Chapter 68: The Rock Wrapped in Steel

Chapter 68: The Rock Wrapped in Steel

Standard Terran Date: 006.M31

Gloriana-class Battleship, the Ironblood

The lower-deck hab-unit was still small, still dark. A year had passed. The mother, Aelia, lay on the cot, holding her son, Petros, tightly. She ignored the shouting and heavy footsteps outside.

The monsters were coming. They were coming to take her last child.

She kissed his forehead, her lips soft. "Petros," she whispered, "your father and I gave you that name for a reason. It means 'Rock.' We wanted you to be strong as a rock, to grow into a good, honest man."

Her thin, frail fingers stroked his cheek. "Remember, Petros. You are a Kalashis. We do not steal, and we do not lie."

Petros knew he shouldn't deceive her, but to spare her the pain, he nodded. He knew.

DOK! DOK! DOK!

The sound was less a knock and more a battery. BOOM! The door was kicked from its hinges, and a squad of armsmen, their armor and foreheads branded with the eight-pointed star, stormed in.

"The Iron Warriors Legion is taking the boy," their leader barked. "He comes with us. Now."

His mother's arms became steel. She clung to her last child, her last treasure. "No," she gasped, her voice weak but defiant. "Olympia has given them enough."

One of the armsmen, a cultist, strode in and brutally kicked the woman in the ribs. He grabbed Petros by the arm, trying to rip him from his mother's grasp.

"You damned bitch!" the armsman spat. "I 'serviced' you just two days ago! Where the hell do you think you got the food to—"

Empowered by his lasgun, the armsman had forgotten what Petros was. He was a shadow. A thief. And a survivor.

A shiv, ground from a piece of scrap plasteel, flashed from Petros's sleeve. He lunged, driving the blade up and under the armsman's gorget, sinking it deep into his neck.

The man paused, his insult dying in his throat. He felt the pain, his hand flying to his neck. Petros ripped the shiv free. A torrent of bright, arterial blood sprayed across the tiny hab, painting the walls. The man gurgled, collapsing to the deck, his hand trying in vain to plug the spurting wound.

The other armsmen stared in shock. One raised his lasgun to fire, but the Sergeant smashed the weapon aside with a gauntleted fist.

"Hold your fire, you idiot!" the Sergeant roared. "Tithe-age boys are scarce enough as it is. You kill this one, and the Astartes will have our heads!"

The armsman, realizing his error, lowered his weapon. "Sorry, Sergeant."

Now, a squad of armed cultists stood in a tense standoff with a single, blood-drenched, 13-year-old boy armed with a knife.

"Sergeant, what now?" another asked.

"My shock-maul," the Sergeant commanded, his voice cold.

He was handed the weapon. He dialed the power setting to its absolute minimum. He couldn't risk permanently damaging the asset. He stepped over his dead subordinate, his eyes fixed on the boy.

He feinted, and as Petros dodged, the Sergeant swung the maul in a low, fast arc. The weapon's energy-field crackled as it struck Petros in the shoulder. The paralyzing jolt seized every muscle in the boy's body. He collapsed, his limbs locked, twitching on the metal deck.

"Get him in restraints," the Sergeant ordered, stepping back. "Get him to the medicae. I won't have him dying on my watch."

One of the armsmen dragged his dead comrade out of the doorway. Another grabbed the paralyzed boy's arm and began to drag him out.

But the mother lunged.

She threw herself onto her son's paralyzed body, clinging to him with a desperate, impossible strength. She wouldn't let them take him. She knew, as she had known when her own brother was taken all those years ago, that if he left, she would never see him again.

The armsman cursed, pulling harder, but the woman's grip was like iron. He was now dragging them both.

The Sergeant's patience broke. He couldn't use the shock-maul's electrical charge, for fear of hitting the boy. So, he used it as a club. He raised the heavy maul and brought it down, un-powered, on the woman's back. He struck her again, and again. Her body convulsed in agony, but she did not let go.

He struck her arms. There was a sickening, wet CRACK as her arm broke.

She screamed, her grip finally broken. The armsmen tore Petros from her, cuffing his hands and feet.

As they dragged the boy from the hab, the Sergeant paused. "This little shit killed one of my men," he growled. "We have to make an example. It's the only way to maintain order down here."

He unholstered his laspistol.

The mother, her arm hanging at an impossible angle, her face a mask of blood and tears, looked up at her son one last time.

The Sergeant fired. The las-beam struck her in the chest. She collapsed, her body still, in the spreading pool of the armsman's blood.

Petros, paralyzed and mute, could only watch. His body was locked, but his mind was clear, his eyes burning.

He was dragged backward, down the dark corridor, toward his new fate. His gaze, however, never left his mother's body, until the corner of the corridor finally stole her from his sight. His eyes, burning with a cold, pure, and unending hatred, then fixed on the eight-pointed stars carved into the backs of the men who were dragging him.

Standard Terran Date: 006.M31

Gloriana-class Battleship, the Ironblood

The boy, Petros Kalashis—"The Rock"—was taken.

He was handed over to the medicae, who stabilized him and cured his malnutrition. From there, he was given to the Legion's Apothecaries.

They would implant him with a full set of Astartes organs, cultivated from the gene-seed of a fallen Imperial Fist.

They would use hypno-indoctrination to scour his mind and pour in the tactical knowledge of the Iron Warriors.

He would be wrapped in steel.

He would become the Rock Wrapped in Steel.