a Short Story

[CaptGarro]

So, this is a short story, which I haven't named yet. C&C would be appreciated, hope the grammar's right.

 

Part 1 - Introduction

There was no time.

He rushed through the barge's corridors.

He had to get to the bridge.

He Pushed a servitor to the ground, ran to the elevator and hit the button.

”Faster, you damn machine! Faster!”

He almost pounded the control panel open.

The elevator's Doors opened. ”HARD STARBOARD! NOW!”

The whole bridge crew just stared at him.

”Excuse me, sir, but what do yo-”

He ran across the bridge, pushed a navigator out of his way and Surged the ship's controls to full ahead, switching the ship's course.

The motors coughed and started shooting searing hot plasma to the space, the whole ship was convulging from the power the engines produced.

”I DEMAND AN EXPLANATION! ...sir.” The ship's human captain yelled.

”Just wait.”

Soon there was a huge rip in space, and a gigantic space hulk appeared from the warp at the port of the ship.

”That's your explanation. If we had stayed, we could be crushed or possibly even boarded. Now assume a following course and contact the nearest systems.

 

The librarian was a terrifying sight to the normal men, but the ship's captain wasn't excatly normal either. They were sitting in his ready-room, waiting for the captain of the 7th company to arrive.

”You could've just explained yourself, now we have to check every system aboard for possible damage due to your emergency acceleration.”

”To speak the thruth, I had no idea what I was actually doing.”

Captain sighed.

”We might've blown up, and now we even had to replace the navigator, he broke some bones when you pushed him to...”

The librarian was up and walking towards the door.

”What are you doing?”

even the captain had to flinch when he saw the librarian's eyes, they were glowing blue. He spoke with an otherworldy voice.

”Scan that hulk, captain, do it now.”

”Ok.” He tapped to the command vox. ”Bridge, this is Tarviz. Re-scan the hulk with the deep-Space -scanners.” All he received back was some static.

Now he too had to rise up, and he walked to the bridge with the librarian following him. Everything seemed to be okay. ”Did you receive the order?”

”What order, captain?” The whole ships internal communications seemed to be garbled. ”Contact the bow communications array.”

”That won't do much good, I think.” The calm voice belonged to the captain of the 7th company, Terminus Adriel. "See that, Emidius?"

The librarian zoomed in with his bionic eye. ”There's some light there... wait, I'll try to re-focus. That's an ork! They must be coming from aboard that space hulk!”

”Captain, red alert, level three security breach on the bow comms array.

Call the on-board security, activate the defensive grid. I'll form search parties for any invaders. And open fire on the hulk if possible.”

”Yes, my lord. Hope the on-board speaker system works. You heard the captain, Level three security alert, send someone to the guard garrisons!”

 

”Brother Emidius, you're with me. Attempt to contact the armoury, brother Aleron's squad should be there. Tell them to get on their Terminator armour and meet us on the shuttlebay.”

Both of them started walking towards the bay. Suddendly the corridors went dark.

”They must have gotten to the generators. How is this even possible? I trust you've got your helmet? Now is the time to put it on.”

”I've managed to contact Aleron. He is coming to the bay as soon as he can.”

As they walked they started to hear something. Metal clanking on metal.

From their right a servitor speeded through the hallway on his treads.

”What the-”

That was all the captain managed to say before a huge ork stormed from the hallway after the servitor. It collided with the captain. Emidius's eyes glowed blue again and the ork was disintegrated.

”the infestation's worse than i tought. Contact Aleron by whichever means necessary, tell him to regain control of engineering. We're going to the comms-array.”

Suddendly the ship convulged again. Tarviz had managed to open fire on the hulk. It seemed that the bridge's backup generator was still working.

”That should keep them at bay. Let's go!”

Getting the ship's communications back online was important, so that they could warn the local authorities of an possible ork infestation.

They arrived to the tram station and started to speed through the ship.

The Marine's internal vox network seemed to work somehow, but without the ship's internal vox-station providing back-up, the signal wasn't very good. Terminus zoomed through his company's leaders' helmet-feed. The battle was going pretty well. ”Captain, we've almost regained control of main engineering. The power should be back any minute now.”

That was Aleron. There was only a small pocket of ork resistance left there. Once they'd recaptured it, they could fire the ship's main cannon and the Hulk would be reduced to small asteroids.

The tram stopped. They disembarked and started their battle towards the communications. Suddendly an ork jumped infront of them, firing it's shoota. The round bounced off the captain's armour straight to the ork's head. It would've been comedical if there hadn't been ten new orks behind it.

”Open fire!”

Both of them emptied their clips to the mob, and there were no survivors.

Emidius 's eyes glowed again. ”There are some gretchins behind that doors. All of them are wearing some sort of crude space suits.” They then opened the jammed door with their hands much to the gretchins horror, and again the bolters sung their deadly song. ”There seems to be no athmosphere here.”

that was evident from the floating bodies of a techmarine, servitors and some normal humans. ”It seems the apotechary's going to have something to do after this.” The dry remark was left unnoticed when the lights came back. An blast-shield slid down to the breach on the array's observation window. ”Good thing this works automatically.”

