The first heart-pounding installment in a new series of intense action-adventure Warhammer 40k short-stories. In this new, gut-wrenching series, the reader will follow the intense stories of the grim, brave Imperial Guardsmen as they fight to repel the Chaos blight that has assailed their city. The reader will learn the mysterious history of Carcatha and the Chaos Invasion while experiencing the rigors of war in the 41st millennium through the story of an Imperial Sniper as he tries to make "The Kill".

Dust and Rubble

Delta Sniper Ryold Riggins had been waiting for Four days to make the kill. The overgrown city on the Planet of Carcatha known as Eyeldin had once been the third largest city on the planet. While it paled in comparison to the central Metropolis located on the coast of the Super-Continent, this inland city had access to vast regions of space available for farming and crops.

The vast mineral wealth of the city of Rewl and the cavernous mining facilities located around it was what supported the economical infrastructure of Carcatha. However, the more glamorous and less filthy life of the metropolitan district made Rewl, in terms of population, the second largest city. Those who didn't care for manual labor made themselves businessmen or shop owners, taking the supplies from Rewl and Eyeldin and selling them to the population. What metal that wasn't sent to the near-by Forge World of Bromomine was used to the fullest extent.

One could even argue that metal-work had become an art-form to Carcatha. The Sniper drifted slightly as warm memories of a metal-shop in Rewl, owned and run by his father, flowed effortlessly from his thoughts. Riggins shook the distraction, banishing the pawing remnants of memory from his idle mind as he caught motion down in the city.

For Sergeant 1st Class Riggins, it had taken two days of restless, high-danger, foodless, travel through enemy territory. When Rewl had been taken by the Chaos invaders as they broke upon Carcatha like a wave, massive Military action had been undertaken to re-claim it. The honest workers there would have been quickly tainted, and forced into labor for the chaos. Using the limited factory supplies and the massive amounts of metals in the mountainous region, the Chaos forces would have been able to re-stock and re-fit their forces even while in the midst of the final stage of their campaign.

For Eyeldin, however, the people had not been so lucky. There was no military asset to be gained by taking the city so immediately. Maybe more mindless, untrained cultists would be recruited, but nothing that couldn't be dealt with by use of minimal military effort.

However, now that winter was beginning to set in, and predictions estimated that this winter would prove to bring incredible coldness, the Carcathan Military had decided it prudent to try and find the fur stock-piles the city had been about to process when the Chaos attacked. The Military Government that had taken the place of the collapsing planetary system also needed a place to house the incredible amounts of refugees that flocked to military bases and outposts. They made such places horribly obvious and ripe for Chaos sneak attacks. In the city, they could all be controlled and defended by minimal military presence.

But this led to that, and that led to the other, and the other led to the latter, and the latter to the former, and here was Delta Force Sniper Ryold Riggins, tired, hungry, worn, but ready to accomplish his task. That was what he was trained to do, designed to do. He was the best that Carcatha could offer, and was outfitted with the best weapons and equipment a planet with a Forge World on its doorstep could afford.

Ryold decided to make a mental checklist, for the umpteenth time, to make sure that he couldn't have been tracked, followed, or found out. Just over four days ago, Ryold had been riding in the Valkyrie transport Beta-Two-Three. He had been alone in the passenger hold, checking his equipment for one last time (though he was sure it was all in order, it was standard procedure), gazing at the same fiery red sun that rose on the horizon that he saw now, sitting in the hollowed out sky-scraper in the middle of the city.

The intercom squawked on, telling him that the DZ was about Five Minute away. The Sergeant reached up, keyed the acknowledgment single to the pilot, and the flier entered a westward bank, turning Ryold away from the warm morning sun.

Just on schedule, the Valkyrie banked once more, and now the Sergeant could see the blue shadows on the dark city, the golden streams of light cast through the towering buildings, and the burnt out or abandoned remnants of normal life entwined with the up-growth. The flier had leveled off, and entered VTOL mode, and began a shallow vertical decent.

