Tyrant of the Hollow Worlds Read online

  The tower stretched from the base of the mountains, deep in the darkness, up through the platform city built between the peaks, and then higher still, above the very peaks of the mountains. Its structure twisted between the walkways and platforms of Carapel in such a way as to cast shadows on buildings that were streets away. Occasionally a slate would fall from the tower’s higher reaches and embed itself in the head or shoulder of some unfortunate passer-by, or else fall through the gaps in the walkways and into the darkness below.

  All astropaths within the Hollow Worlds resided within the tower; such was the distance between the Hollow Worlds and the nearest astropathic relay, and the distorting effects of the Siren Clouds, that it took the collective power of a large astropathic choir to maintain contact with the Imperium.

  They worked in shifts, ensuring that the choir remained at full power. Robed and blind, the astropaths shuffled from their meagre quarters to the chamber which contained the choir, only pausing for meals and other basic biological functions. Theirs was an austere, cloistered life, but a vital one, and they were supported by countless servants and slaves.

  The servants were regularly screened for signs of heresy or mental breakdown, so it should have been impossible for three of them to commit the ultimate act of betrayal. Walking with heads bowed, as the servants of the astropaths always did, they met in one of the uppermost chambers of the tower as the silent bell tolled.

  They did not speak or acknowledge each other as they threw their heads back and were consumed from within, the small mechanical creatures within their bodies eating their way out of their brainwashed carriers, consuming flesh and clothing alike before scurrying across the floor, walls and ceiling, chewing their way into the tower itself. Touched by Chaos, these tiny creatures recycled base metal chewed up by their jaws, using it to reproduce, each miniscule metal insect growing before splitting into two, eating everything in its path. By the time they had dug into the superstructure of the tower, they were legion, even though their lives were short and chewing into the girders that made up the skeleton of the tower caused more of them to shatter than could be built to replace them. Before the last one ceased to function, these cursed, artificial insects had fatally undermined the stability of the tower.

  As that part of the tower collapsed it created an absence between the floors above and below, one that was immediately filled as gravity took hold and the levels fell downwards, crumpling and crashing into the lower ones.

  As a shower of brick dust and rubble was thrown upwards, the higher levels of the structure veered, the twisted shape of the tower and its elaborate structure causing the top to fall sideways. Loose slates and statues tumbling off it crashed down onto the streets and buildings in its shadow.

  It fell like an executioner’s blade, smashing into the elaborate structure that connected the city of Carapel to its supporting peaks. As the tower slid into the darkness at the base of the mountains, so too its weight began to drag down most of the city around it, causing beams to break and further buildings to collapse.

  Within minutes not just the Tower of Astropathy but most of the city surrounding it had descended, fatally, into the abyss, leaving only a scattering of buildings and platforms still connected to the mountains, now isolated from each other. Most of the population, tens of thousands of souls, lay dead, far, far below, crushed in an avalanche of what had recently been one of Laghast’s busiest cities.

  Colonel Ruthger, commanding officer of the Cadian 301st was in many ways the archetypal Cadian officer, a born survivor hardened by years of war. He was the kind of man Veteran Sergeant Kretschman deeply admired, at least partially because Ruthger mirrored how Kretschman liked to see himself. It was not in the character of a man like Ruthger to be rattled by an outsider trying to impose their authority on him, even when that outsider was a member of the Emperor’s Most Holy Inquisition.

  Following Rothke’s directions, Pranix and Kretschman – who the inquisitor had insisted accompany him – found their way to the officers’ mess, which lay behind a heavy black door emblazoned with a silver skull and an inspiring quote about leadership. The leering skull was not an uncommon motif in the Imperium, but here its meaning was clear – the lower ranks should not pass this threshold unless their errand was worth risking decapitation for.

  Inquisitor Pranix didn’t break his stride as he opened the door and walked into the room beyond.

  The colonel was sitting alone on a black velvet-covered chair, a goblet of amasec in one hand and a sheaf of official parchments in the other. He looked up from his reading as Pranix strode into the room, but did not speak or offer any further reaction as the inquisitor dropped into the chair opposite him.

