Fist of Demetrius

Chapter Twenty-Four

‘What is this place?’ Macharius asked. We stood on the far side of the portal, watching the remainder of our force very slowly enter the gate. Each slight movement seemed to take minutes. There was a moment of strangeness when they passed through to our side. Their limbs blurred as if their motions were speeding up, and then, to all intents and purposes, they looked normal.

‘I think it may be something the eldar built, a pathway into the beyond.’

‘Why would the eldar who stole it bring the Fist of Russ here?’

Drake paused. An odd expression flickered across his face. ‘This is a roadway through infinity. The eldar use them to pass through space.’

‘You saw that in Bael’s mind?’ Macharius said.

Drake nodded. ‘This one was a sacred path once, and it leads to something awesome. Or at least that is what I assume.’

‘Or what he wanted you to assume. Is it possible he could have projected false memories into your mind?’

‘Certainly,’ said Drake. ‘I am sure such was his intention. The eldar are clever and deceptive, and I do not trust anything I saw in his thoughts, but it is all we have to go on.’

Macharius laughed. ‘There are only two ways we can go, forwards or back.’

‘I can sense the presence of the Fist here,’ said Drake. ‘I know which way they went. There is something odd, though, a sense of a presence I do not like.’

Looking at the nearby statues I saw that one of them had been marked. It showed a crude rune in a similar style to those emblazoned on Grimnar’s armour. Just some lines quickly scratched with a blade. It took me a moment to realise what it was, then I pointed it out to Macharius.

‘The Space Wolf is leaving us a trail,’ said Macharius. ‘Let’s move out.’

‘Leaving us a trail or making sure he could find his own way back,’ Anton muttered, so low that only I could hear him. To tell the truth it did not matter. It was still reassuring. At least we had something to go on and a path back if we survived.

We moved along the path, a company of men in green tunics, along with several squads of Drake’s storm troopers. I was wondering whether we should send back for reinforcements.

From what I had seen of the eldar, six of them might be able to take us, particularly if they understood this environment and we did not. Macharius did not wait though, and he knew his business.

Of course, there was the distortion of time that passing through the gate caused. By the time help was summoned from outside, days might have passed in here. We had no option but to race ahead if we were ever going to catch up with the xenos and retrieve the Fist of Russ.

The place that we moved through was the spookiest I had ever seen. The air was close and still and oddly perfumed. My skin tingled as I marched as if it had been exposed to some strange drug. Drake’s hazard monitors told us there were no chemical or biological agents present, but it was possible that they had malfunctioned, or whatever was there was too subtle for them to detect. It was not a reassuring thought.

The way ahead seemed to be some sort of tunnel. Massive arches inscribed with odd xenos runes held the ceiling in place. There were times when that vanished, though, and we caught sight of odd vistas. Sometimes through crystal we saw the strange stars of alien skies. Sometimes we saw huge shifting masses of colour that reminded me of chemical cloud formations in the skies of hive-worlds I had visited. The path was wide enough for multiple battle tanks to pass abreast. I wondered who had built it and why.

The thought occurred to me that perhaps the Valley of the Ancients was not a sacred temple site, or at least not just one. Perhaps it was the terminus for this pathway. Perhaps the whole structure was intended to anchor the path in our reality. I pushed the thought to one side and moved closer to Macharius and Drake.

The inquisitor looked particularly queasy and I cannot say I blamed him. There was something in the strangeness of our surroundings that was getting on my nerves. Given his power and his sensitivity it must have been a thousand times worse for him.

I noticed that many of the great statues that lined the roadway had been defaced. In places, it looked as if they had fused or melted under the impact of gigantic las-beams. In other places they were oddly altered. Their features had a lewd look to them. Some of them had multiple arms which ended in claws. Others had… exaggerated physical features. The clean lines that had been the mark of so many of the statues outside were disturbed. There was something about these ones that suggested the crazed uncleanness of the followers of Chaos.

