The entrance to the mines was not far from the main facility. The heavy loading rigs which carted unrefined Ceramite to storage and refinery had left obvious tracks in a tough dirt road to a large security door built into the mountainside. A chart procured from a shift supervisor's office showed that the mines or at least this section of them extended sixty levels down into a myriad of caves and excavated tunnels. More bodies had been found in the course of the search, all headless. Obscene, malefic symbols painted in now-dried blood had also been uncovered. Zano could feel the unease among the company turning into fear, and cursed the luck that had seen his men draw this duty.

One of the Ruinous Powers had afflicted this world. That much seemed obvious. On Jeron their existence was rarely spoken of. Preachers expounded on the need to resist their temptations without ever saying what those might be, or who would be tempting. Names were forbidden from being spoken, in order to keep the mind free from their corrupting influence. The powers of Chaos were to be turned from, ignored. The thoughts of the people were to belong to the Emperor alone. The Archenemy was just a rumour, a whisper, a vague cause to be fought against without knowing its true nature. Even Zano, in all of his years of preparation had learned precious little about the nature of the enemy they would face on Valindril. Everyone knew the stories of course, about the Heresy and the Traitor Legions, about the daemons of the warp who preyed on the frail mortal souls of humanity where they could. Priests of the Ecclesiarchy delivered sermons on the subtle nature of the Dark Gods, but never elaborated on what that nature was. In the Planetary Defence Force, data packets and scripts concerning the combat strategies of the Archenemy had been impossibly hard obtain. The men of the Lucky 7th had never run even a single full exercise on combating Chaos warriors. It was the one thing they were unprepared for. And it would be their first challenge as a Guard Regiment. Zano could not help but see the irony of the situation, but he did not let it show on his face. He couldn't. The men looked to him for direction, and as long as they saw their Colonel was unafraid, they would persevere too.

Sgt Kurkson's platoon had handily uncovered the locking codes for the mines and gotten the powerful doors open. Zano had hand-picked twenty-eight men along with Corporal Kellick and Doctor Vangyre to accompany him into the mines. The steadfast Grull he left in command of the men topside.

"I want this area secured," Zano explained to his aide. "Set up the heavy bolters in defense pattern Gregarus. Use these crates for cover if you need to. The rest of the men should dig in further down the road, within the bolters firing range. The Sentinels and the Hellhound will stay back at the facility with Kurkson and Harrick's platoons to give us advance warning if anything comes that way, or to secure a fall-back location if things should become ugly here. We don't want a repeat of that rout in the Meveri Hills. This time the enemy will be fighting for real, not for an extra serving of rations and a free round in the local pub. Stay alert and keep the vox channels as quiet as you can. We don't know who could be listening."

"Will do, sir. I'll hold things down here until you return with the Inquisitor," Grull promised.

"And I will hold you to that," Zano smiled, feeling his unease momentarily lessen at the staunch faith displayed of his subordinate. But it returned the moment he stepped into the darkened interior of the tunnel ahead. There were a few lights set into the walls and powered by thick cables, but aside from their meagre glow the tunnels were dark and unsettlingly vacant. Mining kit lay abandoned in senseless patterns. Storage units were open and unguarded. Crates and barrels of various sizes had been knocked over and never righted. The whole place was ominously haphazard. Something had panicked the workers here, and no one had come back. No one sane, at least.

"Is the signal clearer?" Zano asked Kellick, glancing back at the mine entrance as he did. The exit from the tunnel seemed further away than he would have thought.

"We need to find an elevator," Kellick said, studding the readout on his sensor-gear with a careful eye. "The beacon is at least a hundred metres deeper than our current position."

"Is there an elevator close by?" Zano asked Trooper Mavald, a sharp-eyed youth who had volunteered for the PDF a few months before the forming of the Regiment. Zano had chosen Mavald to carry the overseer's charts because the young guardsman had been a cartographer's apprentice before joining up. It always paid to know what skills a man brought to a unit, Zano felt. Mavald held the map up in the glow of light and pointed at a corner.

