Chapter 3

the missing vialgers

Over the next few days the camp was on full alert sweeping the area with night vision and thermals letting nothing escape its gaze. The village itself was slowly being torn down and being made into fortified buildings with alleys between them that would turn into blood soaked killing grounds if an enemy ever got past the bunkers. Cameron and Dillon stayed in their post being some of the few lucky guardsmen that didn't have to help build all the metal monstrosities.

Dillon sat with his back to the gun slit holding his rifle and plying with one of the melta bombs now issued to all the men. "I don't get it" he said now throwing the melta bomb to himself "why would they just stand there? Why didn't they attack us, we were in such disarray a Gretchen with a bad leg could of hobbled his way into the base before any one fired on it." Dillon looked sullen and worried. "I don't know Dillon. All I know is that these officers aren't helping us at all, they just take all of our useful tips and just ignore them." Cameron now got up and started pacing the room. "you know I told them about how the blob was dark blue on the thermals? The officer just ignored it, the only way I got some one to listen was is started telling some men in the mess hall of how to spot them." Dillon raised his rifle and did another quick almost cursory sweep of the outcropping using the thermal sight. "Hobbes? What do you think happened to the bodies of the recon?" Cameron stopped pacing. "I mean they cant be to far out there could they? They were only meant to recon the perimeter"

"ill be right back then" Cameron walked out the bolt hole leaving Dillon sitting in his defensive position confused. "where are you going though?" asked Dillon, but Cameron was already on his way to the head quarters.

He walked in through the steel reinforced door and walked up to the clerk sitting at a desk. "I need to see the officer in charge, now!" the clerk didn't pay any attention, he just shuffled his papers and began writing another report.

Cameron leaned down and leaned in until his face was just an inch from the clerks. "where is the officer in charge?" this time he growled his question. When the clerk again didn't answer Cameron made as if to hit him, But stopped as a deep booming voice sounded out behind him. "that wont make him answer you. He's only a servitor." Cameron turned on his heel and looked to see who had spoken to him. Standing in the door way with a steaming cup of coffee was the commissar of the unit. He was a big man a little over 6 feet tall with broad powerful shoulders and a scared face. His skin seemed leathery and old but his eyes had a fire in them that would match a orks blood lust.

"im the officer in charge here and if you want to talk to me hitting my mail clerk wont help" the commissar then motioned for Cameron to follow him and stepped back out the door. Stunned Cameron followed and quickly caught up with the commissar.

"so" boomed the officer "what is it you so desperately wanted to se me about?" Cameron faltered not entirely knowing how he was going to ask this. "I um sir I want to take a squad into the tunnels. I think there may be something down there" the commissar continued to walk and sip from his coffee almost not even thinking about anything. "all there is down there is feces and rodents. Why on earth would you want to go down there?" Cameron didn't want to try and explain the smell which now lingered heavier than it had when they first landed. "please sir I just need one squad to go look through a few tunnels, if there's nothing down there we will come straight back up and ill drop the issue."

The commissar continued to sip his coffee until there was non left and even then he held it like there was a very valuable liquid in it. "ok." The commissar finnaly said. "but ill only give u 3 men and I want to be down there with you." "deall" asid Cameron and he jogged back to the bunker to tell Dillon what they were going to do.

Later that night in the pale glow of the moon Cameron Dillon the sommisar and 2 other guard were huddled around a sewer drain ready to pry it open. "now remember corpral we are down there to check things out and back out in less than an hour. Ok?" said the commissar. Cameron nodded in comfirmation and primed his las rifle. One of the the other soilders took a large crow bar and pulled off the lid to the sewers. What came out of the dark hole was a waft of steam with the smell of boiled skin and flesh. All of the men standing around it reeled back in disgust. "still think we are just going to be wading in feces down there commissar?" said Cameron trying to peer down the hole. The stink was so powerfull it made his eyes water. The group waited 10 minutes to try and let all the steam out, but when it didn't the commissar ordered gas masks on and gave the go ahead to enter the pipes.