So far we’d had no problem following the right trail because there was only one. We had only two directions in which to go, forwards or back towards the exit. I began to notice that in places the stonework seemed eaten away and strange pools of multicoloured light were visible in the gaps. These swirled and shimmered in ways that hurt the eye. At times the clouds swept forwards and billowed flat as if they were pressed against a wall of glass so translucent as to be invisible. When we passed these gaps, I felt nauseous and afraid. It was as if an oppressive presence waited just out of sight, ready to pounce, and its mere closeness was enough to set my nerves to jangling.

‘I like this not,’ said Drake. ‘We are close to Chaos. This is a place where the Ruinous Powers have made their will felt.’

‘That does not bode well for our quest,’ said Macharius.

‘I am starting to feel as if nothing does,’ said Drake. ‘Perhaps this was all a mistake.’

‘Come, my friend, now is not the time for such talk, not when we are so close to finding what we seek. Just think, we will soon have one of the Imperium’s most sacred relics in our possession.’

‘I wonder whether its time here has contaminated it. I sense evil in this place.’

‘Surely a relic of such holiness could not be tainted, even by the Ruinous Powers?’

‘There is nothing that Chaos cannot turn to its purposes, nothing. So I was taught. So I believe. It is why we must be eternally vigilant, with ourselves most of all.’

Macharius looked around at our surroundings. If he were daunted by being cut off from our world within the toils of this ancient, alien place he gave no sign of it. ‘We will do what needs to be done,’ he said.

It occurred to me then that we were very far from home, and that there was a very real chance that we would never return. Less than an hour before I had been celebrating an unexpected victory. Now I was almost sick with fear of the unknown. I wondered if the eldar had known about this or whether they were as surprised by it as we were.

This is a strange and terrible place. It is not at all what I expected. The evil that destroyed my ancestors has touched this webway. All of the signs point to one thing. They created this vault thinking that it would preserve them from the power that was devouring their very souls. Instead, it looks as though they entombed themselves within it. There was no escape for them, here or any other place. The only question that remains is whether the evil that destroyed them still lurks within or whether, lacking anything else to devour, it perished from lack of prey.

My followers are nervous. They do not know why we are here. They think that we are fleeing from a battle that could easily have been won. They think that I am afraid of the Space Marines and what they might do to us. So far none of them have had the courage to say anything, but I can tell that it is only a matter of time. Sileria, in particular, blames me for the loss of Bael. It seems they were, as I suspected, lovers. Well, he was no great loss, and I doubt whether she will be either.

I can see why they are edgy. There is something here that plays on the nerves, that makes even those who are used to causing fear, afraid. This place still reverberates with echoes of ancient terror and ancient pain, and delicious as that would normally be, there is something about it, something tainted that breeds suspicion in our minds.

They think I should be on the surface directing the destruction of my enemies. I can see that accusation in the very body language of every eldar with me. They still do not understand how quickly victory was turned to defeat. Or perhaps they think if I had not been so desperate to get to the gate I might have saved the situation. Perhaps that is nothing less than the truth.

I would have liked nothing better than to direct the destruction of the humans on the planet’s surface, but it is much more important that I should be the first to get my hands upon the ancient reality engine.

I console myself with the thought that at least there is no one here to get in our way, to stop us from finally achieving the goal I set myself all of those centuries ago. I know that time flows differently here. It was one of the warnings that the ancient books contained. I shall let my troops rest before we make our final push towards our ultimate destination.

Then we shall see what we shall see.

The roadway curved downwards and things changed once more. It was hard to put a finger on exactly when and how the changes started. All I know is that the sense of being watched by an alien presence increased. Our surroundings appeared ever more distorted. Larger and larger patches of strangely glowing colours appeared in the walls, and it was not good to look too closely at them. I had no idea how long we had marched. My wrist chronometer said it was only a couple of hours, but this was a place where time had no meaning. It was just as likely that we would return to discover no time had passed as to return and find out we had been gone for days or weeks or years.

