So...normally I have like long winded introduction, make a bunch of apologies, and other stuff.

But right now I got nothing.

ON WITH THE SHOW!

A servo-skull with a pict-screen in place of its jaw begins to play the recording

He was in cover around a corner from where the eight gangers were firing, he couldn't tell which gang they belonged to because they all began to look the same after awhile. Sergeant Muldoon was approximately three meters up behind a stack of crates, Reynolds was a meter away behind an empty barrel, at least he hoped it was empty, Huskar was five meters away behind a metal panel that served as a sort of wall, and Logren was taking shots to keep the gangers in cover and distracted, while Goren took the remainder of the squad to try and flank them. All the while he could hear the ping of bullets from the gangers' stubbers as the bullets bounced off the wall just by his head. To say he was freaking out on the inside would have been drastically underselling how scared he was right now, if he was forced to be honest with himself the only reason he hadn't tried to run for his life was because he was paralyzed with fear.

'Just like the simulations they said,' he thought to himself sarcastically, 'this is nothing like the simulations.'

It was then he heard Reynolds let out a cry and he felt his head snap over to her. Time slowed down to a crawl as he took in the details. A round from one of the gangers weapons had finally punched all the way through the barrel she had been using as cover, causing both the bullet and a small piece of the barrel to fracture, at a point where her flak armor didn't cover, causing her arm to hang limply down at her side, and blood to run down her arm. Now two things happened instantly in his mind, the first was fear began to seep into his mind, it's sickly voice taunting him, proclaiming that if only he had been braver and had fired back at the gangers they might have been more cautious and stayed behind cover. The second thing that happened almost immediately as the first thing started its taunting, was that he ran out of cover, firing a couple of lazy shots in the general direction the bullet had come from as he ran over to the wounded squad mate. Upon reaching her he handed her his las gun, gingerly placed his hands under her armpits, later she would punch him in the ribs because he had accidentally touched a couple shards of metal and inadvertently pushed them deeper into their respective wounds, and began dragging her back to the cover he had been in. Upon reaching the safety of cover, he had reached into her medpac, thankfully the quartermaster had enough when they had been issued out, and pulled out a long strip of cloth with a plastic looking stick thing at about the midpoint. Working as fast as his frayed nerves would allow him, he wrapped the strip of cloth around her upper arm, making sure to avoid the injuries as best he could, he tied the strip off he then took the plastic stick and twisted it until he heard her hiss in pain, upon that being achieved he used one hand to maintain the pressure, and after he tied the tails on top of the stick, to help hold it in place, he grabbed his las gun, and started returning fire, he was pretty sure he might have even hit one of them.

With Corporal Goren…

Corporal Herschel Goren was currently leading the remaining members of the squad through a back alley that would, in theory anyway, lead to a flanking position that would catch the gangers in a crossfire. After this though, if Rollins and Logren hadn't at least learned to tolerate each other he was going to personally throw the both of them into an empty room with nothing but a knife, lock the door, and not open it again until either they overcame their differences or killed each other. He didn't know why there was such animosity between the two guardsmen, and quite honestly he didn't care, their continued hostility toward each other was beginning to create a rift in the squad, and only Sergeant Muldoon was keeping the squad from tearing away at itself.

He then heard the distinctive pop-pop-pop of the gangers weapons, deciding to shelve the problems between two of the members of the squad for later he motioned for Rommel and Jergin to move silently the began creeping up on the gangers. Doing a quick head count, he saw that there seven of them left standing of the ten that they had engaged. Nodding to himself, he looked at Rommel and Jergin and counted down from three, before throwing a frag grenade into the middle of the group, catching two of remaining gangers in the blast and forcing the remainder to disperse and seek better cover. However, what the gangers didn't know was that this would make it harder for them to cover each other and would also put them into a somewhat more exposed position, making it easier to take them out.

With PVT Logren…

Ever since Michael Rollins had become part of the squad, he had a bad feeling. Like the kind he would get when he was a White Shield and the instructors were about to put a boot up their collective asses or when a Commissar was rumored to be nearby. Like things were about to go incredibly bad in rapid succession, and there was little to be done but run damage control. He couldn't explain why he had this feeling, for all intents and purposes the guy had done his best to do job.

