This is a new prologue, I felt the old one was too disconnected from the rest of the story, this one however is closer. If you are new to this story then I hope you have fun while reading it.
Prologue
"Explore the Galaxy! Defend the Imperium! Serve the Emperor!" That was written on the banner beneath a pristine guardsmen standing at attention. Simple, encouraging and one of the better Imperial Guard recruitment posters I had seen. Every time I glanced at it, taking a swig of my quickly draining hip flask, I thought to myself.
What a load of rubbish.
I was currently sitting in the reception area of a clinic, I had been on a waiting list for months to get an opportunity to visit. To make sure I had no assignments on today. To make sure that I'd been free of my duties as a guardsman. I was the only one in the room, there was another person I could hear but that term 'person' was to be debated. A lone servitor typed away at a cogitator. Judging from the serial number tattoo on his forehead he used to be a convict. I felt comfort in the relief he wasn't a guardsman that had exhausted his usefulness and not his life. It made me grimace that anyone I knew could become that. A thoughtless drone made to work until their body disintegrates. Many already view guardsmen that way, the rebels would anyway. The other noise in the room came from the buzzing metal fan. Driving off the stuffy heat which came through the windows. The room itself was bland with grey walls adorned with posters, warning of venereal diseases and praising the Officio Medicae. The only other stand out was the brass Aquila that hung from the doorway. The magazines on the low table were boring and outdated. The latest being today's newspaper, the headline read 'VICTORY ON CHERABOS!' The ticking chrono held the time twenty hours. Or what I would call in Aralan dialect, 'late arvo'. I placed my flask back in my pocket.
I could really go for a meat pie right about now. I was trying to think when was the last time I had one. A true meat pie, not full of corpse starch or other additives that so many others called a 'meat pie'. I mean a true, Aralan, 100% mince meat pie. Just grox mince and gravy held within a gold, flaky pastry crust and held together in a foil pan. Some squirts of sauce and it was just right. The first bite would then be salty and warm as the gravy dripped and it burnt the mouth. The core of the pie being like molten lava. But that was the beauty of it as the steam would emit from that piping hot core on a winters day. Showing its warm interior. Maybe I could get one of the ratlings to try recreate it. Some canned, processed bully beef, corpse starch pastry and that green gravy. I actually don't know what the gravy is made of. The more I thought about it the less I wanted to know how the gravy was made and what it was made from. Even though I've probably eaten much worse.
I deeply miss Mum's cooking.
My nostalgic thoughts of home cooked food were interrupted by the itching sensation in my left arm. I put down my slouch hat and looked down as I rolled up my green uniform. My bionic arm was revealed, being cut bellow the elbow. I scratched at the cross over between flesh and metal. The enginseers and medics said the itching would go away after a few days. That was three years ago. After scraping at my rough skin for a while it eventually went away. Leaving me back to where I was. Sitting alone, in my uniform and the time ticking by. With my slouch hat tucked under my bionic arm and organic arm resting on my lap. Instinctively ready to grab the holstered laspistol at my hip.
"Mr Duwal, Dr Liverance may see you." I looked up to see a young woman, roughly mid twenties with tanned skin, black tied back hair and a nice smile. She wore the standard grey and blue clothing of the settlers of this planet.
"Thank you." I nodded as I passed her, the servitor didn't move its empty gaze as robotic fingers hit the keys.
I reached the wooden door labeled on a bronze plate. I entered to see a man, around his mid fifties with a dark grey beard and balding head. He was behind a wooden desk, the top of which was cluttered in recaff stained paper and various trinkets. In the middle of his desk sat a typewriter. Technology on this planet was sometimes still quite primitive, especially in the regional areas.
"Lieutenant Duwal I assume?" I closed the door behind me and walked over to the empty chair, his office shared a similar vibe of untidiness. It disgusted me.
"First off I would like to say thank you for your service to the Imperium and Cherarbos. I feel much better knowing the heretics are no longer a threat to our planet and myself." His tone was chipper and friendly holding a smile, he soon realised he was not going to change my reaction.
"So why is it that you have come to see me lieutenant?" I placed myself in the creaking chair, putting my hat on my lap and staring at the friendly eyes of the doctor. That's when my thoughts left me.
