The Beast Arises

He remained in the Cerebrium long after Kubik had departed and thought through his next steps. When he doubted, he looked out at the moon, and at the empty round table in the centre of the chamber: the adversary and the absent leadership. He was still there when word reached him over the vox that the Alcazar Remembered had returned and made low anchor over Terra.

Koorland made his way from the Cerebrium to the space port beyond the Daylight Wall. On his orders, the ceremonial purpose of the space port had been discarded. Reserving the facility for the most privileged dignitaries was pointless, now that orks had walked its rockcrete landing pads. Koorland was more interested in the time saved by having his officers reach him in the most efficient way possible.

The Thunderhawk Honour’s Spear touched down with a surge of retro thrusters. Thane pulled back the side door and jumped out. He had worked on his armour during the return from Mars, and it was clean again, shining in the arc lights of the space port. There had not been time yet to repair all the damage, though — it was pitted and scarred from the conflict at Pavonis Mons. Koorland eyed the marks of fire and thought: We have done this to each other. The Imperium fought itself. Are the orks laughing? They must be.

‘Chapter Master Koorland,’ Thane said when he reached Koorland. He crossed his arms, slamming his hands against his chest-plate in an aquila salute.

‘It’s good to see you, Chapter Master Thane,’ Koorland returned.

‘I had my doubts that we would meet again,’ said Thane.

‘Understandably.’

They walked back towards the Daylight Wall.

Thane said, ‘I wish the mission had resulted in information that was less grave.’

‘It is information that we can act upon. So we are better off than we were before.’

‘The Interdictor and its escort are still unaccounted for?’

‘As is the information they carry, yes.’ The Black Templars had learned something that could be used against the orks, but Koorland had to face the real possibility that the knowledge had been lost to battle or the warp.

Thane nodded. ‘There is something else I must tell you.’

‘Yes?’

‘I hesitated.’

‘When?’

‘Moments before the order for the ceasefire came. I was about to call down a full orbital bombardment.’

‘I’m grateful you did hesitate.’ Koorland spoke with feeling. It was important Thane believe him.

Thane seemed unconvinced. ‘The day was saved by chance. The battlefield conditions dictated immediate action. I did not take it.’

‘And you would feel you had done your duty, if we were left with nothing to salvage on Mars and a growing war with the Mechanicus?’

‘Of course not. But the principle remains.’

They walked down a vast colonnade, their boot steps echoing off marble. Above them, for hundreds of metres, were layers upon layers of galleries. Guards in the livery of the Lucifer Blacks stood to attention as they passed.

‘No son of Dorn should owe his victory to luck,’ Thane continued.

‘Perhaps not,’ said Koorland. ‘But it is mere chance that I am alive. It could easily have been one of my brothers. Or none of us. Your hesitation served us well. Relentless advance is not enough in the battlefield, you know this as well as I. Sometimes we have to listen to our instincts. The disorder of war demands that we adapt and improvise. I take it you doubt your fitness to be Chapter Master.’

Thane looked ahead stonily. ‘Perhaps.’

‘I think the complete absence of such doubts is simply arrogance.’

Now Thane’s lips creased in a grim smile. ‘High Marshal Bohemond would disagree.’

‘Quite possibly. The fact remains that you made the right decision, and averted a greater disaster. Accept your victories, brother. We need them.’

Thane nodded. Koorland wasn’t sure if he was convinced, but he seemed content to let the matter drop for the moment. ‘And what do we do with what we have discovered?’

‘We go to Ullanor.’

Thane’s intake of breath was sharp. He must have known what I would say, Koorland thought. Just as he had known what he would say in response to the question Thane was bound to ask. Speaking that sentence, though, giving voice to the thought, made him realise the immensity of what he was contemplating.

We go to Ullanor.

Those words should have been inconceivable. But so was the ork occupation of the world. And so Koorland had to confront an impossible reality with an impossible act.

‘If that is where these orks are coming from, we are not in a condition to bring the battle to them,’ said Thane.

‘I know. We can’t go alone.’

He said nothing else until they reached their destination. Outside the chamber of the astropathic choir, other warriors of the Last Wall waited. Daylight, Eternity, Absolution and Hemisphere — once of the Fists Exemplar, the Black Templars, the Crimson Fists and the Excoriators, now they saluted Koorland as their new Chapter Master. They were a union come to support the summoning of an even greater one.