The Torchbearer

[Wargamer]

Thought I'd write about someone else's Chapter for a change...

 

The interior of the boarding torpedo was filled with the volcanic roar of the cutting beams just beyond the assault ramp. In the darkness thirty Astartes stood ready, shields raised and guns locked into the firing grooves. At the head of the formation were five Torchbearers, the elite of the Bright Lords Chapter. These warriors served as the personal retinue of Captain Tádor, who presently stood off to one side supervising a tech-adept's work.

 

The adept glanced up from the arcane device he operated and announced, "I have access." He solemnly handed a vox-mic to the Captain, who took it with a nod.

"Attention vessel, this is Captain Hakrimael Tádor of the Bright Lords. In the name of the Emperor, I claim your ship as Prize! Surrender immediately, and you will be treated fairly and with mercy. Resist, and I shall be forced to bring the full wrath of Him on Terra down upon you! You have two minutes to decide."

As the tech-adept took back the mic he asked, "why do you make these offers, Captain? You know they never accept."

"That is true," Tádor answered with a sorrowful tone, "but they must be given a chance. Every wayward soul deserves at least one chance to redeem themselves."

"Every soul, Captain?" asked Heyel, the squad's Lightbearer.

"Every soul," Tádor confirmed.

 

As the sounds of the cutting beams ceased, Tádor donned his helm and took up his position in the fighting line. The Torchbearers held boarding shields and storm bolters ready. Tádor cast a brief glance to the boarding squads behind, confirming their readiness. "Unto the breach once more, my Brothers. Make me proud."

"Once more duty takes us into the darkness," Heyel said quietly over the squad's vox-channel.

"And what shall see us through?" the Captain asked in reply.

Heyel tapped his meltagun against the edge of the boarding shield, "overwhelming firepower."

 

There was a breathless moment when the assault ramp fell. A fleeing pause where both sides saw the enemy for the first time, but had not yet begun the battle. In the cramped confines of the frigate's lower gun deck three hundred pirates had amassed to resist the Astartes. They were filth-clad figures, their skin and clothes covered in oil, soot and sweat. The lucky ones held lasguns, shotguns and stubbers; the rest had to make do with whatever tools they could lay hands on. Small detachments of better-equipped troops were positioned around the improvised barricades, readying webbers, flamers or grenade launchers.

 

Then came the storm. The harsh crack of half a dozen storm bolters firing in unison was almost lost to the cacophony of the defender's firepower. The Torchbearers reeled under the barrage, their shields ringing like chapel bells. They stood firm and returned fire, pounding shells into the ship's interior with grim resolve.

"Fields!" Tádor roared, and the Torchbearers obeyed. The smell of o-zone filled the boarding torpedo as the refractor fields flickered into life, and the drumming rhythm of bullets on ceramite changed to a sharp, electric crackling.

"Lux Permanet!" the cry echoed from every throat as the Bright Lords began their assault. The Torchbearers marched forward, their shields popping and cracking under the weight of fire directed at them. The next wave of Astartes began hurling grenades over the veterans, filling the air with deadly shrapnel that peppered friend and foe alike. The Torchbearers, protected by fields, shields and war plate did not so much as flinch. The defenders, mostly unarmoured, lost dozens to the explosives.

A less experienced officer would have been emboldened by the seemingly unstoppable advance of the Torchbearers, but Tádor knew that the attack had reached its most vulnerable point. In the narrow confines of the breach, the half-dozen Astartes had formed an inviolable phalanx. But on open ground, the enemy could outflank them, bypassing at least part of their protection. It would fall to the boarding squads to hold the flanks, ensuring the Torchbearers did not become bogged down. In turn, the Torchbearers had a duty not to advance too quickly; the natural urge of any assault troop was to push forward as swiftly as possible, break through the foe and reach the shelter of the inner decks. For the sake of their brethren, the Torchbearers had to deny that urge.

 

A stub-nest on the left flank exploded, cooking off rounds that rebounded off bulkheads and punched through flesh and armour alike. Tádor felt one such round bounce off the deck at his feet and strike his boot with enough force to dent the armour. A flamer team doused him with burning promethium, searing the Chapter's heraldry from his right shoulder and setting fire to the thick layers of web-adhesive that covered his shield. Sheer weight of fire from a gun-pit under the nearest macrocannon had burned out his refractor field. No mortal could have survived the assault he and his men endured; even Astartes were pushed to their limits in these conditions. Tádor had fought innumerable boarding actions in his time as both attacker and defender, and knew from experience even the mightiest of foes were found wanting in the long minutes of the first storm.

 

As he turned his storm bolter on the shell-cradles above the gun-nest, Tádor felt a masochistic sense of pleasure fill his heart. For a brief instant the weight of duty left him; all thoughts of his comrades were pushed aside. For that single, blissful moment he thought only of himself - a lone warrior tasked with a suicidal mission, a duty to face impossible odds and overcome.