Landing in a small park with an old, rusty children's roller coaster, the Sergeant leapt from the jet as it hovered a few meters from the ground. The Sergeant landed, rolled, and checked his gear with a quick glance before signaling up to the pilot. The pilot nodded, gave him a thumbs-up, and pulled the jet up quickly, accelerating into the heating air of dawn.

The Sergeant nodded to himself, checked again to fasten all of his equipment, and started toward the objective building.

He had looked at the diagnostics map before making the journey with the acting CO of Delta as well as a number of his fellow elite Delta Operators, and they had all determined the best place from which to take the shot. A tall building, once a communications and trade-management and documentation building proved to offer an excellent view of the projected target meeting point.

The target, the leader of Chaos forces in the city of Eyeldin, would be meeting with the second hand man of the enemy commander of Rewl. The messenger would deliver a few words, a few pieces of information concerning Imperial Forces movement through out the area would be exchanged, and maybe an agreement to give some of the wool and fur stock-piled in-city to keep the Cultists and Warriors warm and able.

The idea was that the Sniper would take the shot, kill the target, and fade back into the woodworks, to be extracted at a pre-set LZ when radio confirmation for evac. was called.

Despite the fact that Ryold wore a Ghillie suit, the finest that Carcatha had to offer, and the fact that he had spent upwards of an hour attaching local shrubbery, adding local colored dirt clods and such like to his camouflage, there were times when he felt horribly exposed. Granted, he had three days to move a little under two miles. In normal circumstances, he would be able to cover the distance in under an hour easily, depending on how harsh the undergrowth was. However, when crawling through heavily enemy infested territory, circumstances changed.

Every now and again, Riggins would pass by a few patrols, and would let them pass for the most part. However, the closer he stalked toward the objective, the more heavily occupied the territory got.

The first major encounter occurred about a mile off of the target building. A large group of enemy units, including a captured Chimera APC, and about five cultists escorting, appeared to be heading right for his position. The sniper had immediately looked around for some cover, likely a thick patch of shrubbery, or a particularly heavily hit burnt out car. Nothing of any real merit was near. Moving incredibly slowly as to avoid detection, the Sergeant had shifted himself silently over into a building, and hid below a window as the group passed. He could hear the cultists breathing, and the crunch their boots made over the rubble. He waited for fifteen minutes after the last sounds died out, and ventured a look.

The enemy unit had moved on, and Ryold stalked back out, still relying on the shadows. After he was sure all enemy activity had ceased, he kept moving. He stayed tuned in after that. He had been far closer to being found out than he would have liked. He heard every sway of his Ghillie grass, every gallop of wild animals in the side-streets, and every bird that took flight from empty building drain gutters.

This Ghost-Town was going to be hard to re-populate. He could only imagine the horrible acts of violation and murder that had occurred here in this city. When the chaos forces met any semblance of resistance to join their ranks, they horribly butchered and defiled the offenders. Ryold knew he wouldn't want to live in a place where an entire family was murdered.

When the dried carcasses of victims began to appear on totems deeper into the city, the enemy activity picked up. It was almost as if the horrible things were signs, warning those who entered about what lied within.

Many convoys of the type of the first one appeared regularly. At its worst, a half mile from the target building, the sniper was forced to come to a crawl for the rest of the way.

It was then especially that the sniper cursed the thin-spread military forces. He would have given anything to get a fellow sniper in with him. Sleeping-shifts, an extra pair of eyes and ears, someone to communicate with. The feelings of hopelessness were drowned out by the training, but he would have killed for some company.

The undergrowth was, thankfully, thick inner-city. He could crawl as much as possible undetected, and would stop all movement and melt into the land when enemy units came too close. The largest convoy he experienced moved right over him. Four Chimera APC's, and upwards of 50 cultists, plus actual warriors for chaos, not mere tainted victims. They were armed to the teeth, and covered in hastily sewn furs. The air they exhaled was foggy and white.

