At first Fayre didn't had entered her caste quite willingly, expecting to live the tales of heroic battles and great conquests all in the name of the greater good just like the ones her farther always told her, but now she wasn't sure.
Her name was Fayre Allius; she was a Gue'vesa of the fire caste of the tau empire. Gue'vesa was translated as human helper; it literally meant a human servant of the tau empire and their philosophy, the so called greater good. Fayre had been raised her whole life thinking that the greater good was the ultimate way of life, it was the only spark of light in a dying galaxy. She truly had been amazed by the mere splendour of the tau empire and when she was called on to serve the empire as her parents had done, she felt it was the greatest honour she would ever feel. But lately she had begun to feel disturbance of a more philosophical sort.
The tau sometimes referred to their ideology as the great machine, its servants were mere but little parts in the machine of something greater. She gave a small smile as she remembered the lessons the ethereals had taught her as a child, they would all sit in a circle around him and wait to hear him speak.
"Remember children of the tau'va, we are all but parts in one great machine. And a machine is only as great as the sum of its parts, each one of us must perform our duties to the maximum. This is our duty to the empire, to our brothers and sisters and ourselves, the reason this empire exists is to bring about the future of this galaxy. Your human brethren in the imperium cling to the carcass of their dying empire; they have not been enlightened as you have. For their sakes as well as yours"
Fayre remembered that time fondly, she had always loved learning the way the empire worked and what made its citizens think. She had always failed to understand why for the greater good she was born into the fire caste, which was the way they did things of the more 'enlightened' human systems. The tau traditionally moved in alongside their new allies and trade flourished between the two peoples. Then much later they traditionally tried to use the caste system to get maximum efficiency out of the population, everyone did roles to which they were suited to so nobody seemed to mind. Since inter-caste breeding was allowed with humans it was made so that a child would adopt the caste of his parent of the same gender, sons followed fathers and daughters followed mothers. Both of her parents had been fire caste, so she always knew she was destined for solider-hood. That was the way her forefathers had done it and it was good enough for her, or so she had been taught.
"Hey Fayre, time to get ready!" shouted her friend Felas.
She gave a nod; she was never really one for social interaction, other than the odd remark. Still she did enjoy the company of her friends; there was Felas of course, a replacement member of her squad after most of hit had been slaughtered. He always did lift the mood with his cheery attitude; he was always a great morale boost. Then there was Vargil, she didn't know his last name, she was what he referred to as a native, meaning he was a native of Sa'cea, apparently there was a tribe of primitive humans who had lived there before the tau occupation Fayre wouldn't know, most of the Gue'vesa were descendants of those who had settled in the empire during the aftermath of the damones gulf crusade, certainly that was as far as she knew of her ancestry. Then there was her last friend Rilou, he was very strange in the fact he had been born an imperial. He told her sometimes that he had been orphaned as a boy and taken in by the tau; her squad had literally come across him after he'd managed to save Felas's life, since then he and Felas had become best friends, he had also left an impression on Fayre herself, she never before knew anyone so quiet and mysterious and this fascinated her. And his kindness and ability to see the good in any situation always was a comfort to her.
"Are ya ready lass? It would seem yer think the imperials were going to kill themselves!" bellowed Vargil.
Fayre gave a scowl, "I'm coming lard-ass! Don't you worry!"
Vargil snorted, he knew Fayre was short tempered, but she also knew he was impatient so it was fair enough.
They had been sent to keep a supply shipment safe; their convoys were increasingly under attack by their imperial rivals. This was unacceptable by high command. They were spread so thinly that the squads had been divided into small groups, Fayre was not unhappy about this since it was just her and her friends. They had rested in a burnt out building last night and now emerged into the unwelcome sunlight.
For every day a new challenge awaited, this was the way of the fire caste, the way of the empire. Fayre growled with excitement as she left her shelter and proceeded to the supply transport. They all hopped upon the sides and made themselves comfortable as possible as it bounded off.
"Says this route's supposed to be deserted! We shouldn't encounter much trouble!"
"How many times have you said that before Vargil!" shouted Felas.
Fayre realised this banter was for morals sake as well as caution; they were literally sitting ducks out there. Fayre always smiled at the banter, she never really had friends growing up, and now she had three who she wouldn't give up for the world.
A large blast shook her of her thoughts, the transport rumbled as if there was an earthquake, Fayre winced as her arm struggled to hold on, and she heard the strangled screams of her teammates as they fell off. Fayre herself landed with a hard thud and raised with tears in her eyes, when reality came back into focus she saw the transport with a smoking hole protruding ugly from its side. Her training made her switch on her sniper and immediately look for the source of the trouble.
As she suspected, imperials coming towards her, these imperials seemed a bit more ragged than normal, Fayre snorted, such expendable troops were usually given the most basic of gear and she wouldn't be surprised if their equipment was generations old. She took aim and sniped at the first one, he fell screaming, by now all the others had gotten out. Vargil sighted a large group of them and blew them apart with his rocket launcher; he gave a bellowing laugh as he did so. Rilou coped Fayre and sighted them with his pulse rifle, he blasted them with far range and the ultimate stopping power of the rifle, she knew he always marvelled at the rifle, in a way so did she, there was rarely an average infantry weapon as far ranged as powerful as the pulse rifle.
Rilou's shots were merely a diversion for Felas; he snuck up on them and levelled a lot of them with his favoured pulse carbine, the quick rate of fire defiantly made up for the short range. It also had a grenade launcher which he made much use of; he fired one of the grenades into the cover which they were sheltering. They scattered out and were easy targets for Felas.
Fayre shook her white hair free of the grime of battle and tried to inspect the damage, the transport was complete wrecked, the driver was dead and they would have to get a new one.
"I thought they said we wouldn't get any trouble from the imperials!" Felas shouted.
"I don't think there imperials, look at their gear that doesn't look like any uniform" said Rilou.
He was right, they certainly weren't common soldiers, they had no uniforms only normal clothing with rough leather vests over them, and their guns were so broken apart there was no way they would have passed even an imperial weapon inspection.
"Mercenaries?" offered Rilou.
"Possibly" said Fayre, it was true that the imperials were losing this fight, they had received no support and so had left this planet for dead, only the imperium would have the numbers so they could give up on a planet, the tau would never abandon a sept of their own.
"Why don't we ask this guy!" shouted Felas, he was dragging a large wounded man towards them. His face was pale from blood loss, Felas shoved him against a rock and Fayre strode up to him, he looked at her with a scowl, Fayre knew what he thought of her so she didn't wait. She slapped him and said
"I've got a deal for you friend, you give me information and I let you keep your life, good deal" she offered
He spat "I'll never tell you anything heretic whore!"
Felas moved to strike but Fayre stopped him "oh I think you will" she said and pointed her gun to his head.