During the training, the guy could hit the targets when they had fire drills, but other than that he was an abysmal failure, when it came to obstacle courses, the guy had trouble getting past even the simple ones, when it came to PT he almost always either broke off, passed out, threw up, or outright collapsed, and from where he was positioned, Logren could see that the guy was going to be utterly useless in a fire fight. Growling to himself he reminded himself to have another talk with Sergeant Muldoon about getting Rollins transferred out to someone else, maybe to the front lines or somewhere like that who could use another member of the sandbag brigade. It would probably go like all the other conversations he had had with the sergeant on the subject, ultimately the sergeant would make a statement along the lines of 'needing all the manpower they could get'. While he couldn't argue against that statement, he felt that they needed the right kind of manpower.

So, if he was asked to put it simply, the man wasn't Cadian, and all that ultimately entailed. He didn't not have Cadian discipline, a Cadian's drive to succeed, Cadian determination, and most importantly a Cadian's courage. There was often a joke that floated around the Imperial Guard, that if a Cadian regiment was protecting a planet then the planet would crack before they did. So far Michael Rollins showed absolutely none of these qualities. Peeking out of cover to take a shot at the gangers, he noticed Rollins was dragging Reynolds, who was firing two las guns, to cover, and began reaching into her medpac.

'He had better be giving her first aid,' Logren thought, before lining up a shot on one of the remaining gangers, only for him to go down before he had a chance to pull the trigger. Opening the eye that hadn't been peering down the sight, he saw that Rollins was furiously firing in the direction of the gangers. Just after that happened a frag grenade went off and killed two more gangers, and then Corporal Rommel's group opened fire, mowing down three more of the gangers. Needless to say the final two were taken out in short order, and everyone came out of cover. Walking over to Reynolds, he checked her over, and saw no fewer than five metal shards had embedded themselves into her arm. His eyes then traveled up her arm to see a tourniquet had been hastily applied to help stem some of the bleeding. Checking the tourniquet, he noticed that it was tied as tightly as could be managed with the flak armor in the way. It would hold until they could get her to a Apothecarion to get the metal extracted.

"So he is good for something other than wasting oxygen," Logren said to no one in particular. He then heard a sound, like someone was getting ready to empty the contents of their stomach. Turning, he saw Rollins was bent over a railing that kept people from falling into a gap between the walkway and a massive conduit pipe, his gas mask, which had worn whenever they left the purified air of the base, laying five meters away, and he was violently retching over the pit. Followed by Sergeant Muldoon grabbing his shoulder and possibly asking what was

Meanwhile…

It was hungry, it was always hungry, but this time it felt a pressure that made it ravenous. It had been one of the many changes that had been made to its form as it consumed what it could, it could now sense when the warm squishy things were close. But it was sensing something more now, if the warm squishy things it normally sensed were little drops on its senses then this was like a roar of the giant metal things from where it climbed from. That roar made its hunger deeper, made the pangs of starvation near unbearable. It didn't know what was causing it feel this way, only that it might be able to sate it's ever growing hunger if only for a bit.

It was growing closer, it could feel it in the tips of it claws, and with every swing of it's finned tail. It quickened it's pace, it's tongue scrapping the back its fangs as it hurriedly ascended a metallic structure. It could feel it now, an overwhelming pressure against its senses. It ascended a little further and then made a predatory leap.

With Sergeant Muldoon…

The fire fight was over, and it had taken two minutes, he have to put the team through extra drills to get them up to snuff, because in his mind that fight should have lasted only a minute at most. Scanning over the seven troops he currently had, he noticed that Logren was marching over to where Rollins had taken cover. He wasn't blind, he knew that the two hated each other, Logren because he didn't like having a non-Cadian on the squad, and Rollins's temper was beginning to wear thin, although he had taken the treatment better than most. He then heard something clatter to the ground, followed quickly by another clatter. Turning he saw Rollins had ripped his helmet and gas mask off, the gas mask he refused to take off whenever they left the base because he couldn't breathe otherwise. He then noticed he bolted over to a set of railing next to a conduit pipe and he began violently retching over the side.