"Should be one just through that tunnel there," he explained confidently. "It goes nine levels down and then we'll need to move to a secondary lift. I've found one on that level as well," he continued, pointing out a mark on the chart.

Zano nodded at him approvingly. "Thinking two steps ahead, are we, Trooper Mavald? Good. Continue impressing me!" he smiled.

Mavald grinned back and pointed out the way, a service tunnel near to their left. Zano ordered the men to fix bayonets and form into a two staggered lines before they entered the thinner area. He couldn't help but think of the ill-fated exercises in the Austern Caverns on Jeron a few years back. A section of tunnel had collapsed during the training mission and six of his men had died, crushed by rubble. Zano had retained a hatred of caves ever since. The walls seemed to press in on him from every side, and the poor illumination seemed to contort every flickering shadow into a looming enemy just out of sight. Everyone was on edge. The mines were a claustrophobic environment, and it only became worse. The elevator Mavald had led them to was large enough for the whole group to go down, but Zano sent three guardsmen and the secondary vox-operator, Rafen, down first to be certain that the ride was safe. With a loud rattling noise, the lift descended into the deeper darkness of the shaft, and the men were lost from sight. A few minutes later Kellick's set chimed and the way was declared to be clear. Zano knew that his caution was costing them time, but he refused to blunder his way into the mines recklessly. He had already lost one good man on this damned planet, and Zano didn't want more senseless casualties on his conscience.

Reaching the bottom of the first shaft, Zano found the four troopers waiting eagerly. They had found some discarded lamps in operable condition near the elevator, and passed them out. Batteries were low, but for an hour at least the Jeron would be able to see.

In theory, anyway.

The walls of the mine were deep red, but here and there an off-white vein of raw Ceramite could be seen. The temperature seemed oddly warm, and Zano caught himself licking his dry lips nervously. He knew no one could see him, but still chastised himself for showing such nervousness in front of his men. It would do no one good for him to seem intimidated by the cavernous path before them. The tunnels were silent, but every now and then a strange yawning feeling seemed to pass through the ground beneath them, subtle enough that it could be missed unless you were on edge, but the Jeron men most definitely were.

"How much further Mavald?" Zano asked quietly as another dark cavern opening appeared beside them. The mining lights were far and few between on this level, and the scavenged lamps barely penetrated the darkened side-passages.

"Another seventy meters straight, and then down another side passage," Mavald explained. Doctor Vangyre, being armed only with a laspistol and his medical bag, had elected to carry one of the mine lamps, and held it up for the trooper to see the charts more clearly.

"And the beacon, Kellick?" The Colonel inquired.

"Still below us sir. The readings are getting clearer though, so we're definitely closing in."

"Good," Zano muttered. "The less time we have to spend in this-"

The deep, coughing sound of a power-drill whirring to life halted Zano's words. The manic screaming of twenty blood-thirsty miners quickly followed it. A clutch of the maddened wretches, daubed in blood and profane sigils had burst out of a side passage like vermin from a rat's nest. They brandished bore-drills, pipes and hammers, or merely wild fists.

"Flamers out!" Zano shouted, pulling his chainsword off the hook on his belt and flicking it's power switch on. Troopers Pote and Kevar wordlessly ignited their weapons and bathed the incoming group with searing promethium. The fires lit the tunnels up with a macabre glow as the miners were scorched and charred. Incredibly some of them managed to sweep around the burst of flames or even ran through it, hurtling themselves into the Jeron while still on fire. A few were dropped by scattered las-fire, but half of the blood-crazed workers still managed to close in, swinging their weapons with wild strength. The Jeron troopers were taken aback by the ferocity of the charge, and the darkness and flashing lights disoriented them. Four of them went down immediately, though in the dark Zano couldn't see who. The colonel had been at the front of the column, but since the miners had struck from a side tunnel he was out of range to deal with them. He intended to change that.

