes, my lord.” The officer depressed the control stud that passed the fire order to the lance turrets. An instant later the lance batteries spat a searing beam of condensed atomic fire at the tau vessel, parting the smoky clouds, spearing the open bay, vaporising the armoured figures, and passing clean out of the other side of the module, accompanied by a rapidly expanding cone of fire and debris.

  “Target well struck, sir,” the ordnance officer reported.

  “Well enough, Mister Batista,” Lucian replied. “Prepare for a second strike.” Lucian scanned the flanks of the enemy vessel as the range closed to five hundred metres, seeking further armoured bays from which the battle suits he had seen used before might deploy.