The Sergeant noticed the huge convoy, and dug himself in with the best of his ability. He forced his breathing to slow as the group turned, and began to walk directly toward him. If he moved, he would be spotted and either captured or killed. He was forced to wait it out.

At Fifteen meters away from the enemy, Ryold slowed his breathing, and coordinated it with the wind that moved the underbrush as much as possible. The first unit to pass by him was no more than three meters to his right. The convoy seemed to go on forever. The smell of them was horrible. It seemed as if they were rotting alive. The odor made him noxious. The closest a tank came was, again, about three meters. He could hear every sound in the thing. The grinding of the treads as they rolled past the gears, the rumble of the engines, the crunch of two and a half tons of armor and man on dust and rubble. A huge man stopped at one point, a half a meter in front of the sniper. He carried a vicious axe that was slung around his shoulder. His weapon was a standard issue Imperial Guard weapon, but had been carved and painted to better serve the Chaos warrior.

The warrior looked around, sniffed the air. He held his hand up, and some of the convoy came to a halt. He grunted something loudly, and spit flew from his fowl mouth onto back of the sniper's resting head. A soldier close to each APC slammed the hull, hard, and four metallic clunks echoed, signaling the drivers to stop.

Silence hung in the air of quickly approaching night.

After a few minutes of what seemed to be endless hours, the huge man grunted, shrugged, and spat to the side. He waved forward, and everything started back up with four thumps against metal hulls, ushering Chimera transports and all down the road.
After that, the road had been relatively clear.

Now, sitting on the 17th story of the 20 story Sullivan Market building, Ryold Riggins saw the convoy approach the large gathering of Cultists already at the projected meeting place. Ryold mentally smiled that the Intel had finally been right. Placing the meeting in a likely spot at around 600 meters from the base of the building, and knowing that he was around 200 meters high from his point on the 17th story, this meant that a distance of around 635 meters, or around Four Tenths of a mile, existed between him and his target's projected location.

Ryold nearly lost it when he recognized the large brutish man from the large convoy walk neatly into his scope. He slapped a skinny, almost scared looking cultists on the shoulder, and walked over to the back of a Chimera APC with multiple radio antennae and additional communications equipment which had backed itself up to the ring that seemed to have formed by a couple collapsible tables with large computers and vox-equipment on them.

Additional to the familiar convoy, a number of military humvee's, obviously captured, with large autocannons mounted on the back, and a sizable Leman Russ Exterminator Battle Tank, as well as upwards of a hundred men, gathered around the area.

The circle of men with the scared messenger inside held a single golden sliver of light, the morning sun rising through the cracks in the building. In the blue-black darkness, Ryold could see the dull red lights at the back of the APC, and saw the chaos leader get out after The Brute slammed the back hatch.

The man was massive. Bigger than The Brute in height, and well built, almost healthy looking. Ornamental Carapace adorned his body, with sickening twists of sharp, burnished gold, and blood-dried leathers, stretched over thick, almost medieval body armor, as well as ornate furs and trinkets of extravagant decadence that startled the sniper, as compared to the Chaos forces he had seen before. A fur-lined black cape billowed in the slight wind.

Ryold took note of the wind, already making pre-shot calculations. Humidity, air pressure, and temperature were all fed to him through a single use environmental sensor that he had taken with him. He cross-referenced the information given to him with his own observations. The due settling on most surfaces confirmed humidity. His breath in the air and the unfrozen due also led him to approve of temperature. Air pressure seemed fine, though there was really no way for him to check that without the use of a tool.

Height, bullet drop, wind-speed…

The Chaos commander was talking, negotiating, nodding occasionally. An odd smile would flicker across his lips every now and again, and would fade with a nod of acceptance.

Mil-dot cross reference, bullet speed, target size…

The Brute walked up to the commanders ear, mentioned a few things in silence. The Commander chuckled, and his bald, dirty head and venomous, snake-like face contorted into a chuckle. He bode the Messenger continue.