"Hold fast! Form a bayonet line" He shouted, trying to get near enough to engage the maddened attackers with his chainsword. The weapon stirred to vicious life and roared in the air as he drew closer to the miners. The air was thick with the stench of burning flesh and hot coppery blood. The screams of the flamers burning victims were drowned out by roars of their comrades as they snarled and cursed at the Jeron. In the glow of a fallen lamplight Zano saw one ugly wretch with a profane symbol marked on his forehead thrust a hefty boring drill into the ribs of Trooper Mavald. Blood spewed out from the guardsman's torso as the mining equipment tore his flesh and uniform to shreds. Zano lunged forward and brought his chainsword down in an arcing slash that severed the miner's weapon arm at the elbow. The tattooed scum roared in pain, but had no time to counter-attack as the colonel's next stroke cut his legs out from under him. "Vangyre! Man down!" Zano bellowed, before charging down another of the cultist miners. His chainsword shredded the workers unprotected flesh with brutal efficiency. The rest of the Jeron troopers, their courage bolstered by Zano's assault began to fight with renewed fervour, stabbing out with bayonets and combat knives or clubbing the cultist miners with the stocks of their las-rifle. Though fierce, the cultists proved no match for the Jeron and were killed to the last, but they had done their share of damage.

As Zano executed the last of the still-living wounded with his laspistol, he turned to see Vangyre kneeling on the ground, shouting for more light and desperately trying to stabilize Mavald's condition. There had been other injuries, minor lacerations and Trooper Pote received a mild concussion but the young guardsman Zano had so recently interacted with was the worst. For fatalities, they had lost three Troopers. Orras, Dalgren, and Hitch. Orras and Hitch had been new recruits like Mavald, who'd signed on to the guard when the news from Brovonius came, but Dalgren had been a six-year PDF veteran. Zano remembered his rough but friendly voice and incorrigible love of pranks. He tried to recall if the man had family back on Jeron. He thought he did. Zano muttered a quick prayer to the God-Emperor and then cleared his throat.

"Men! Form up. Check the tunnel and see if any more of those bastards are trying to hide from us. And get these bodies piled up. I want them burned," Zano demanded tersely.

"Colonel?" Zano heard weak voice from somewhere behind him and turned. Mavald was looking up at him worriedly.

"Trooper Mavald. Good to see you're still with us," Zano said, squatting down slowly next to the wounded trooper and the company Medicae.

"S-sorry about this Colonel," the young guardsman mumbled. Dark red blood was dripping from his lips. Zano knew enough about field medicine to understand that at least one of his organs must have been punctured.

"Don't worry lad. It isn't your fault," Zano said gently. "I'm sure we can get you through this." But one look at Vangyre's drawn face told the Colonel that no matter optimistic he might be, the situation was dire.

"I-I didn't…bleed on the…charts, did I sir?" Mavald managed to ask. Zano looked at Trooper Rafen, who had taken Mavald's pack and kit. They were bloodied and dirty, but the mine-schematics were miraculously undamaged.

"No lad, they're fine," Zano assured Mavald.

"Good," the youth said. He tried to manage a smile, but instead coughed up more blood.

"Just relax, Mavald. It's going to be alright," Vangyre said. Mavald nodded, but his eyes were wide and full of pain. He seemed to want to speak again, but when he opened his lips the only thing that came out was a wet, ragged wheeze, and then nothing. The young guardsman's eyes stared sightlessly into the dark of the cavern. Vangyre closed them with his hand.

Zano sighed. Another of his men had been lost to this mad world, another casualty of a mission which he had never wanted to be sent on. Mavald had been smart, intuitive, loyal. He could have made a fine officer one day. But the young soldier had no future now. And there would be more following him. For a moment Zano felt himself lose focus, felt his anger at the death of the young guardsman flood through his mind like a raging red wave. A desire to abandon this place, forget the mission. Leave the cultists and the Inquisitor both. But Zano steeled himself with the knowledge that to do so would be to make Mavald's death in vain. It would strip the Lucky 7th of all honour and purpose. And above all else, it would be cowardice of worst kind. Zano was no coward. He was an officer of the Imperial Guard, and he felt he had better resume acting like one with all due speed.

