V3 Chapter 111: Rights? You Won't Have Any of Those Left, Master
Duvette led the group further into the Administratum's depths, and the resistance they met along the way could hardly slow them at all; every enemy was destroyed within moments of contact.
As the Emperor's own most powerful warriors, the Custodians could have broken through these mortal-manned blockades easily even without any skill enhancement at all.
With Duvette's combat skills all in effect now, these so-called elite forces had lost even the ability to slow them down.
Eight defensive lines fell one after another. Anyone who opened fire on the Custodians got, for their last sight in life, only a streak of gold flashing past.
The twenty Custodians stayed at the head of the group throughout, and though they appeared scattered from one another, each of them still knew exactly where the others stood.
Italeo could feel it: his reaction speed, strength, and perception had all climbed to a level he'd never known before, and that only made him more aware of how anomalous this power truly was.
Duvette walked through a shattered position, stopping beside the smoking wreck of an autocannon, and looked up toward the Administratum's Supreme Administrative Hall in the distance.
It was a sprawling administrative bastion. Its heavy armoured gates had already closed, and every weapon platform along its outer walls had gone to full combat readiness.
Duvette turned his attention to the strategic map. Over a hundred red markers filled it.
"Over a hundred Astartes." Duvette narrowed his eyes. "Seems Cimotrion really did leave himself a way out."
The size and colour of these markers far outstripped anything they'd faced from mortals so far, and the numbers came close to a full company.
Among them stood twenty more prominent targets, along with one whose size dwarfed even an ordinary Astartes.
Terminators, and a Dreadnought.
Duvette let out a short, quiet laugh. His own force now held twenty fully-enhanced Custodians; stopping them head-on would take a Primarch showing up in person at minimum, and even some Primarchs might not manage it.
"The Supreme Administrative Hall is right ahead." Duvette's voice carried through the comm channel. "Take it. Clear out anyone still resisting, whatever their identity."
Italeo raised his halberd, and the twenty Custodians reformed into an assault formation. The thirteen Shadow Wolves of Luna fell in behind Duvette, guarding him.
"Begin."
****
Ulrich, Captain of the Minotaurs' Third Company, stood on the command platform of the Supreme Administrative Hall's ground floor, watching the defensive positions ahead go dark, one signal loss after another.
His power armour was linked into the Administratum's surveillance system, and footage of Duvette leading the Custodians and the white-armoured Astartes in an assault on the Administratum played across his helmet display.
The combat footage Cimotrion had provided had been edited; the footage of the autocannon turret firing first on the Custodians had already been cut.
All Ulrich could see was Duvette giving the order to kill Administratum personnel, then leading the Custodians onward toward the Supreme Administrative Hall.
Cimotrion had also told him that Duvette had used some ability to influence Guilliman and a portion of the Custodians, and had taken the two Lord Inquisitors and the Grand Master of the Assassinorum hostage.
According to the Administratum's account, this mortal was staging a coup under cover of the Emperor's son's return, and the anomalous white-armoured Astartes were his own private army.
The authority seal on the record carried the Administratum's highest-tier authentication, yet all attempts to reach the main Minotaurs fleet by comm had failed without exception.
Ulrich had no choice but to fall back on the High Lords' earlier security decree, and continue protecting the Administratum's key personnel and facilities.
He hadn't expected all eight defensive lines ahead of him to fall in so short a span of time.
The armed personnel deployed further out had struggled to relay any useful intelligence back, managing only a few seconds of panicked shouting before they died.
The entire Minotaurs Third Company had already finished deploying. Over a hundred Astartes were spread along both sides of the hall and the upper walkways, and twenty veteran Terminators guarded the road leading to the core district.
Three Rhinos sat angled across the centre of the hall as cover, and a Land Raider held position behind the main passage, every heavy weapon mounted on its hull locked onto the entrance.
A Hecaton Dreadnought stood in the hall's central fire lane, its heavy weapons tracking slowly in step with its sensor systems.
The hall stretched wider than several hundred metres, its upper levels laced with walkways and firing platforms; any enemy coming through the main entrance would be exposed to fire from dozens of directions at once.
