We have to take him/ said Rassi, indicating the old priest.
Agreed. Let's go/
Begundi opened the far door of the hut and led the way out. Bequin followed him, then Fischig. Rassi reached out to help the old priest up.
'Come on, father/ he said.
Seeing the hand coming for him, Dronicus yelped.
'Shit! We're rumbled!' said Haar. They're coming!'
Las-fire, bright and furious, suddenly hammered at the doorway and blew holes through the rotten fibre-ply.
Kara dived down for cover. Haar kept his place and I heard his long-las crack.
'One down/ he said.
Rassi and I hauled the old priest to his feet and bundled him towards die back exit. Behind us, the long-las cracked again, and was joined by the chatter of Kara Swole's assault weapon. Return fire hammered into the side of the longhouse, perforating the wall.
'Get him out/1 told Rassi and ran to the door.
Standing over Kara as she fired, I shot several bolt rounds through the gaping window. Las-shots seared down the street and burst against the side of the hut. I got a glimpse of figures in bulky grey combat fatigues scurrying closer and pausing to unload their lasrifles in our direction.
A sudden thought, true and clear, lanced into my brain. I grabbed Kara and Haar. 'Move!' I howled.
We had made it to the rear door when the grenade took the front off the hut. The entire doorway area where Haar had been crouching erupted in a flash of flame and shredded fibre-ply.
The blast-rush blew us out into the street.
Fischig hauled me up.
'Go! Go!'
Kara was bleeding from a shrapnel wound on her temple and Haar was dazed. But we ran, dragging them with us, up the muddy roadway towards the main dish.
Three men in insulated combat armour raced into the street ahead of us, raising lasrifles.
Begundi's Hecuter pistols were in his hands faster than any of us could raise the weapons we already held. He blazed out twin streams of shots, the shell cases spraying out from the slide-slots of his weapons. All three men ahead of us lurched back and sprawled.
Begundi ran ahead, chopping down another two as they emerged, his handguns roaring. Then he dropped suddenly onto his back, rolled round and blasted another assailant off the roof where he had suddenly appeared.
Five more loomed behind us, breaking out of the rear door we had escaped through.
Fischig and Kara turned, firing. They dropped three of them. Bequin brought down the fourth with a single well-placed head-shot. A round from my bolt pistol knocked the fifth five metres back down the road.
Thorn? Desiring Aegis? Pattern oath?' my vox suddenly squawked. Medea was monitoring the activity over the vox-link.
'Negative! Thorn wishes Aegis repose under wing!' I replied, using Glos-sia, the informal private code I shared with my staff.
Aegis stirred. The flower of blood.'
Aegis repose, by the thrice ignited. As a statue, to the end of Earth/
'Gregor! Let me come!'
'No, Medea! No!'
We were in a serious firefight now. Las-shots and hard rounds whipped in all directions. Fischig and Haar laid down heavy cover fire. Kara and Bequin selected targets more particularly and hit most of them. Begundi blazed away with his matched handguns. I fired carefully, cautiously, keeping the old priest behind me. Rassi's fission-lock pepperpot banged and sparked and hailed lead balls at the enemy. Every few seconds, he raised his cane and sent forth a drizzle of psycho-thermic flame from the silver
tip-
'Brace yourselves,' I yelled. 'You especially, Poul.'
He nodded.
Such a raw outburst would usually have floored all those around me, but Haar, Begundi and Kara had all been mentally conditioned during rigorous training to black out my psy-streams. Bequin was untouchable and Fischig wore a tore that protected him.
Rassi, forewarned, put up a mental wall. The old priest screamed, stood up and wet himself.
He wasn't the only one to stand up. Our attackers rose into view, each one clutching a smoking weapon, each one blinking in dumb confusion.
Begundi, Fischig and I cut them all down in a few, lethal seconds.
Victory.
For a moment.
Suddenly, Dronicus was running away down the street and Rassi was doubled up by convulsions. I felt it too. A sudden jolt in the background psionic resonance. Like a painfully bright flash of light.
I staggered back and slammed into the side of the nearest hut. Blood spurted out of my nose. Begundi and Kara fell to their knees. Haar sat down hard, sobbing. Even Fischig, protected by his tore, felt it and staggered.
Alizebeth, the only one unmoved, glanced around at us and yelled, 'What? What is it?'
I knew where it had come from. The hangar. I struggled upright in time to see the hangar roof quiver and buckle as something broke through it from inside.
Something huge that smashed entire roof panels out of the way as it got to its feet.
It must have been lying down in the hangar, I realised. Now it was rising and activated. What we had felt had simply been the backwash of its mind-link going live.
With dreadful certainty, I realised that Fayde Thuring was going to be damn near impossible to stop.
I had made an unbelievable, unforgivable mistake. I had underestimated him and his resources. He was nothing like the minor warp-dabbler I had once let slip away.
He had a Titan, Emperor damn him.
He had a Battle Titan.
FOUR
Fleeing the giant.
A terrible long shot.
Its name was