"Put his body with the others," he instructed the Medicae. "Let's get to that beacon before we meet any more of these madmen." Then standing up he asked loudly, "Does anyone else know how to read these charts?"

They finally found the beacon's source. Or at least according to Kellick's sensor and the map, they had. From to the schematics of the mine, which had so far proved accurate, the Jeron should have been in front of a storage shed, built into the rock foundation of a particularly narrow cavern located on the seventeenth level down from the entrance they had come from. But there was no shed to be found. Just a smooth rock face that looked cold and unyielding in the bare light of the mine lamps.

"Kellick, what's going on?" Zano asked quietly.

"I'm not sure Colonel. According to the sensors that beacon should be in front of us."

"The map says there's a storage shed here. Why isn't it here?" Trooper Onmund asked, anxiously. Mavald's replacement had good eyes, but was not the strongest of nerve. Zano shifted on his feet and stared at the rock wall before them. They had not come so far to be defeated by mere stone. His men were now six-hundred meters or more beneath the earth. It was even warmer down on this level than the ones preceding it, and the yawning pulse in the walls seemed to grow stronger with each passing minute. Zano had an ominous feeling about the place. After the bloodshed in the tunnels above, he was anticipating anything.

"How many grenades are we carrying?" he asked. "We might be able to blow this rock apart."

"An explosion could lead more of those cultists to us," Vangyre warned.

"I know, but I don't see how else we're going to get through," Zano countered, walking up to the rock-face. "After all, this thing is solid-"

He stopped mid-speech, as before his eyes the rock seemed to ripple ever so slightly. Frowning, Zano put his hand out to touch the rock, but instead his fingers went right into the stone as if it wasn't there. It dawned on Zano suddenly that this was because it actually wasn't. The rock was some manner of illusion.

"Arrange yourselves in defence pattern Asterius, then walk through the stone," he snapped.

"Sir?" Trooper Onmund asked his eyes wide with disbelief.

"The rock is an illusion. Go through it," Zano ordered. "I think the shed is behind it."

And so it was. The illusion had seemingly been placed four metres from the actual position of the storage building. When Trooper Onmund tried the door, it was barred from within. Zano frowned at it, wondering what lay behind the barrier. He didn't like the fact that some magic or madness was playing with their senses, and decided to not take chances.

"On the count of three, smash that door down," he ordered Troopers Kolt and Lerman, the largest members of the unit. The burly troopers counted off and then kicked the door hard in unison. The wood splintered under the force of the blows and as soon as it fell away Troopers Pote and Kevar were pointing their flamers inside, searching for targets.

"Colonel?" Kevar said slowly. "I think we've found what we were looking for."

Zano stomped into the room, his hand in his chainsword's handle. It was unlit, but the mine-lamps his men were aiming in showed three inert forms on the floor, and a single, seated man at the back edge of the shed.

"Hello?" Zano asked cautiously, keeping his finger on his laspistol's safety-stud. He looked hard at the seated man, trying to see if he was wounded

The object of his attention cut an intimidating figure, even sitting as he was on a plain wooden packing-crate, his arms folded in concentration. A short power-sword, inactive, lay at his side, and an ornate inferno pistol rested in his lap. Despite his posture suggesting rigid self-control, he looked ill. His face was pale and the veins on his furrowed brow stood out under the skin. His hair was a golden leonine mane, strikingly thrown back from his head, but also unkempt and greasy, as if he had been running his hands through it constantly and had not had the chance to wash it in some time. His right eye was closed tightly, but his left, an augmetic replacement that stood out fiercely amid the lines in his craggy face, gazed coldly at the Jeron men.

"At least one of you had best have a full canteen," the seated figure muttered, still keeping his good eye closed. There was a rough, gritty quality to his voice that made Zano wonder how long he had been without food or water.

