The Battle of Blackthunder Mesa by Phil Kelly

Author:Phil Kelly
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi, pdf
Published: 2018-11-12T14:25:05+00:00

About the Author

Phil Kelly is the author of the Space Marine Battles novel Blades of Damocles and the Warhammer 40,000 novellas Farsight and Blood Oath, as well as the Warhammer titles Sigmar’s Blood and Dreadfleet. He has also written a number of short stories. He works as a background writer for Games Workshop, crafting the worlds of Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000. He lives in Nottingham.

An extract from Farsight: Crisis of Faith.

The tau have the right of it.

Many of our fellow inquisitors would hang me by the neck as a heretic if they heard me say that, for all the good it would do them. But this little xenoculture on the fringes of Imperial space has a way of interacting with the universe that is fascinating to me. I feel they are somehow more likely to see the truths of existence afresh, perhaps by being so far removed from the shattered fragments of knowledge that the older races so habitually cling to. They have open eyes, and comparatively open minds. A very dangerous combination, unfortunately, and one that cannot be left unmonitored.

These tau know nothing of nameless doubt, of existential fear, or the hideous reflections that even the meekest human souls can cast into the hell-dimension of the warp. They are not a psychically active race – or if they are, they are so weak that even I find it difficult to read their Empyrric presence. What blessed ignorance that must be, to live unthreatened by one’s own rapacious shadow. I can only imagine.

Given the grand scale of humanity’s realm, a xenos empire of perhaps a dozen scattered systems is no great cause for concern. The little wretches haven’t even mastered faster than light travel. Ambitious they may be, and technologically advanced in a way, yet their race is isolated and hopelessly outmatched. Conceivably, if they discovered the art of warp travel, they could one day pose an epsilon-level threat.

Frankly I doubt it will ever come to that. If not for their temerity in crossing the Damocles Gulf, I doubt the Imperium would have really bothered with them at all.

Far direr threats cast their pall across mankind’s realm than the tau. The bio-ships first engaged at Tyran, for instance, may soon have the whole Ultramar empire fighting for survival. Still, whilst the greater mass of the Adeptus Terra concerns itself with ghastly fiends, void-borne terrors and brutish savages, I am content to keep an eye on this pocket empire of optimists. Why? Not through lack of courage; you know me well enough to realise that. In short, it is because of that which lies beneath.

Today marks the third year of my assignment to observe this xenos race first hand, from within their society and without. It is fairly common knowledge on the Eastern Fringe that the tau seek to ‘enlighten’ those they encounter with the truth of their precious communality. This is known in common tau parlance as the Greater Good. It might seem a laudable idea, to a naïf. Trust me, dear Xyndrea, it is not nearly as benevolent as it sounds.

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