[Imperial Guard 05] Ice Guard by Steve Lyons

Author:Steve Lyons
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Science Fiction. warhammer 40000
ISBN: 9781844166725
Publisher: Black Library
Published: 2009-01-05T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Time to Destruction of Cressida: 20.32.13

From the outside, Iota Hive had seemed relatively intact.

Inside, it was a different story. Hardly a structure had been left untouched by the war that had raged within. Bridges had been blown out, gantries collapsed, water tanks exploded. A burnt-out Chimera lay on its roof, the corpses of a driver and two gunners rotting inside. There were many more bodies, and parts thereof, strewn about the streets or half-buried in the wreckage of demolished walls. Barricades had been built up from whatever materials were available, to be broken down again.

No natural light could penetrate this deeply into the hive - and the electric lights were intermittent, unreliable, allowing black pools to congregate between them. Grayle drove through it all, along narrow streets that had once teemed with people. Those streets were empty now, most of the people dead - and of those who had survived, most would have joined their attackers and left with them, marching on to wage their next bloody battle.

Even so, the sounds of other vehicles and of pounding machinery still thrummed through the hive, and occasionally a voice could be heard raised in maniacal laughter or a tortured scream.

All in all, it was a sobering scene - especially for these nine soldiers who had, only yesterday, been fighting to defend a hive much like this one. The difference was, thought Grayle, that Alpha Hive had been attacked from without, its walls beaten down. The reason that Iota's walls were still, for the most part, standing was that it had suffered a far worse fate. Iota had been attacked from within.

When he had started the truck's engine, it had roared like an asthmatic lion. The unnatural sound had reverberated from the roof and the walls until it had seemed loud enough to bring them all crashing down. Gavotski had handed him a tattered robe, torn from a dead cultist, and offered the same to Barreski who was seated beside Grayle now in the cab. Neither of them had been happy about touching the foul cloth, wrapping it about their shoulders, but it had had to be done.

"The cultist I questioned talked about an Ice Palace," Steele had said, "the stronghold of the Chaos leader in these parts. He didn't exactly provide a map, but there's no doubt that it will be the most defensible and defended building in the city. That means it will be as near as damn it to the centre, and most likely on one of the higher levels. We'll have to make our way inwards and upwards, get as close as we can to our goal before the enemy knows we're here."

So far, Grayle had seen precious little of the enemy - just a few shapes flitting across high walkways, and at one point a cloaked figure slumped in the gutter, singing to herself. That changed as he guided his truck around a tight corner and was confronted by at least twenty of them.

It looked like they had been celebrating here, among the ruins.

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