Trooper Pote handed over his water-flask and Zano gave it somewhat gingerly to the man. He drank all its contents without preamble or thanks, and tossed the empty container to the ground.

"How many of you are there?" he barked.

"I am Colonel Julius Zano of the Jeron Illustrious 1st Regiment, 7th Company." Zano stated cautiously. "Are you the Inquisitor who activated the beacon?"

"Of course I'm the bloody Inquisitor who activated the beacon! The name's Damaron Hagen of the Ordo Malleus." The man rumbled, drawing his Rosette out as proof of his rank before dropping it back into his coat. Zano recognized the symbol and nodded deferentially. He decided not to hold the man's behaviour against him, for it was obvious he had been in a dire situation for some time.

"We have encountered some hostile activity in our search for you. I was merely being cautious." He explained.

"Never mind that. How many men have you brought?" the Inquisitor asked forcefully. "What is your operational strength?"

"We have taken some casualties on our incursion into these mines, but you will have more than two-hundred of Jeron's finest infantry at your disposal." Zano announced proudly.

"Two hundred!" The Inquisitor shouted in disbelief. "A single company? Is that all?! I asked for any and all military aid to be diverted here! The transmission should have brought more than-"

"Your beacon's message was distorted," Zano tried to explain, unable to comprehend why the Inquisitor was so angered. "We were not able to discern the full contents of it. As such it was deemed by my superiors that a single company would most likely be able to fill your needs. My men are disciplined and well-"

"There were over twenty-two thousand people on this world." Hagen barked. "If even half that number has succumbed to the Ruinous Powers then this planet is doomed and so are we all!"

Zano fell speechless as the scale of the situation dawned on him. There could be more than twelve thousand cultists on this planet? And against them he had brought two hundred and…

"How? What caused this?" Zano managed to ask.

"I suppose as few of you as there, you still should be brought up to speed," Hagen growled. "I was dispatched to this world eighteen days ago in order to investigate claims of psychic apparitions, cult activity and outbreaks of violent behaviour. I brought a small retinue of loyal comrades and a twelve-man squad of Storm Troopers in case the situation grew dangerous. These three are all that is left of that original number."

"What's wrong with them?"

"Nothing. I'm keeping them in a psychic trance. I didn't want any of our presences giving us away to those blood-crazed heretics."

Hagen seemed to twitch, and the still forms of the three Storm Troopers slowly began to move. One reached for his weapon as he saw Zano's men, but the Inquisitor spoke out.

"These are our reinforcements Major Faulton, such as they are," Hagen explained gruffly. "Get yourselves together. I'll need you all soon."

The full-faced helmets of the Storm Troopers prevented Zano from reading their reactions, but the three acknowledged Hagen's orders and began silently checking over their equipment.

"You're a Psyker?" Zano asked, amazed at the feat of power the Inquisitor had displayed.

"Yes. And a damn good one," Hagen growled. "It's how I've kept us alive this long despite our diminished numbers. When I arrived on Valindril the situation had become far worse than was originally implied in my briefing. The local administrator had turned much of the populace over to the power of chaos in the duration. I executed him and tried to impose order with help of the local security forces, but the source of this heresy did not stem from the administrator's influence. It was something deeper, older. I tried to seek out the source of the corruption, but the challenge proved too much. The miners had been killing and taking heads into these tunnels secretly. They were bringing them here for a reason. They were repairing something they'd found. A Summoning Shrine, buried in a massive cavern far below the surface. It was ancient. Could have even predated the Great Crusade. I was barely able to catch a glimpse of it the first time I reached the place, but that was enough. It was unmistakably Khornate in design."

Zano grimaced at the harsh death promised in the sound. The name of one of the Ruinous Powers. The god of blood and murder. Khorne.