Bullet Strength, Armor Density, Travel time…

The Commander nodded one final time as the messenger finished repeating his master's wishes. The Commander seemed pleased, and began talking. Despite his wicked nature, he seemed legitimately warm and friendly. He was cordial, businessman like, and he seemed to punctuate with a joke here, or smile with his wicked, sharp fangs there.

He made a finishing statement, bowed extravagantly, holding his cape up in the air, as if to protect it from the ground. He stood straight again, and took a step toward the messenger, extending a large, wickedly sharp looking gauntleted hand toward him to shake. He was in the golden shaft of light, and his gauntlet with sharpened golden features and black leather caught the morning sun.

The back of his head exploded, and deep scarlet globules of blood broke into the air. They seemed to hang there for a second, as the commander fell over, dead instantly by a shot that entered just at the top of his forehead, and the skull fragments, and fatty tissue, and the red blood floated for a moment, caught basking in the golden sun, reflecting, warm red in the frozen morning air.

The Brute yelled something and all present dove for cover. The crowd swarmed and moved like a wave, or a hive of insects. Sergeant Riggins saw none of this. He saw the commander's head smatter the men behind him, and had grabbed his rifle and was moving toward a window at the opposite side of the floor before those surrounding the target even heard the gunshot.

Ryold wasn't sure how well their counter-sniping or ballistics knowledge was, but he knew that if it turned out they knew exactly where to look, he didn't want to be there. He had fastened the rifle to his back and had latched the rappel line to his harness when a rocket propelled grenade detonated a floor below him. The cubicles and computers on his floor shook and fell over, and a massive show of sparks and sound emanated from the floor below.

He took in a deep breath and pushed off from the building ledge with his feet. He pushed off with great force with his legs, and by the time he had gotten down far enough to get off the line, his legs were worn. He landed right above floor 7, and chaos forces from ground level sent wild shots up at the grass-thing jumping down the building. He pushed off one final time, and stiffened his legs to break through the tinted blue glass. He burst through, landed hard on his rump, and un-harnessed himself.

The sniper knew that the enemy was spreading chatter about his location, and would try and storm the building to find him. He got down to the second floor, and his legs were on fire. The stairs were a killer. He figured they'd have a small welcoming comity in the lobby, or at the entrances at ground level. He glanced at his rifle to make sure it was slung properly, and ran over to a roller-chair. He grabbed it, took it to the stairs, and flung it down. He could see the las-shots tear it apart, the guns that had been waiting in eager anticipation to blow him apart relieving themselves on a piece of furniture.

Bursting through the glass 4 meters up, the Sniper Sergeant leapt from the building window. He had conveniently decided to exit on a side that had no floor entrance, and so had not been covered by Chaos soldiers. He hit, felt a shock of pain shoot up his right leg, and rolled on the hard, cold, ground. He stood straight back up, and let out a small, involuntary yelp of pain.

He look down at his right angle, and noticed that his foot was bent slightly inward. He limp-sprinted over to a nearby patch of bushes, dove in with a grunt, and assessed his injury.

"Command, this is Sierra Romeo Romeo. I am in need of immediate evacuation, over."

At first, the static was all that answered him. He left his mike on, and bent down to place his hands on his foot. With a quick, painful pull and a rending crack, he righted his foot as best he could. It was still broken, but better than before.

"Repeat, this is Sierra Romeo Romeo. The target has been eliminated. I am in need of immediate evacuation, over."

After another moment of silence, a grainy response came through on his micro-bead head set, "Roger that… …meo Romeo, we can s… …will you be at the designated LZ?"

"No. I need some place closer. There is a local mall with a landing pad on top of it. Can you land there? Over."

"That zone is incredibly hot. Can you get somewhere further out? Over."

"Sir, no sir. I've got a broken ankle, and the enemy is aware of my presence. I'll be there in fifteen minutes. Over and Out."

He didn't want to give them any chance to back out. He wasn't even sure if he could make it that far, but he sure as hell had to try.