Perhaps we would turn out to be like those ships’ crews who had been lost between the stars for centuries and returned to find out all their descendants were dead. I had heard tales of those who had entered ancient, haunted vaults for what they thought was one night and emerged to discover a century had passed. Had they entered a place like this?

The way ahead started running through larger chambers. It remained a massive roadway, paved and marked with ancient runes. Sometimes, off the road, we would see robed skeletons lying there. Macharius would not allow us to depart from the trail, but the little I saw of them suggested something inhuman to me. They were too long, too thin, and something in the way they sprawled was not the way a human body would have lain.

The roof of the chamber started to shimmer and change, and sometimes pictures came into view there, gigantic images of god-like beings who seemed to be looking down on us, or into the area through which we walked. Sometimes they were scenes or parts of scenes, broken images with no pattern that I could see and only one common theme. In all of them were tall, beautiful creatures, in surroundings similar to the ones in which we were walking through.

They were eldar, like the ones we had fought physically. Their expressions had nothing in common with the cruelty of Bael and his kindred, though. These people looked peaceful and pleasant and full of love. Of course, who am I to judge whether they were or not. We are taught to be wary of the xenos, rightfully so. Perhaps this was just a deception or a trap, but some deep seated instinct told me that this was not the case.

We marched on. I prayed to the Emperor that we would find the eldar and get this over with. There was something about this pathway that frightened me more than death.

This place has been strangely altered, tainted by She Who Thirsts or her followers. The path looks like many others I have travelled, but I can see that it is frayed, that the very fabric of the powers that make it up is unravelling. It is only a matter of time before the whole structure is swallowed and another of our ancestors’ creations is devoured.

Of all the things they made, this is one of the few I would regret the destruction of. The webway allows us to travel between places and worlds, but this is not like that. It is a vault, a secure place, a protected place. It was intended to keep safe things of value to our ancestors. It was intended to be a refuge when their universe went mad. In their weakness, they sought not to confront and overmaster what threatened them but to hide from it. Their own spinelessness betrayed them.

They thought they had dug themselves a hole to hide in, a burrow where they could hide from the predators that pursued them. It is obvious they were wrong. They brought what they sought to avoid with them, and when they sealed the doors behind them, they trapped themselves with it. The irony is enough to make me laugh. My guards do not understand why I do, but they echo my mirth. Even here they look to me for leadership. They are not afraid but nervous.

So far none have audibly expressed any criticism of my leadership, nor are they likely to, for they know that I will not stand for it. Yet I sense their doubts. I have my own. Memories of the last few minutes of the battle on the surface keep coming back to me. Who would have thought mere apes could have fought so well? My followers are inclined to attribute the setback to the presence of those known as the Adeptus Astartes, and there is some truth in that. I am the only one who knows that is not the whole story.

There is an intelligence guiding the humans, commanding them, a mind of subtlety and great tactical gifts. I have seen it in the traps it has laid for our forces. Every time we thought we found a weakness, it was a snare. We have taken far heavier casualties fighting the humans than even the presence of Space Marines would have suggested.

Warrior for warrior, they are the equal of any of my force and the superiors of most, but they represent the merest fraction of the enemy’s number. Those with them should never have been able to withstand our swift and merciless attacks. Their weak spirits should have been broken, their slow minds incapable of understanding the speed of our assaults. Yet somehow they not only stood their ground but inflicted devastating losses on us. Many noble bodies will need to be rebuilt after this. Many fragments of flesh reclaimed.

If I return now, without that which I seek, I will be a laughing stock. My enemies will whisper about how I was defeated by an ape. I will lose face and my enemies will not fear me as they should. I begin to suspect that perhaps I have been lured here by those very enemies. Perhaps it is no human mind that guides them but something else.

I push such thoughts to one side. I must concentrate on my goals. I must find the reality engine.