"My retinue and the remaining security forces were ambushed. The same thing happened to my pilot and ship on the surface. Servants of the Blood God rioted in the hab facilities and dragged much of the remaining populace off to be slaughtered. The madness being emanated by the shrine proved too much for some of the security personnel. They went mad with bloodlust and turned against us before I could destroy the shrine. It was a slaughter. More and more of the damned cultist kept showing up, drawn by the bloodshed. The only reason we escaped was because Major Faulton here detonated some mining charges and collapsed a tunnel. Damn near brought the roof down on us, but at least it stopped the bastards from following."

"How long ago was that?"

"We've been locked in this storage shed for eight days now. My powers are growing weaker. I've been using my psychic abilities to conceal our presence here from the cultists and try to keep tabs on their efforts. Bloody dangerous and a strain on my sanity, but you couldn't hope to begin to understand what I mean. I've been praying that my emergency beacon would attract some attention from the war-efforts at the nearby Forgeworld. And I suppose it did."

"My men may be fewer then you had hoped for, but we will endeavour to help you destroy this foul thing with all our strength. If we get you to the surface-"

"You don't understand. There's no time for that," Hagen muttered, with a groan he lifted himself up from the crate and walked slowly towards Zano. "By this time, those wretches will have managed to complete the shrine. That tremor you've probably noticed in the ground? It's the reverberations from their ceremony. They're trying to summon a Greater Daemon from the Warp onto this world. Do you have the slightest idea what that is?"

Zano, opened his mouth to answer, but the words didn't seem to come. His heart was in his throat.

"No clue?" Hagen asked. "Count yourself blessed by your ignorance. I'll tell you what it means for you and our men though. If we do not stop this infernal ceremony from being completed, if these heretic madmen succeed in their goal, then the effects of our failure may mean every world in this sector could be doomed to damnation."

"But-but there are no ships here to transport an army off-world," Zano stammered, thinking of the report he had received and studied before disembarking. "Surely the situation will be contained-"

"If these maniacs have to build a warp-craft from mining scrap and our desecrated corpses roped-together, then they'll bloody do it!" Hagen bellowed. "And when they do, the first place they will surely head towards is Jeron Minor, Colonel, your homeworld. If you want to prevent everything you hold dear from being consumed by the Ruinous Powers, then you will treat this threat as seriously as I do."

"...What do you need us to do?" Zano finally managed to ask.

"Help me destroy the summoning shrine," Hagen stated. "Even if the only use you'll be is in dying, your deaths might still buy me enough time to halt their infernal ministrations."

"How can we destroy it? My men carry only light weaponry and a few grenades."

"I picked this shed to hide in for a reason. These creates are filled with mining explosives. Alone they're not particularly potent, but with enough of them made into a satchel charge we should be able to destroy the thing." Hagen explained. Zano felt like a simpleton for not noticing the explosive warnings on the boxes around him, and nervously waved Kevar and Pote with their flamers out of the room. The Inquisitor had not seemed alarmed by the possibility that they might all be blown sky high, but then again perhaps he could just psychically shield himself. Zano didn't have that luxury, and so opted for caution.

"I'll have my men assemble such a device then. In the meantime I shall send for the rest of the troops on the surface to move-" he began to offer, but Hagen stopped him short.

"No. I need them to stay and defend the entrance to these mines. I can sense a great number of corrupted souls approaching this mountain from the plateau above, down from the south-east. The mine we are in was not a major one compared to the other facilities on this continent, hence the small size of the settlement at its base. The original cultists left it to spread across the mountains and slaughter or convert the rest of the people on Valindril. Those that have not already reached this place are returning now, in a large horde. If you want to have a chance of getting out, your men will have to hold the entrance."

"How many are coming? When?" Zano asked.

"To examine their numbers minutely would be a waste of my reserves of will and strength. But I can tell they number somewhere in the area of ten-thousand." Hagen said flatly. "And they will be here in less than an hour."

"Holy Terra," Zano breathed. There was no way his men could survive such a battle. No way at all. And yet they had to, if the task at hand was to be completed. But could they even do that much? Could they last long enough and inflict enough casualties to give the Inquisitor time to destroy the objective? The Colonel swallowed, and set his shoulders.