The sewer was dark and rank, the air itself hung with a wet deathly stink, it seemed to coat the walls in a thick ooze that the commissar insisted on none of the men touching. Down at the bottom of the ladder Cameron stepped down on a wet cold floor. It was slippery with the ooze that covered all surfaces it seemed. The roof of the sewers was dark and deep in shadow to the point where about 10 meters over their heads.

When all the men had landed the commissar looked to Cameron. "ok corporal now where?" Cameron was caught off guard. He expected t her to be some clue as to the smell but instead the sewers were just empty. There were no dead bodies like on Calahan IX. "I say we work our way down that way 50 meters" he said pointing down one of the main pipes. "then we work the other way and try and check in a 50 meter circumference, if there's something down here it should be close."

With that all the men switched on their under slung lamp packs and began moving down the tunnel in the direction that he had stated. As they moved on Cameron noticed the ooze was a deep red almost to the point of being black. In some places the ooze was thick and in otheres it didn't even cover the walls. Strange he thought. At the end of the 50 meters and seeing nothing Cameron took them back to the start and went through another tunnel and back again seeing nothing. But something bugged Cameron something at the back of his mind was screaming that there was something wrong with his place. But he couldn't place what it was

After exploring another 5 tunnels and coming up with nothing the commissar called a halt "Cameron there's nothing down here lets just give up and go to the surface" the commissars voice was muddled and distorted through the gas mask. You were right theres no feces down here but there isn't anything out of the norm now is there?"

Then it hit Cameron. He looked down into the basin in the middle of the pipe that should have been full of feces and excrement but instead it was dry as a bone in the desert. At the same time he could hear dillons muffled voice behind him say "golden throne" when Cameron looked around he saw that Dillon wasn't looking at the empty basin but rather at the roof that was to dark to se with the naked eye. But now Dillon had his lamp pack aimed up and on high beam. 2 of the men joined him and used their lights on the roof.

The 3 lights made maniac shadows that made it look like movment or even life but Cameron knew that what was no the ceiling was not alive. "commissar. I think we found the villagers." On the roof in twisted forms with bones jarring out and organs looped around them was the entire population of the deserted village. Stripped of all skin. The ooze wasn't any sort of moss it was instead the blood of they dying villagers as they were nailed to the ceiling and flensed alive.

"emporer protect us" muttered one of the guardsmen "the emporer has forsaken this place a long time ago" said the commissar trailing his beam of light down the sewers. Suddenly he stopped moving his light and dropped to his knee shouldering his bolt gun.

"what is it commissar" said one of the soldiers. It was the last thing he would say. The man who spoke had his head cleanly ripped off by a spinning black blade that whirred through the air and embedded itself in the sewers wall. Before they could react a sick beat of slapping flesh and metal on concrete beat its way to them. The commissar opened up with his bolt gun sending a magazine of deadly rounds down the tunnels throat and into an unseen attacker.

Cameron and Dillon saw it at the same time, almost as if it was frozen in time. It was a being that should not have existed half metal and half sutured skin it was running twards them with a large bladed fore arm. Then time resumed and both began to fire. Las rounds ripped open the flesh and the bolt gun dented the metal exoskeleton. One of the troopers threw a melta bomb and blasted a great hole infront of the beast. With a loud clang the metal thing slammed to the groun missing all of its skin now and having lost its legs. But no matter how damaged it was everyone in the recon group knew exactly what it was. It was one of the thinking machines from the age of strife.

Cameron slapped the commissar on the shoulder "WE NEED TO GET THE HELL OUT OF HERE!" he shouted as the machine began to claw its way twards the men. The commissar nodded and began to run with Cameron and Dillon stopping long enough to hurl a hand full of melta bombs at the machine to make sure it was truly dead.

On top of the sewer now the commissar and all the men sat around looking at the now dark sewer opening. "we need to get reinforcements now." Said Cameron. The commissar looked at Cameron with a face of dread. "don't you remember ? the ship left to try and get another garrison 2 days ago. Its in the warp right now we could never contact it." "what do we do then commissar?" asked one of the troopers. "we wait and hope we can fight these things and hold them off long enough to get picked back up by the transport." Said Cameron with a grim look of determination on his face.