  Kretschman, unsure of the politic thing to do in such circumstances, stood to the side, standing to attention and offering the colonel a sharp salute. There he stayed, awaiting further orders.

  The colonel nodded to Kretschman, but kept his eyes on Pranix as the inquisitor reeled off an introduction similar to the one he had given to Rothke and Kretschman at the gate. He had unbuttoned the top of his coveralls, the seam of which opened out into sharply cut lapels; on one was fastened a small silver badge shaped like a letter ‘I’. When Pranix referred to himself as an inquisitor, Ruthger’s eyes flicked to the badge briefly, as if checking its authenticity, but otherwise he listened to Pranix intently.

  Kretschman had seen inquisitors before, on the battlefield and communing with senior officers. He knew that Ruthger had encountered them too. He suspected that, in spite of his lack of obvious reaction, Ruthger was taken aback by Pranix’s appearance – most inquisitors in the field were towering figures dressed in elaborate robes, wielding ornate personalised weaponry and laden with symbols of office and mystical paraphernalia. On some level the common Guardsmen were not supposed to know of or acknowledge the Inquisition and its work, but the inquisitors hardly conducted themselves discreetly.

  Pranix, on the other hand, only resembled an inquisitor in terms of his formidable self-possession. Ruthger was probably having the same doubts as Kretschman. In spite of the badges of identification, was this really an inquisitor or just some lunatic?

  Ruthger sipped his amasec, then placed the goblet on the table. When he spoke it was with deferential calm. ‘While you are entirely within your rights to take command, my lord, it would be… helpful to the transition of command to know the nature of the crisis we face.’

  Pranix removed a vial from an inner pocket and tossed it across the table to a surprised colonel, who caught it out of the air and held it up to the light.

  Kretschman couldn’t resist glancing down at the vial. It appeared to contain some kind of grey insect.

  Colonel Ruthger caught Kretschman looking, and offered him the vial.

  ‘Sergeant,’ said Ruthger. ‘Have you ever seen anything like this? And for the Emperor’s sake, stand at ease. It’s making my neck stiffen just watching you there.’

  Kretschman nodded, slackening his shoulders, and took the vial from his commanding officer. It was, as he thought at first glance, an insect. Small, like a beetle, with a strange metallic shell. Its body was spattered with some kind of blackened crust. There were only a couple of reasons why such a creature would be considered a threat.

  ‘Not seen this one before, sir,’ he said to the colonel, then turned to Pranix. ‘Is it an infection carrier, my lord?’

  Pranix looked impressed. ‘A clever thought, sergeant, but not quite. We’re dealing with something worse than swamp fever. Look closer at the shell. What do you see on the beetle’s back?’

  Kretschman squinted at the beetle. It was hard to make out, but there appeared to be irregular but precise symbols carved into the beetle’s shell. Something about them made Kretschman’s retinas feel hot, and he blinked a couple of times.

  ‘It’s writing of some kind,’ he said. ‘Hard to make out exactly what it says, though…’

>   Kretschman looked harder, and was surprised to find the vial gone from his hand – Pranix had snatched it away so quickly he was left staring at his own fingertips.

  ‘Best not to look too closely,’ said Pranix, pocketing the vial once more. ‘Those symbols represent the foulest heresy. I could give you a lens to see them in perfect detail, but the reaction wouldn’t be pleasant and I doubt the colonel would appreciate you crying blood into his amasec.’

  ‘A… heretical insect, then,’ said the colonel, visibly exasperated. ‘But what’s it for, my lord?’

  Pranix leaned forwards. Kretschman was still standing there, but the colonel and the inquisitor – Kretschman was finding it harder and harder to doubt Pranix’s credentials – had their attention locked on each other, and seemed to have forgotten he existed.

