The Beast Arises

Daylight saw the ships, tiny by comparison, that flooded out of the moon’s interior into the sky. They looked like insects swarming in their masses, coming out of their colony mound on the one hot day of the year to take wing and migrate.

Thousands. There were thousands of them.

They were too far away to identify with any confidence, but Daylight had enough of a grasp of comparative scale to know that some of them were smaller atmospheric aircraft, and some were vast void-capable warships.

They were seeing an attack formation, a multi-strand attack designed to hit surface and nearspace targets simultaneously.

A rapid-deployment raid of huge magnitude.

An attack on a planetary level.

An invasion force.

Daylight heard the whistle of high-altitude munitions auguring in. The first blasts ripped through the hills above the stockade, turning them into steam and light. Monumental cannons, vast missile arrays and planet-slicing beam weapons were being fired at the surface from the invading moon and the fleets of attack ships it was disgorging.

Bombs rained down, chewing their way across the valley in mushrooms of smoke, or hurling water from the lake in towering columns. Stabbing beams of light raked in from high above, vaporising ground targets and scoring deep canyons of blackened, fused glass in the rock.

‘Rally! Rally!’ Daylight yelled. He couldn’t see First Captain Algerin anywhere, but what little force the Imperial Fists had left needed to be focused and directed.

Projectiles smashed into the countryside around them like meteors. They fell like giant bombs, but they didn’t detonate on impact. Thunderclap concussions blasted out from each strike.

‘Landers! Troop landers!’ Slaughter cried.

Daylight didn’t argue. The enemy, this brand new enemy, was deploying in unimaginable strength. Daylight saw the first of them appear, flooding from the impact crater of one of their lander projectiles.

Smoke washed the air, but he could see their ground forces distinctly. He could see what kind of creatures they were. The face of the enemy, revealed at last.

It either made no sense, or it made the worst sense of all. Daylight knew this enemy. Every brother of the shield-corps knew this enemy. Warriors of the Adeptus Astartes might almost regard such a foe contemptuously due to over-familiarity.

Except this particular foe never operated in this particular manner. It simply didn’t. It couldn’t.

There was no more time for questions. The roaring enemy was upon them, and all that remained was war.

Daylight drew his sword.

‘Daylight Wall stands forever,’ he voxed. ‘No wall stands against it. Bring them down.’

Twenty-Nine

Terra — The Imperial Palace

An individual was more vulnerable when he or she was alone. That was basic.

The Officio taught its agents and operatives to watch the behaviour patterns of a target patiently and methodically, learn their routines, and then carry out the play when the individual was most vulnerable.

Alone. In a bath, perhaps, or a bedchamber. On a retreat to a country property, or in transit in a small craft. When at his ease or relaxing, his guard down. Eating, that was a good moment.

Approaching a target when he or she was accompanied by other people made things much more difficult. The play might be compromised. A definitive killing action might not be possible. The individual might be surrounded by bodyguards, retainers or a security retinue. Whoever they turned out to be, and whatever their level of expertise, vigilance and reaction, they were witnesses. The presence of others increased the agent’s vulnerability. It reduced the chances of success, or anonymity. It reduced the chances of finishing the play and withdrawing alive.

There were eighty-four thousand, two hundred and forty-seven people with Lord High Admiral Lansung when Vangorich approached him. Vangorich knew the figure precisely because he had swept the immense domed chamber with a miniature sensor drone.

He knew exactly what he was doing.