"Something has been bothering me doctor." I played with my hands as the scribbling of an autoquill could be heard on paper.
"And what is that?" My blood chilled, I felt ashamed at my cowardly behaviour. I had charged into gunfire, gone hand to hand with vile xenos and heretics and had seen vicious mutilation of mind, body and soul. Yet I couldn't talk about one issue of myself.
"Doctor, have you ever lost anyone, but never truly lost them?" His eyes remained blank behind his glasses, his mouth crept open.
"…I" I interrupted him before he finished his long exhale.
"Like a true loved one, someone that when they left you…You just felt, incomplete-" He interrupted me this time round, I was thankful he did.
"So your problem is dealing with loss?" I looked at my metallic hand, tensing and relaxing the cold fingers, still not used to the feeling of when I touched my own skin with it. I nodded, he continued to write this down on the same piece of paper.
"And how long have you had this problem." I pondered to myself, considering how long it had been since that day.
"Over nine years doctor." He continued to write this all down, he stopped and looked at me with a sense of bewilderment as he grabbed his glasses.
"Nine years? That's a long time Lieutenant Duwal, why not get help sooner?" I guess he was unfamiliar with the standard Imperial Guard protocol and decided to fill him in on why.
"Well it's more three years, but that was three years of non-stop fighting. This is the first chance I got to ever talk about it." Those three years I had spent battling the heretics on this planet, he nodded in understanding and wrote something down. He then looked up again, his eyes focusing on my laspistol.
"Do you carry that into battle lieutenant?" He pointed it out with his autoquill, I lifted my hand away and nodded.
"Usually I carry a boltgun into battle, this is more of a backup." He paused and fixed his glasses holding his mouth slightly ajar. I'm not surprised if he was unfamiliar with more advanced Imperial weaponry. He continued to speak.
"And this boltgun, what would happen if you lost it?" I couldn't tell where he was going with this, but I went along with it anyway.
"Fill out the munitorum paperwork and wait for a replacement, while I wait I'll use my chainsword and laspistol for combat." It was at that moment the intoxication of the drink I took earlier was starting to wear off, I reached into my tunic and found my hip flask.
"So you would just let go of it, leave it in the past?" He responded as his eyes followed my flask. I undid the lid and swallowed some more hard alcohol. The hardest I could find. It tasted slightly better with the aftertaste of the last drink. I wiped my mouth before speaking. I was starting to grow impatient.
"Doctor I don't see what this has to do with my problem." I stated as I put my flask back in its pocket in my tunic. The doctor clasped his hands together.
"Lieutenant I am a psychiatrist, not a psyker. I need to know what is wrong with you to help you through it." It was too soon but I already wanted to ingest more alcohol. We both sat there in silence for several minutes. He leant back in his chair as he continued to talk to me.
"Do you not like to talk about what's bothering you?" I stopped, looking at everything but the man that I asked to help me. I reluctantly and slowly nodded.
"Would it be better if you wrote this all down on paper." I paused for a second, eventually I managed to look the doctor in his soft and grey eyes.
"Doctor, if I was to do that it, I'd be handing you a book, a very long book." Maybe I was just delaying the inevitable, but this didn't discourage him as he continued.
"Ok well, how much time do you have?" Orders tend to be given at the last minute, the Astra Militarum had a bad habit of doing that. Some call it a good thing so nobody has enough time to start having doubts.
"Well, currently we're just doing some clean up operations, we could be shipped out at anytime." So far we had no indication we were moving anywhere, Liverance put on a comforting smile.
"Ok, how about you send me it piece by piece and I will look at from there, how does that sound?" I did have the materials and memories, I might need to fill in a few gaps but I could do it. I gave my verdict.
"Good, I guess." He quickly scribbled something down and took another piece, he opened up a file under his desk.
"Ok lieutenant Duwal, write down what is bothering you and send me it piece by piece. Once I get it all I should be able to help you with what's bothering you. Just remember we all lose things lieutenant…" He stopped as his eyes began to become wetter, he stared into his lap.
"The heretics stole my son from me. May the Emperor be with you Lieutenant Duwal." I stood up and gripped the handle, standing in the doorway looking back at the psychiatrist.
"May the Emperor be with you too doctor." I donned my slouch hat and shut the door behind me as I passed the servitor, still clattering away its joyless life. I grabbed my brown greatcoat and opened the door.