Ulrich believed that even Custodians would falter against terrain like this.
The Minotaurs finished their final adjustments under his orders. The Terminators tightened their grips on power fists and thunder hammers, and every heavy weapon was trained on the entrance.
Heavy footsteps soon reached Ulrich's ears.
He glanced once more at the record Cimotrion had sent, and finally raised his hand.
"All units, ready."
The Land Raider's turret swung toward the entrance, and the Dreadnought raised its weapons as well.
As the footsteps drew closer, Ulrich dropped his arm.
"Fire."
Every weapon in the hall roared at once. Bolt rounds, las-beams, and plasma bolts poured into the building's entrance together, and the Land Raider's heavy fire smashed the steps just outside the door to rubble.
Explosions rang out one after another. The broad doors and the surrounding walls collapsed fast, huge chunks of stone and metal crashing down, and smoke swallowed the entrance completely.
The Minotaurs kept up the barrage for several seconds. Ulrich judged that no ordinary target could remain intact under an attack of this scale, and gave the order to cease fire.
The hall fell silent again, the Minotaurs warriors holding their aim, waiting for the smoke to clear.
Several streaks of gold suddenly burst out of it.
The tactical squad standing at the front had only just begun to react when several Custodians had already torn straight through their formation.
Halberds swept down together, disintegrator fields tearing through ceramite plate, and ten Astartes were cut down almost in the same instant.
"Enemy's in the hall!" a Minotaurs sergeant roared over the comm. "Re-acquire targets!"
Gunfire erupted again, crossfire sweeping the hall's entrance.
The Minotaurs' enhanced vision could just barely catch the flickering gold shapes, but neither their bodies nor their weapons could keep pace.
Bolt rounds only struck the spots the Custodians had already left, and on the rare occasion saturation fire actually landed on the gleaming gold armour, it did nothing but throw sparks off the surface.
Under Duvette's full enhancement, every Custodian now carried strength and speed approaching a Primarch's, able to read a Minotaur's line of fire before the trigger was even pulled.
The terrain Ulrich had judged easy to defend and hard to assault was, instead, now boxing in the Minotaurs' own firing lanes.
The Custodians moved fast along the building's structure and the armoured vehicles, denying the warriors on ranged support any chance to mass their fire.
One Custodian slammed into a Rhino blocking the passage, flipping the multi-tonne vehicle over outright, sending it crashing down onto the Minotaurs firing nearby.
Another Custodian leapt onto the Land Raider, driving his halberd into the join between the turret and the hull.
The disintegrator field, enhanced by [Blessing of the Omnissiah], tore through the armour in an instant, setting off the weapon systems inside.
The Custodian leapt clear of the hull before the blast spread, and drove straight into another tactical squad.
The twenty Terminators charged down from the upper platforms, trying to hold the Custodians back with sheer weight of armour and power fists.
The moment the two sides met, the foremost Terminator had his chest plate punched clean through by a halberd, and the second lost an arm severed clean at the joint.
Italeo cut straight through the gap between them, his halberd spinning in continuous arcs, cracking open the armour of three Minotaurs Terminators at once.
Their heavy bodies hadn't even hit the ground before the Tribune had already moved on to the next position.
Ulrich kept issuing orders, trying to reorganise the line.
The Minotaurs' comm channel carried nothing but chaotic reports now; every squad that tried to close a pincer got broken through before the formation could ever seal shut.
These Astartes' loyalty to the High Lords' decree had been turned, by Cimotrion, into nothing more than a tool for buying himself time.
Even now, they still believed they were stopping a traitor bent on controlling the Emperor's own son.
The Hecaton Dreadnought took a heavy step forward, pouring fire in Italeo's direction.
Shells tore up the floor, the blasts covering an area dozens of metres around the Tribune.
Italeo burst out of the flames, only fading traces of smoke visible across his gleaming gold plate.
He sidestepped the power claw the Dreadnought swung down at him, his halberd burning brighter still under the skills' enhancement.