  ‘I extracted that insect from the brain of a filing clerk in the long library in Carapel,’ said Pranix. ‘His fellow clerks had beaten him to death to stop him from eating their overseer’s face. Before he died, he was speaking in an unknown tongue, and the words haunted the nightmares of everyone who heard them for weeks afterwards. Two witnesses had to be executed for heretical outpourings after the incident.’

  ‘That’s one incident,’ said Ruthger. ‘Disturbing, but insanity amongst the menials is not unknown. Surely not enough to warrant the Inquisition’s attention.’

  ‘It does when there is a pattern. The Inquisition watches all, and I am always alert to this kind of pattern,’ said Pranix. ‘As you say, insanity and butchery are not uncommon, and nothing a few executions won’t resolve. But when there are many, many incidents of this kind, over months, spreading across a specific area… Even though no one of significance was killed, the phenomenon was visible, and the source clear.’

  ‘The source?’ asked Ruthger.

  ‘The first incidents were in areas near to the Hellward Gate, mainly the port cities on the nearest shoreline,’ said Pranix. ‘But since then they have spread, less concentrated geographically but much further afield, across all of Laghast. Everywhere, attacks by otherwise innocuous subjects of the Emperor. And, where I have had the chance to requisition the bodies, these insects were present in a high percentage of incidents, buried deep in the brain.’

  ‘An infection, corrupting the mind,’ said Ruthger. ‘Introduced from off-world, slowly spreading. But only on Laghast, you say, not further into the Hollow Worlds?’

  ‘No,’ said Pranix. ‘It seems a curious limitation, something to do with the Archways. I myself had a dozen samples of similar insects which I intended to take to the Adeptus Mechanicus on Kerresh to obtain their opinion, but having passed through the Archway I found that there was nothing but dust in my sample cases. These creatures go wherever the carrier goes, but they cannot pass through the Archways.’

  ‘But what’s the purpose, if the carriers don’t attack anything of importance?’ asked Ruthger.

  Kretschman had been wondering the same thing. The insects seemed to do nothing more than the kind of damage caused by hive riots and slum plagues in any given year.

  ‘I don’t think these attacks were intentional,’ said Pranix. ‘I think they were malfunctions. I cannot determine the exact nature of these insects, nor their purpose, but they are organic creatures augmented with technology and contaminated with the vilest heresy. They are undetectable, even by a trained psyker like myself. That they should be created for such random carnage is unlikely – I believe the intent was for the carriers to perform some specific act with far greater impact. I believe that what we have seen so far is the result of a small number of failures, where the human subjects have broken down due to the touch of heresy.’

  ‘How many of these failures have already occurred?’ asked Ruthger.

  ‘Somewhere between two and three hundred,’ said Pranix. ‘Although I cannot be entirely sure.’

  ‘And what percentage of the total infected would you consider those failures to be?’ asked Ruthger.

  ‘I cannot imagine more than three per cent,’ said Pranix.

  Ruthger had nothing to add, and sat back in his seat.

  ‘So you see, colonel,’ said Pranix. ‘We may have thousands of unwitting agents of heresy within our midst, and no idea of who sent them or when they might be activated.’

  ‘What do you need from us?’ asked Ruthger.

  Pranix was about to answer him when someone tried to kill them all.

  The assassins came in through the rear entrance to the officers’ mess, via the kitchens. Though dressed as lowly workers and servants, they acted ruthlessly and efficiently, raising their weapons and aiming straight at the colonel.

  Kretschman reached for his lasrifle the moment the door was kicked open, but felt himself being roughly pushed aside as the inquisitor moved forwards to kick the colonel’s chair over, causing the commanding officer to tip backwards onto the ground.

  Before Kretschman had brought his weapon back up, the inquisitor had taken down their attackers with three tight bursts from a laspistol. The assassins fell to the floor, dead before they could even fire a shot.

  ‘Apologies, colonel,’ said Pranix. ‘There was no time for a formal plan. It was lucky I was carrying a weapon. I don’t usually travel armed, it tends to be conspicuous.’

  Kretschman, moving to help the colonel off the floor, suspected that if the inquisitor didn’t bother going armed most of the time, it was because he didn’t need to be.

