Deathwing by Neil Jones

Author:Neil Jones [Jones, Neil]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2012-03-20T10:59:05+00:00

"But we were Marines. No sooner had they opened up with their lasrifles than we returned fire with our bolters, cutting them down. Van Dam tried to contact the fleet but our comm-links were being jammed. and we could not teleport out. There was nothing for it. We had to fight our way to the planet's surface and hope that a dropship could reach us.

"It seemed as if the whole planet had turned against us, and that was more or less what had happened. Two hundred of us fought our way out of the audience room. We were met by armed men, unarmed children and their mothers. All threw themselves against us with insane ferocity. As we cut them down, they showed no fear - only a strange, unholy joy. The whole world had been infected.

"Our trip to the surface was a nightmare. We battled along dark corridors, crawled up access ladders and through narrow hatches never meant for Marines. I saw Steel Fist tumble back headless from one hatchway. Van Dam lobbed a handful of crack grenades through and we were spattered with the remains of a full-grown Stealer"

"My brother Red Sky was pulled down by a wave of feral children with explosives in their hands. They detonated them as they crawled over his body. He did not live.

"Twice in the endless corridors, we were almost overrun. It came to hand-to-hand combat with purestrain Stealers. Twenty of our brothers were cut down before Two Heads Talking's force axe and Cloud Runner's power sword carried us clear.

"It was while guarding the final hatchway that I lost the use of my leg. A Stealer cut right through the floor and grabbed me, trying to pull me down. I blasted frantically at it. The last thing I remember was its horrid, leering face as it pulled me down toward it. Around it was a group of' Thranxians who stroked and pushed against it fondly.

"The others told me what had happened when I woke up in the medical bay of the ship with a new bionic leg. Two Heads Talking and Cloud Runner had pulled me clear and carried me to the roof of the world. where the dropship waited.

"There was only one thing to do: order the Exterminatus. The whole place was sterilised from orbit with virus bombs. Later, inquisitorial investigators ascertained that the whole business had begun only sixty years before, when an unrecorded space hulk had swung through the system.

"It had taken only three generations for the Stealers to infect a whole world. For that is how they reproduce - by turning people into hosts for their offspring. Their victims endure this willingly, due to the Stealers' hypnotic powers.

'Many nights I have lain awake wondering whether we could have saved the world if only we had arrived sooner. Perhaps if we had been able to eliminate the Stealers before the cancer had spread, we would not have had to order the Exterminatus.

Cloud Runner could see that the warriors had been swayed and angered by Lame Bear's tale.

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