"Excuse me sir." I turned to see the woman who invited me in standing behind me, she didn't notice my hand was already on the grip of my laspistol.
"Yes ma'am?" She stood slightly shuffling on the spot, holding her hands at the front of her as she looked up at me.
"Did you fight at Tinggi Bukit?" She was referencing a village which became a large heretic holdout, the place was a cult compound crawling with mutant filth and so-called, blasphemous pleasurable degeneracy. Supporting the heretical insurgents that cowered in the shadows.
"Yes, I did." We stormed the place and raised it to the ground with Hellhounds and flamers, we didn't give mercy to anyone found in that place. The debauched mutant scum understood the Emperor's wrath, and we brought it to them.
"Ok, thank you, I just wanted to know." She turned and went back to her job at filing, I wanted to inquire to her why she asked me about it. Instead I closed the door and threw on my greatcoat.
I was met with the blue sky and orange dirt of Cherabos. A planet built up by a rogue trader and now overseen by the Administratum. The settlements ranged from the large and modern cities to backward and rural villages. It was covered in thick brightly coloured forests, with blue rivers and purple rocks. The colours were brought on by a range of strange anomalies and chemicals brought from comets. My experience at Muana II came in handy in this thick terrain. This settlement was one of the larger towns, surrounded by fertile soil growing cash crops. Being a mixture of rapid industrialisation built on top of backwater buildings. As night was beginning to fall the people of this town packed away as the inevitable curfew would come into effect. The light night breeze was drifting in, ruffling my uniform in the wind. The citizens ignored me, another guardsmen, what's to do with it? These people see guardsmen on a regular basis. Children were ordered inside, shops were packed up and autocarriages were driven into garages. By the time I reached the road heading to the guard camp on the edge of town the only sound that was heard was the howling of nocturnal creatures and brushing of leaves. Sitting beneath a bug infested lamp sat a guardswoman, head first into a magazine with a ciggie hanging from her cracked mouth. Her eyes covered by her unpinned slouch hat.
"Lieutenant." She didn't look up to me when she acknowledged me with an informal salute, she used her feet to hit a button on her desk, the wire gate of the base opened.
"Corporal." I returned the salute to no further reaction, I let myself in past her. Stricter regiments would punish this lacklustre behaviour. Whenever an officer tried that they got reminded this is the Aralan Imperial Force, not the Mordian Iron Guard. Aralan soldiers don't react to well to following regulations to the letter. The gate guard was a very sought after position, as it often lead to high amounts of bribes from men who couldn't get back from brothels before curfew. Or visits from the population giving generous gifts, always left undocumented.
Music and drunk laughter could be heard from the mess as guardsmen of varying regiments enjoyed themselves with chance and grog. Of course alcohol couldn't be brought in, but who said we couldn't brew it on base. Usually I would head there but after what the doctor said I had a sense of urgency to write my issues down. Guardsmen gambled in the shadows and discussed various topics, especially around the recent skirmishes. I was well known amongst the guardsmen here, each knowing something of what I had done. All certainly knew my name and face. The usual story involving the loss of my arm along with my Star of Terra. No one dared not acknowledge me as I walked to my quarters.
I swung open the flap for my tent and hung up my great coat with my slouch hat. I had to share my tent with a two fellow officers. One was probably in a brothel trying to find his wallet while the other was perfecting his brew. I sat down in the metal chair and pulled over my typewriter. That's when I just sat there, looking at the blank page. My hand resting on the keys without any words coming to my mind. I looked at him, looking at me with those friendly eyes and cheeky smile. The picture on the desk was adjacent to a case containing all his medals. Something I still took with me, so he was still with me. I knew he was still out there, I can still find him. I looked under my desk and was happy to see a good bottle of amasec and my brief case was waiting. Taking a few gulps of the sweet liquor I put it down and felt the imagination flowing. I flipped open the brief case to see the slew of various Departmento Munitorum documents, letters, my journal and other primary sources spill out. The initial alcohol failed so I continued to drain the bottle dry and place it with the pile of others. But then it hit me. I knew were to start, all the way back, before the death, before the madness, before the grim darkness of the universe.
It all started all the way back, to one usual day on the planet of Arala.