Suddendly the vox channels were alive with the sounds of battle.

From between all of the sounds there was Tarviz's voice: ”ALL TROOPS, BRACE FOR IMPACT!” The whole battle-barge shifted when the captain ordered the firing of the ship's main cannon, nicknamed ”the reaper”. It fired a shot seven times the size of a normal shell, packed with nuclear explosives. When it impacted upon the Space Hulk, there was nothing left, only an contaminated area of space.

”Damage report, captain.”

”Some damage to the port systems, internal security took some casualties but your troops remain intact, except no one can find Brother

Alkaios.”

”He was in the communications room when the orks boarded. They must've took him by surprise.”

 

After brother-Apotechary Eduardus had taken care of Alkaios, they set for the nearest forgeworld for repairs.

”We've contacted the world, my lord. They will be expecting us.”

”Good.”

The librarian flinched, now his eyes were burning red.

”What is it, Emidius?”

”I'm not sure, I just got a really bad feeling about all of this.”

[CaptGarro]

Part 2 - The voyage

”We'll be arriving in the Krix IV system in one and a half day.”

Terminus gazed at the messenger-servitor. He never had liked those drooling automatons. They didn't deserve to serve the emperor's finest.

”Tell the captain to raise them on the vox. My quarters. And get Emidius here.”

”I exist to serve.” Muttering something else the servitor left the captain.

 

”This is planetary governor Grosberger.”

”I'm brother-captain Terminus Adriel of the Guardians of the Covenant 7th Company. We are scheduled for some repairs and maintenance.”

”Ah, yes. You would be better off with the Adeptus Mechanicus Grandmagus Olivian. I'll just patch you right thro-”

Terminus interrupted the governor before he could finish his sentence.

”You are in control of the planetary security, yes?”

”I am.”

”Have the local Guard regiments had any contact with orks recently?”

”No they haven't, though our communications have been constantly interrupted. It's propably nothing.”

”thank you Governor. I presume captain Tarviz already briefed you on what happened to us?”

”Yes, we are alert.”

”Good. End transmission.”

 

”Hmph. I hate warp travel.”

”Would you rather be put on stasis for the remainder of the voyage?”

The Librarian had walked to the room. He was still bigger than the captain even in his off-duty robes.

”You just keep on joking. You don't have to wear this damn hood all the time when aboard a ship.”

”I thought that was used only to supress the xeno and traitor psykers?”

”Like you'd know.”

An servitor strolled in to the room.

”Captain tarviz wishes to see you.”

Both of the astartes rose up and walked past the servitor, leaving it to drool on the captain's floor.

The corridors were busy. There were servitors, astartes and on-board personell crawling past each other. On one corner there was an mechanic welding a panel that was ripped off when the orks tried to board the ship. Suddendly a small green hand reached out of the crevice and stunned the man. A small Grot jumped out and started to run along the hallway.

”HOW DID THAT GET PAST THE SECURITY SWEEPS?!”

There was a single shot and the goblinoid stopped on it's track.

Terminus gazed to the room the shot came from. It was the medical bay.

Apotechary Eduardo was there pointing with a bolter in his hand.

He always took the loss of a brother severely.

”Oh. Captain.”

”I'd appreciate it if you didn't try to rip this ship apart, the Orks did a good enough job at that.”

”Sorry captain, but that thing had to be killed.”

”Even a regular guardsman could have just stepped on it.”

The apotechary grinned. Terminus and Emidius continued on their way.

 

”Once we arrive in the krix system we'll stay there for two weeks.”

”And this was why we had to come all the way here?”

”No, but I tought you should know. Now, I called you here because of this.”

He threw a small metallic pendant on the table.

It had an chaos undivided mark and on top of it a skeleton with it's arms spread.

”Where was this found?”

”It was on one dead guard's belongings. We have started a ship-wide investigation.”

”Good. I'll start one of my own.”

 

The pendant troubled Terminus. He had seen that kind of an skeletal figure before on an Dark Angel's backpack when he was still an initiate on the chapter's 10th company. That marine was shooting against his own brothers.

He contacted the rock.

”This is brother Ortho. Why have you contacted us?”

”This is brother-captain Terminus Adriel. After the recent Ork invasion of our ship we found this kind of an pendant on one of the on-board security's body.”

”The fall- I'm sorry, but I can't help you.”

The connection was severed and Terminus couldn't re-establish it.

That troubled Terminus. What could ”The Fall” mean?

He started reading through pages and pages of reports of Dark Angels contact with traitors.

After a while he decided to take a little sleep. Though the astartes don't really need it, he enjoyed it.

 

”We'll be dropping out of warp in two minutes.”

Terminus woke up to the sound of the announcement. It was always a rough ride when traveling through warp, not even mentioning the part where they'd pop back to normal space. The ship started to shake. The librarian called for him.

”Captain, you'd better come see this.”

He walked to the observatory which was right next to his living quarters.

”Look, down on the planet.”

They were on orbit around Krix IV. The planet was green.

”Everything seems to be in order.”

”Not after you see these reports.”

gazing though the dataslide he had been given he realized it; A forgeworld shouldn't be green. It was the orks.