"Kellick?" He asked. "Patch me through to Master Sargent Grull."

The Vox-Operator nodded after a moment and complied, expertly tuning his equipment to the responding vox-set on the surface.

"Yes Colonel?" Grull's voice crackled roughly in the confines of the tunnel. "Have you found the Inquisitor?"

"I have, but the situation here is more dangerous then we'd thought. I have new orders for you," Zano said, and he struggled to keep his voice calm. "The cultists on this world are heading towards this mine. It is imperative that they not breach the entrance. They will by coming from the south-east, in less than an hour."

"Numerical strength?" Grull asked.

Zano closed his eyes, and swallowed a lump in his throat that had mysteriously appeared. "Their full strength is uncertain at this time, but it is likely they may outnumber you by as much as fifty to one."

For a moment, there was only silence from the other end of the line.

"We'll do our best sir," the Master-Sergeant replied tersely. "I'll see that the men are made aware of… what they're in for."

"No," Zano shook his head, "that should be my duty Grull. Stand by for another message." Turning to Kellick, Zano fixed the vox-operator with a needful stare. "Can you patch me through to all vox-units across the company?" He asked.

"From down here it'll be difficult sir, but I could manage it," Kellick replied, but his face looked pale as he adjusted his frequency. All the men in the unit looked pale and worried as a matter of fact. Zano knew that he was probably no exception. The idea that the lucky 7th would not survive its first mission was plainly on all their minds. And if left unchecked it might destroy their resolve utterly. As uncaring as the Inquisitor was, Zano knew that he needed their help to destroy that shrine, and if his men fell apart then they would die, and fail to save others. That was unacceptable.

"This is Colonel Zano speaking," he announced as soon as Kellick signalled the channel was ready. "I have found the Inquisitor. But our work here is not done. There is an evil thing hidden beneath these mines which the Inquisitor has asked us to destroy. But the heretics who uncovered it are returning from their evil deeds beyond these mountains, and are heading our way. They want to return for a ceremony which will unleash an unimaginable evil onto this planet; one which will threaten this entire system, including our beloved Jeron, if we do not stop it here and now. I have just informed Master-Sergeant Grull that the enemy force headed our way is much larger than our own. In fact, for every one of us, there may be as many as fifty of them." Zano stopped his speech short, trying to think of a way to steel his men in the face of such odds. His men who had followed him with such loyalty and confidence to this blasted world. His men whom he had held such great hopes for, that had never once let him down in all their training and all their simulated battles.

"But do not let this break your spirits," he continued. "Inquisitor Hagen is relying on us to stem the tide and buy him time to do his work here. And I know you can do it. Everything I have seen of you in our practice, our preparations, tells me that you can. We have worked so hard, for so many years to earn the right to join in the glorious wars of the Imperium. This may not be the battle that we were expecting, but it is the battle before us nonetheless, and I know that you will face it with courage and determination. As your commanding officer it has been my honour to prepare you for this moment. I have seen you all fight in training as if each one of you were ten men, and I believe you will each fight like twenty now that a real battle is upon you. That puts the odds at around 2-to-1. And I think that we can manage that." He assured them, smiling despite himself. Around the Colonel his men seemed to straighten and lose their daunted expressions. His words had even seemed to affect the Inquisitor, who watched him with interest as he finished his address.

"Above all else, I wish to remind you that our lives are in the Emperor's hands," Zano told them, "and to remember that the Emperor protects. Zano out."

Kellick cut the transmission and the shed and tunnel became silent. Inquisitor Hagen looked at Zano curiously.

"Have your men ever fought against forces of the Archenemy before?" he asked.

"No." Zano answered.

"Have your men actually seen combat before this day?" Hagen wondered with a penetrating gaze.

"...No."

"Then I should not expect to see them again. Pray that they can hold the mines long enough for us to do our work. Now get your unit ready. They're about to enter hell."