He looked outside of the bushes, saw a number of warriors run by, and broke out of the brush. He quickly oriented himself, and started himself toward the mall. He had noticed it when he had been viewing the map, and noted it as a possible emergency evac site. He un-slung his rifle, and shouldered it as he crouched down and began limping in the right direction.

He came around he corner of a building, and saw a large group of cultists gathered in the middle of the street. They spotted him, and he quickly ran from the scene, the pain nigh-unbearable. He made a quick turn and flung himself into some long weeds. The unit passed, and he stood himself back up again, taking a new rode this time.

After about seven minutes of full speed running, injury and all, he came to the edge of a field, or park. Only two overgrown trees, some grass, and a parking lot stood between him and the mall. A number of stray cultists and a warrior with two dogs sniffing around occupied the territory.

Ryold flung himself down, made some very minor calculations for the close-targets, and began taking heads.

His first shot was at a warrior who was looking around, and seemed to be giving orders. His right cheek exploded in a mist of blood and grey matter, and he fell to the grass with a thud. The other warrior turned to look at his falling comrade, and was about to release the dogs when a shot blew his knee-cap apart. He fell to the ground, screaming, and easy target, and was silenced by another quick shot.

The dogs began running toward the sniper, two of them, tainted, vicious, killer dogs. The first shot sliced right through the dog below the neck. It fell and stopped cold. The other shot, with the dog frighteningly close, hit the left breast. The thing stumbled, rolled, and was close enough for the sniper to run up quickly and slice it at the neck.

A few cultists scattered and ran, but three remained. A few cultists and a warrior in the parking lot sprinted toward the fight.

The cultists nearest the sniper hastily drew up his lasgun, and the wild shots went wide. The sniper had dropped to one knee, and placed a shot into his gut. The man keeled over and bled. The other, next closest fighter was distracted momentarily, and was shot in the hand. The blast tore off most of the digits and palm, and the man fell to his knees before another shot tore into his chest. The remaining cultist ran away.

The sniper stood once more and made his way toward a couple metal garbage cans next to a bench. A lethal round from a heavy bolt pistol zipped over head, and another tore a fist-sized hole through the back of the can. The sniper dove out, lined up a relative shot toward who he assumed had the weapon, and pulled the trigger wildly as he rolled. The shot went wide, but the attackers all hit the ground for cover. This gave the sniper the opportunity to peg the bolt-carrying man as he rose. The warrior keeled over, and the sniper got up to his knees. The next shot sent a red puff of blood into the air as a shot impacted on a cultist's head. Following suit from his brother earlier, the remaining cultist sprinted away, leaving his weapon. The sniper decided to save his ammo as he walked over and salvaged the large bolt pistol from the chaos warrior.

Ryold made his way across the civilian parking lot at a broken trot, still with rifle shouldered, and was beginning to think the mall wasn't occupied when two heavy bolters in entrenched sand-bag boxes in the mall windows opened fire. The sniper sprinted, and dove behind an abandoned car. A shot from the massive rounds tore into his left arm and lower right side as he did so. He screamed openly at the pain.

He checked the ammo on his rifle, and crawled slowly to the edge of the vehicle. The thing was being raked with heavy rounds. A few punctured the car, and heavy bullets passed through the thing. Aiming for the gunner he could see just barely around the edge of the car, the sniper took a shot. It bounced off the soldier's scavenged helmet. He fell back, startled, and got back up to his weapon. The next shot was lower, and hit him, literally, square on the nose. The ammo-runt ran away. The other gunner kept firing.

With just a little shifting and two well-placed shots, both the gunner and the loader were down. It was a short sprint and a light hit to the glass main entrance that got him into the mall.

The Sergeant took the place in at a glance, and noted the exceedingly simple structure of the place. He limped over to the escalator, which was out of order, and ascended. He crossed the upper section of the mall, toward a room he saw labeled as Janitorial Staff Only. He was about to open it when they attacked.