 

This was where he belonged. Here, in the Hell of man's own making where an entire war was compressed into a single thirty-yard charge... only here did he truly exist. Elsewhere he was a Fleet Captain, loyal servant of the Chapter and proud defender of the Emperor's domain. But here he was Hakrimael Tádor has he was meant to be.

 

The cradle gave an alarming creak as the cables gave way and it dropped onto the deck, flattening the emplacement below and turning all those manning it into a red smear. Heyel's meltagun liquefied another position, leaving those within no shelter from the bolt rounds and frag grenades launched by the attackers. In desperation, the last wave of pirates charged the Astartes, hoping to achieve with wrenches, hammers and hooks what bullets and last-bolts could not. Tádor admired their courage, and asked the Emperor not to judge them too harshly as he dispatched their souls to Him.

 

Just eight minutes after the boarding ramp had dropped, the gun deck belonged to the Astartes. Tádor stood before the bulkhead door as Heyel began cutting through, and turned back to survey the battlefield. Every deck plate was buckled and warped; every wall peppered with impact craters. The air was so thick with particulates it was hardly breathable, and even with his enhanced vision he struggled to see the far wall.

"All sergeants, report casualties," Tádor ordered, and felt his stomach tighten as the reports came back. Of the thirty Bright Lords who began the assault three were dead and a third wounded, including one of his own Torchbearers who was currently slumped against the wall, insisting that all others be treated first. The death count could yet rise higher, should the assault team take too long securing the ship and evacuating the most seriously injured.

For Tádor, each death felt like a personal failure. He knew that losses were unavoidable of course, but that didn't stop him from asking if, had he done something different, those men might yet live.

"I'm through!" Heyel announced, stepping back as the door collapsed inward with a rush of air that seemed as fresh as a meadow breeze compared to the fetid atmosphere of the gun deck.

"Sergeant Fasir, secure a place to tend to the wounded. Sergeant Ahkamad, head for the drive section. The Torchbearers and I shall take the bridge."

 

Victory was theirs. The Bright Lords knew as much; the enemy had failed to deny them a foothold, and allowed them to take the gun-deck with strength to spare. From this point on the fight would be an unending series of corridor brawls; gunfights and blade work in passages that at best allowed two men abreast. The Astartes advanced through the ship in single file, safe behind their shields and armour, and crushed all before them. Before long, the crew turned and fled rather than face them. Some even shot their own officers in the process.

 

The bridge was unguarded. The pirate captain, who still wore the uniform of an Imperial Navy officer, stood to attention and tried not to show his fear as Tádor and the Torchbearers entered.

"Captain Tádor, I presume?" the old man asked, giving a sharp salute. "I wish to offer my surrender."
Tádor gave a mournful sigh, "I offered you surrender once before, and had you accepted it from a position of strength I would have accepted it gladly. But you resisted, and I have lost good men because of that. Now, I believe you ask for surrender not from a desire to repent, nor to spare your crew any more of our fury; I believe you seek only to save your own traitorous hide. Surrender refused."

Tádor's storm bolter blew the traitor captain in half in a spray of viscera. A silent terror filled the bridge as everyone present, officer and ordinary crewman alike prepared for the worst.

"The bridge is mine," Tádor declared. "Any who wish to contest this, do so now."

None did.

 

Announcements of the ship's surrender were made on all decks. As the remains of the vessel's former commander were cleared away, Heyel placed a golden Aquila on the deck before the captain's seat. The icon was missing a chunk of one wing from the storm, but otherwise the Lightbearer had born the icon safely to its destination. In the Imperial Eagle's talons it gripped an iron halo, in the centre of which burned an old fashioned torch.

"In the name of the Emperor and the Chapter, let this vessel be reconsecrated and returned to the noble service of Him on Terra, the Master of Mankind. Fiat Lux." Heyel made the sign of the Aquila cross his breast and bowed before the icon. The captured bridge crew mirrored his veneration, on the grounds that it might save their lives to do so.

"The prize crew are aboard, Heyel," Tádor announced. "Your orders are to bring the vessel to the muster point at Santh's World. The Imperial Navy will assume ownership of the vessel from there."

"And bring us home, I hope?"

"I'm sure if you ask nicely they will oblige," the Captain replied with a smile. "It's not a bad little ship. Not exactly a match for a Sword or Gladius, but these days the Navy can't be picky."

Heyel nodded in agreement. "Are you sure we can't keep it for ourselves? With a little work we could make a proper warship out of this junker."

"The Navy's need is greater," Tádor answered firmly. "Don't worry, old friend; you'll get your own command soon enough."

The veteran Marine smiled at the assurance. "So long as I don't have to give up my duties as a Torchbearer, I'll gladly accept such a duty."

"Why should you?" chuckled Tádor, "it never stopped me."

He made his own blessings to the Aquila and left the bridge. The vessel was a welcome prize, but the Strike Cruiser had fallen behind the convoy, and there were likely to be other pirate vessels out there. They would all have to be found and either captured or destroyed; now, more than ever, it was vital that supplies and troops made it through to where they were needed most.

 

And despite all his experience to the contrary, Tádor held out hope that at least some of these wayward souls could be returned to the Emperor's Light.