The Bleeding Chalice

Team seven, are there signs of habitation?'

'No, sir.’ said the leader.

'Movement!' came a shout from behind. The leader spun around to bring his gun to bear and his camera showed a squat shape drifting along the floor -another servitor, but not a combat pattern this time. It was an autoarchiver, its legs and arms replaced with long, thin jointed metal manipulators which removed and replaced volumes from the shelves as it moved along on the wheels set into its back.

It was still functioning. That meant this place -this library - had been used recently and had probably been abandoned in a hurry.

'Leave it alone,' said Thaddeus. 'I want this place intact.'

'Understood.’ said the team leader. 'Don't shoot it!' he yelled to his men. 'And don't touch anything. The bosses want it clean.'

A faint mumble of discontent from the other men indicated that they had been looking forward to seeing what they could loot.

Thaddeus glanced at the other images. One inset screen was blank - the team had stumbled into an explosive booby trap in the hospital ship, a set of tripwires strung across the entrance to one of the surgery theatres. Another had lost three men when a gantry over an engine room gave way under their weight. The team in the brig were rifling through the contents of an armoury locker - they were taking out wicked combat knives the size of short swords, power mauls and large calibre ammunition for which the corresponding guns were missing. Gradually the teams were moving further into the hulk, and most of them were finding signs of a recent, organised and presumably human presence. One or two had reached parts of the hulk evidently of xenos design. But here their orders were to halt.

Thaddeus looked back at team seven. The library seemed huge - several bulkheads had been removed to form a large enough space. Mem-slate blocks stood like glossy black monoliths in rows between the bookshelves.

'Get me one of the books.’ said Thaddeus.

The team leader took one of the small volumes from the nearest shelf.

'Catechisms Martial,' read the team leader from the gold lettering on the book's cover.

Thank you.’ said Thaddeus, and switched from the team back to the officers on the Obedience.

Thaddeus was a well-read man - an inquisitor had to know a great deal about the various histories and philosophies of the Imperium to be able to root out the heresies that infected it. But he had only recently become acquainted with the Cate-. chisms Martial, a work of tactical philosophy that espoused a swift, shattering form of warfare where speed and overwhelming focused strength were the primary weapons.

It was written by the philosopher-soldier Daeny-athos. Daenyathos of the Soul Drinkers.

The Pilgrim had been right, again. The Soul Drinkers had made the hulk their home but they had left suddenly and recently. The hulk was the single biggest clue Thaddeus could reasonably have hoped to find, but it was still just a clue and not a part of the goal itself. The Soul Drinkers were somewhere else in the galaxy, pursuing some perverse plan while Thaddeus took tiny steps towards them.

'Captain.’ Thaddeus transmitted to the Obedience, 'have your crews secure a landing zone. I shall oversee the exploration from the hulk.’

By the time the captain replied to object that the hulk was still not safe, Thaddeus was already gone from the bridge.

THREE

THE FIRST SIGHT of the enemy was a scarlet streak through the upper atmosphere, glimpsed from the porthole of the Thunderhawk gunship as it plummeted from orbit towards the landing zone.

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'Prepare for rapid deployment,' ordered Korvax as the Thunderhawk's deceleration ramped up a notch and the G-force kicked in.

The engines flared and the Thunderhawk was hovering about thirty metres above the ground. Korvax glanced out of the porthole - he could see two of the other gunships alongside. The shape of the outpost - a low building set into the hard frozen earth of the tundra - was broken by the Adeptus Mechanicus troops firing from the roof at the eldar moving rapidly towards it. Small arms fire from the strange eldar shuriken-firing weapons spattered against the Thunderhawk's hull.

The rear ramp of the Thunderhawk opened and the sound of the engines flooded in, punctuated by explosions and gunfire from below. Cold air rolled in, too, for the outpost was on a planetoid of frozen tundra too far from its parent sun to be hospitable. The restraints on the grav-couches snapped open and with practiced speed the ten-strong squad of Soul Drinkers Space Marines dropped out of the ship on rappel lines, bolters slung.

Korvax was amongst the last to drop out of the Thunderhawk. He saw Marines from the force's other gunships doing the same - he counted five ships in total and a small black shape trailing smoke and heading upwards, meaning one of the Thunderhawks had sustained damage and was heading back to the Carnivore. That still left fifty Space Marines making landfall.

Fifty against three hundred plus. Though pride was sinful in the eyes of the Emperor, Korvax still admitted to himself that those were the kind of odds he liked.

The battlefield yawed below him, and as the rappel line hissed through the clip he grasped it with his right hand. The outpost was surrounded by smoke and gunfire. Tech-guard on the roof had formed fire points and were firing at the eldar now moving to surround it.

The Mechanicus had access to the most advanced of weapons, Korvax saw a form of rapid-firing missile launcher send volleys of frag missiles into the eldar lines, and glimpsed the unmistakable liquid fire of a heavy plasma gun bursting amongst the aliens. The eldar were in many forms - as was the way of this heathen species - some wore bone-white bodysuits with tall masks which shrieked horribly as they cartwheeled through the gunfire to use their power swords against the tech-guard up close. Others had plumed helmets and shuriken Weapons, and were covering green-armoured eldar with buzzing heavy chainswords and masks with mandibles that spat laser fire at the tech-guard ma

Korvax hit the ground in the centre of his squad. A quick hand signal told them all they needed to know -advance and engage. The safest place on the barren battlefield was toe-to-toe with the eldar. The aliens were quick and skilled, but pile on enough pressure and they would break. Korvax had fought them before on Quixian Obscura and broken them, too.