The Chaos Space Marines. Two Hearts, Three Lungs, they spit acid, and they wanted nothing more than to see Delta Sniper Ryold Riggins dead. They carried boltguns. A trio came from seemingly no-where and opened fire. A shot impacted the Sergeant's lower right leg, and he yelped in pain again. The silent, stoic warrior admitted that he was thoroughly, utterly screwed, and in a hell'uva lot of pain.

Thinking quickly, he yanked the single flash-bang grenade he never thought he'd need but that was standard issue. He wasn't sure if the Chaos Marines could even be affected by it. He grabbed it, pulled the pin, and tossed it like a frag grenade. The Chaos marines, thinking it was just that and not wanting to get showered in shrapnel, went to grab the frag. The shorter timer standard on Imperial Flash-Bangs detonated right around the time the lead marine picked the thing up.

The grenade tossed him over, and the others shielded themselves to avoid the injury they thought was about to come. They uncovered their faces, angered, and met with the Sniper's lethal fire.

The first marine took two shots to the head, which was just enough to make him stagger for a few seconds, and then fall down. The second took a trio of shots to center mass, only one of which punched through the thick power armor he wore. The grounded marine stood up with amazing speed, and both of the Chaos Elite stormed toward the sniper, guns blazing one handed and long, wicked blades held high in the air.

The sniper took one shot at the previously shot marine, and the lethal round found a niche between the lower chin-plate and the upper breast-plate. The round sliced through and out, and the marine was thrown back and twitched. The other marine, faster than any normal man alive, was already on the sniper.

The massive behemoth of genetically altered man and ceramite armor slammed into the Delta Operator. The sniper leaned back just before impact. The crushing force of the shoulder would have killed him otherwise.

The marine, not expecting the sniper to go with the blow, had over-estimated, and flew over the sniper. The marine landed, but rolled and stood once more, rather gracefully for a 7-foot armored warrior.

The sniper rose, grabbed his rifle off the floor, and pulled the trigger. An empty click sounded. Empty.

The Marine seemed to laugh wickedly as he jumped at the Sergeant once more, this time with only his foot-long bladed weapon available. The Sergeant sidestepped this time, but the marine countered, and landed atop the sniper with crushing force. The sniper tried to stop the one-handed stab of the marine, as the other hand pressed in around his throat, but compared to the enhanced strength of the demonic warrior, he could only scream soundlessly as the knife dug in half a foot.

In a rare moment of clarity, or chance, or of fate, the Sniper remembered his training. He had another weapon.

The entire clip of the bolt-pistol he had stolen from his enemy earlier tore into the enemy's face, and blew meaty chunks of brain, skull, and helmet skyward. The dead matter landed on the Marine's back, and the dead-weight of the massive thing was hardly able to be thrust off by the weakened man. He gripped the sword in his side with both hands, and pulled it free swiftly with a blood-curdling yell. He lie on the floor, panting, for a moment, looking up at the ceiling, trying to see though to the sky beyond it.

After a moment, he reached over and grabbed his empty rifle, and slowly pulled himself up. He crawled on two feet over to the Janitor's room, using his gun's butt as a cane. He stood up straight, and smashed the lock out with a scream and a swing of his weapon.

He staggered up the iron stairs to the roof. In the gathering light of dawn, the Valkyrie, guns blazing at the enemy that swarmed the Mall below, glided down onto the concrete and gravel. The downdraft sent dust and stones through the air, and the heat washed over the Sergeant. Two Delta Operators leapt out as the jet landed, and helped the staggering sniper onto the plane.

They were yelling at him to hurry up, but he couldn't hear. He had lost so much blood, was so tired. He could hardly think. When the chaos soldiers burst through the doors to the roof, and the jet-mounted heavy bolters and mini-gun opened up, he didn't hear that either. His world was in slow motion, and his mind in silence.

He was hoisted onto the aircraft, and took off into the brilliant golden light of the cold morning air.

Stay tuned for the next story; a Company of Imperial Guardsmen race against time and the biting guns of enemy tanks in a run 'n' gun tank and vehicle battle on the barren tundra plains of Carcatha.

Thanks for reading,

-S.B.