The Tribune leapt straight in, driving the halberd into the Dreadnought's chest armour.
The enhanced disintegrator field forced its way clean through the outer plating and the structure beneath it, killing the pilot who kept the Dreadnought moving.
The Hecaton Dreadnought's movement stopped dead. Italeo pulled the halberd free, and the massive war machine, its balance gone, crashed down backward into the centre of the hall.
Ulrich raised his bolter and fired at Italeo in a continuous burst.
The Tribune stepped aside from the line of fire, and in the next instant was already standing before the upper command platform.
The halberd swept in sideways, shattering the bolter in Ulrich's hands.
Italeo followed through at once, driving the halberd's butt into his chest plate and sending the Minotaurs captain slamming into the wall behind him.
Ulrich hit the ground hard, wide cracks already spreading across his chest plate.
Just as he made to rise again, Italeo's halberd was already resting against his throat, and the fighting throughout the hall came to a fast stop.
Duvette walked in through the collapsed entrance at an unhurried pace, the thirteen white-armoured Shadow Wolves of Luna following behind him.
Some of the Shadow Wolves moved off to secure the Administratum's Cogitators and archive systems, while several others destroyed the comm-jamming device hidden deep within the hall.
Duvette glanced at his pocket watch.
Nineteen seconds.
Over a hundred Minotaurs Astartes, twenty veteran Terminators, and a Hecaton Dreadnought were all but wiped out.
Only Ulrich and a handful of gravely wounded Minotaurs remained alive in the hall.
"Know why I'm not killing you?" Duvette walked up to Ulrich, and signalled for Italeo to draw the halberd back. "You were all deceived by the information Cimotrion fed you."
Ulrich braced himself up with one hand, and lifted his head with great effort.
His gaze passed over Duvette, settling on the Minotaurs bodies scattered across the hall.
"The comm jamming's been lifted." Duvette went on. "You can check the order your Chapter Master sent."
Ulrich activated his helmet comm with a trembling hand, and the messages that had been blocked flooded into the system at once.
The one carrying the highest authority came from the Minotaurs' Chapter Master, Asterion Moloc.
"The old decree is void. The Minotaurs no longer protect Ilthor Cimotrion. Every combatant currently within the Administratum is to cease hostilities immediately, and submit to the Imperial Regent's investigation."
Ulrich stayed frozen where he was, staring at the bodies around him.
The entire Third Company had been all but annihilated. Of the twenty Terminators, only two still showed signs of life, and even the Hecaton Dreadnought had gone still.
From the first shot fired to the end of it all, not even twenty seconds had passed.
"This should have been nothing more than a misunderstanding, Captain Ulrich." Duvette turned away, leading the Custodians deeper into the hall. "If you hadn't fired first, all of this could have been avoided."
Ulrich finally lowered his head. He still couldn't accept the result before him, but he'd already lost any reason to keep fighting.
A Shadow Wolf soon reported to Duvette that the Administratum's core Cogitators were now secured, the Chief Archivist and the Keeper of the Authority Seal had both been taken alive, and the purge of the execution rider's records hadn't been completed in time.
Cimotrion, however, had already left the Supreme Administrative Hall.
Duvette looked to the strategic map. The red marker representing the Master of the Administratum was moving beneath the building, apparently making for the distant secret spaceport along a hidden passage.
"Markus, take some men and secure the archives." Duvette turned to Italeo. "Lord Tribune, bring two men and come with me."
****
Ilthor Cimotrion, with the last dozen or so of his personal guard, moved fast through a narrow hidden passage.
He hadn't moved at such a pace in far too long, and his body soon began to give out, his breathing growing heavier with every step.
This hidden passage existed only in the Master of the Administratum's most classified records. Everyone who'd taken part in building it had died long ago, and the servitors responsible for its upkeep had had their memories wiped, again and again.
So long as he reached the secret spaceport at the passage's end, Cimotrion could board a prepared aircraft and leave the Outer Palace entirely.
He'd thought the Minotaurs would at least buy him some time.
