The Journal of Corporal Militis, 1st Platoon, Echo Company, 75th Terra Storm Troopers W11357
Why was I assigned to this regiment? Why was I selected to be in such an elite unit? They don't respect me. I don't much like the way the others in the regiment looked down on me, either. I'm one of the highest scoring soldiers in the regiment in terms of shooting and physical fitness. Plus, I'm a Non-Commissioned Officer. I outrank the men who enjoyed mocking me. Well, all of that came to a grinding halt on the day of our first battle together…
"Fuck you, you brat!" Trooper First Class Shobar yelled. Apparently he had a problem with my orders. "If you want to stick your head out in that mess, be my guest, but I refuse." My blood boiled, but I could see why he was so unhappy about my orders. A sniper had taken off Debray's head, poor bastard, and almost immediately after, withering las fire was ripping the wall apart, chunk by Emperor damned chunk. It was near suicide to comply with my orders. But disobeying them would mean certain death at the hands of the Commissariat for all of us. We were expected to move in further and bring down a generator building that was powering the enemy's artillery. Failure would be frowned upon with eyes shaped like las-gun muzzles.
"Fine, you damn coward." I replied, shouldering past him. "I'll do it my damned self!" I grabbed a grenade from my belt, a fragmentation grenade, great against infantry, but wretched on vehicles. Good thing they didn't have any. I poked my head around the edge of the once beautiful Imperial cathedral. The once ornately decorated walls had been pummeled nearly smooth by withering fire and detonation from nearby shells. All across the streets were the scattered, smashed remains of the statues of Imperial heroes and Saints long gone and dearly missed. It nearly broke my heart seeing such powerful religious artifacts destroyed without care.
I lobbed the grenade as hard as I could and then returned to taking cover behind the slowly shrinking wall. After the thud, the enemy fire died down a bit. With all the breath in my lungs I shouted "For the Emperor!" and flew out of my covered position and sprinted towards the enemy's line. My hellgun spat death at every foe who had enough of him exposed for me to hit. By the time the sniper had the drop on me, I had it on him. As I was about to squeeze the trigger, praying to the God-Emperor that I killed him first, a bright blue lance of energy destroyed the area where the sniper had been. Rather than foolishly look back, I kept moving and firing, knowing that my squad had actually grown a pair, not wanting the regiment's baby to show them all up by myself. I had them on my side now. Perhaps they would go all the way with me.
We pushed through the enemy so fast and hard that day that plans for retaking the Hive city were accelerated. We had forced our way into the generator building and accidentally blown the wrong cufflink. We ran as fast as we could and watched as an explosion of near nuclear proportions obliterated the enemy artillery and a flying shard of metal nearly impaled me through my face. The rubble strewn streets, ruined buildings and corpses were all that was left of the great hive, before and after we pushed through. We had just made a big hole in the middle of it all. It had been a great victory. My great victory, and I knew that, from that day forward, no one in the regiment would disrespect me so completely again. The jokes were inevitable, I knew, but I had showed what I could do, and my men were impressed.
Corporal Preliat Militis
3rd Squad, 1st Platoon
Echo Company, 75th Terra Storm Troopers