  ‘It’s started,’ said Pranix redundantly. ‘No doubt the authorities on this world will already be under attack. We need to move to take control of the city, starting with a suitable hub to be our base of operations.’

  The colonel took this in his stride.

  ‘I believe, lord inquisitor,’ he said, brushing himself down, ‘that I know a place.’

  Dumas Cheng had been system governor of the Hollow Worlds of Lastrati for over 150 years, since the death of the previous incumbent. As was ancient tradition, he had been elected to the role by his fellow planetary vice governors following a mere seventeen years governing Plini. His tentative appointment had been approved by the appropriate Imperial authorities via astropathic message, and he had been the Emperor’s voice within the Hollow Worlds for a century and a half since.

  It was a position of unquestioned authority, and Cheng’s rule had been a successful one. Although no system in the Imperium was ever free from strife, rebellion, heresy and attempted invasion, all of these threats had occurred in a predictable fashion and been crushed with efficient brutality. A high state of security and regular purges had ensured that Cheng’s reign had been a largely peaceable one, and that the import and export of people and resources that was the Hollow Worlds’ lifeblood continued unimpeded.

  While the great machine of war was fed at a satisfactory rate, the wider Imperium saw no reason to interfere in Cheng’s administration. The Hollow Worlds were secure and efficient, a barrier between the wilds of the Maelstrom Zone and some of the Imperium’s safest worlds.

  It was a fortress system, and its walls were strong.

  Aided by countless rejuvenat treatments, Cheng had kept in good health, and rose early every day to go about his duties. As his worlds were ruled in orderly fashion, so he lived an orderly routine.

  He was unaccustomed to being woken in the early hours of the morning by the sounds of voices raised in panic.

  The throne world of Ressial was the administrative, if not geographic, centre of the Hollow Worlds. The interior of the world was dominated by the Onyx Palace, a vast structure of lavish halls and twisted spires that was clearly visible from any point in the world, at the centre of which a cavernous throne room held a throne so resplendent it could blind the unwary.

  The palace had been built by ten thousand slaves over a dozen centuries, and it lay completely empty, kept immaculate by a legion of servitors for the impossible day when the Emperor might choos
e to visit the Hollow Worlds and take His seat upon that sparkling throne.

  At the edge of the Onyx Palace’s deserted estates lay the Gatehouse, an aquila-festooned ziggurat that, compared to the Onyx Palace itself, was merely obscenely ostentatious. Each step of the ziggurat was lined with spikes, upon which were placed the skulls of traitors and invaders who had tried to disrupt the peace of the Hollow Worlds.

  The Gatehouse was the system governor’s residence, and it was there he was woken in the very early hours. His underlings ushered him through the ziggurat’s catacombs to a central communication room filled with scribes and serfs, monitoring cogitators and scratching their findings onto vellum.

  Cheng took to the lacquered throne at the centre of the room and plugged himself in, attaching the required tubes, including the nutrient pipe into the side of his neck. As system governor he would not move until any crisis was resolved. That was his duty and his honour, although he silently wished he had been given the chance to eat some solid food first.

  As nutrients and stimulants woke his body, Cheng accepted a sheaf of vellum from a robed servant, and quickly scanned the reports. They spanned a mere two hours, and were fragmentary at best, but they described a disturbing series of events all across Laghast.

  The fall of the Astropathic Tower. Attacks and assassinations. A Lastrati Astra Militarum regiment besieged in their barracks, while the vice governors of three worlds were missing, presumed dead. Water had been poisoned, cities were ablaze.

  Disturbingly, in the short time these events had occurred the reports were becoming more, not less, fragmented, as if something had infected the Hollow Worlds’ communications.

  Now that he was connected to the control throne, Cheng could feel it. A hiss, a sinister build of static where there should have been a relentless stream of signals and communications at the edge of his awareness. It was like an absence, a lack of information, but at the same time it felt like something more substantial and malignant. Trying to feel the nature of the interference, Cheng felt an itch behind his eyeballs, a growing sense of nausea.