But the last footage to reach him from the Supreme Administrative Hall showed the Astartes there holding out for less than twenty seconds.
Cimotrion couldn't even process what he'd seen: twenty streaks of gold moving fast through the hall, and then the entire Minotaurs force simply going dark, every vital sign gone.
None of his resistance had managed to slow Duvette down in the slightest. Fleeing Terra was the only path left to him now.
Cimotrion gritted his teeth and pressed on. He would survive. And then he would make every one of them pay.
The end of the passage had already come into view.
"Where are you off to in such a hurry, Master?"
A familiar voice came from ahead. Cimotrion stopped dead in his tracks, and saw a figure in a commissar's greatcoat standing at the dim end of the passage.
"D... Duve—"
"I did say, Master, that I'd come find you myself." Duvette said with a smile, stepping forward. "Doesn't look like you're too pleased to see me, though."
The shock on Cimotrion's face turned to fear fast. He couldn't imagine how Duvette had found the hidden passage, let alone how the man had managed to arrive at the exit ahead of him.
"Kill him!" Cimotrion roared at the guards around him. "Kill them, now!"
The death-oath guards, conditioned from childhood, raised their hellguns at once, but before a single one of them could pull the trigger, a violent rush of air tore past Cimotrion on either side.
Blood sprayed through the passage, painting Cimotrion's clothes and face red.
The dozen or so death-oath guards fell all at once, and two Custodians already stood behind Cimotrion.
The Master of the Administratum stood with his mouth open, feeling the warm blood run down his face.
He tried to speak, but only a ragged, heavy breath came from his throat.
Duvette walked up to him, clapping slowly as he came.
"Quite the impressive resistance." Duvette glanced at the bodies behind Cimotrion. "We had to clear out eight of these just to find you."
Cimotrion gradually recovered a measure of composure, straightening his body once more, trying to hold onto the last scrap of dignity a High Lord was owed.
"When you signed the order to have me killed, did you ever imagine this day would come?" Duvette asked.
Cimotrion wiped the blood from his face, fury surfacing in his eyes once more.
"I had the right to do it. The right to answer for every affair of this Imperium. The right to remove anyone, and anything, that could endanger it."
Cimotrion's voice rose. "And you, Duvette Erdmann, I once granted you the supreme honour of the Star of Terra, and you repaid it by bewitching a Primarch, trying to turn him against the Imperium, against humanity itself!"
Duvette listened to all of it in silence, and then suddenly laughed.
"You're pathetic, you know that?" he said. "Right up to the moment of your death, and you still think you get to decide everything."
Duvette drew the Blade of Glory, without activating the disruption field along its edge.
"Power?" He levelled the blade at Cimotrion. "You won't be holding onto that anymore, Master."
Italeo emerged from the passage behind them, his recording systems running the entire time, having captured the whole of Cimotrion's flight and the attack his guards had launched.
"Lord Tribune, record what follows." Duvette said. "Ilthor Cimotrion refused an arrest order issued by the Imperial Regent, deployed armed force against the Custodians, and attempted to destroy evidence and flee Terra."
Italeo looked at the Master of the Administratum.
"Facts confirmed." the Tribune said, low. "His actions constitute armed rebellion against the Imperial Regent, and against the Golden Throne."
Duvette turned back to Cimotrion.
"Under the authority Lord Guilliman granted me, a target resisting arrest by force, destroying evidence, or attempting to flee Terra may be executed on the spot." His tone turned colder, word by word. "Master of the Administratum, Ilthor Cimotrion. Execution, effective immediately."
"No, you can't do this!" Cimotrion's eyes went wide in an instant. "You have no right to execute a High Lord! I have the right to a Council trial!"
"I do."
The Blade of Glory swept across Cimotrion's throat.
His head rolled away down the narrow passage, and the body, no longer held up, crashed to the ground behind it.
Cimotrion's face still carried the terror of his final instant, his eyes never closing.
Duvette looked down at the Master of the Administratum's body, and flicked the blood off the Blade of Glory.
"Your death is going to be the opening act of this purge."
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