"What's wrong guardsman," he asked, his voice both stern and concerned. Then his ears picked up on a clicking sound. It had started as faint at first, and then it increased in both rapidity and volume. The only thing that had saved both of them from having their heads removed from their shoulders, was he had instinctively shoved them two of them apart. Turning at what had leaped at them, he saw a thing that could only have been born from nightmares. The thing was ten foot long from the tip of its snout to the end of its finned tail and was five feet tall at the shoulder. The creature had a mouth that almost split its mouth in half and was filled with sharp needle like teeth, set in a saurian face, it's body was lithe, taut with powerful predatory muscles, it's back and shoulders were covered with a ridged chitinous material, and from what they could tell, it didn't have any eyes. But in spite of this it appeared to be staring at Rollins hungrily, it then let out an ear-piercing shriek, and made another leap. It would have completed the leap and likely have used him as a chew toy, if it hadn't immediately been peppered by shots from two different las guns, which had caused it to miss its trajectory. It dug it's claws into the metal decking and pivoted to face the new threat. All the while Rollins had finally gotten to his feet, just in time for the tail to smack him over the railing. The monster screeched in rage, before it bolted toward one of the ganger corpses and snatched it up, before fleeing.

Three levels below…

She had successfully completed her mission, the firefight that had taken place three levels above had been a good distraction. She had destroyed the drug lab beyond any hope of rebuilding, with the few innocents that had been trapped inside. Then her ears picked up on something, a sound of repetitive, meaty thuds. Quickly following the noise, she heard one final thud. Upon finding the source of the noise she saw a man laying on his back, wearing the green and khaki of the Cadian shock troops minus the helmet. She shook her head sadly, truly it appeared that another of the Emperor's servants had been called to his side. She had made to leave the dead man, when she heard a pained groan come from what she had assumed to be a corpse.

Walking over to the body, she saw that he had short cropped hair, in the style of the Imperial military. Checking his neck, she felt a faint pulse that was slowly growing stronger. Then she looked at his face and then she had a strange feeling, like she had met this man somewhere before. Feeling her face pull into a scowl, she placed her hands under his arm pits, picked him up, and then placed one of his arms over her shoulder and walked to her hideout.

Inside Michael's mind…

The sun felt warm on his skin, too warm, and the air was too moist. That would make it summer, and judging from the sound of waves crashing on the shore he was on vacation from his job, god he hated that place. Smiling to himself, he looked down at the book he had brought with him, he had forgotten the title because he had read so many. Then he head someone else take a seat in a chair beside him. Looking up from his book, he saw his girlfriend before he had wound up here, she was a year younger than him, with her arms covered in tattoos and her black hair had streaks of dark purple mixed in, currently she was wearing a tank top with the Guns-N-Roses logo on it and wearing knee length dark purple shorts.

"Am I in heaven," he asked rhetorically, a small smile on his face.

"Not quite," she replied, looking out at the ocean, the face he had thought so beautiful was drawn in a look of annoyance. Looking out at the ocean he saw bank of dark clouds swiftly approaching. He looked on in annoyance, looked like this day at the beach was over, and then he squinted, his eyes had to be playing on tricks on him because he thought the clouds had the shape of screaming faces.

"You remember what Celebrimbor first said to Talion," she asked, which struck him as an odd question since she had never shown any particular interest in video games.

"You are banished from death," he said skeptically, "where are you going with this?"

The wind picked up, and to his ears it sounded like the screams of a million forsaken souls. She looked at him sadly and clasped his hand.

"It gets a little more difficult for you to go back each time," she stated sadly, "and you still have more work to do."

He fearfully pulled her up into a hug and clung to her tightly.

"What if I don't want to go," he asked tearfully, holding her like a lifeline.

"When did you ever leave a job half done," she asked, before kissing him on the cheek as the world faded to white.

Half a day later…

He had been occupying the only bed for about half a planetary day, Big Sister had gone out to see about getting supplies. The guardsman she had brought in had been breathing shallowly and had been quietly whispering something, she hadn't been close enough to hear it. After having stripped him of his armor, Guardsman jacket, and undershirt, she saw that his chest was covered in healed scars, and then she rolled him on his side, and ran her hands along his back, and felt bones snap back into place. Shaking her head in amazement she carefully put his undershirt back on him and began to try and decipher the book her adoptive sister had taken. When she heard the thin sheets on one of the only bed rustle and a masculine voice gasp.

"Where am I," the man asked, panting as he looked at her with a scowl on his face.

So what did you all think?

I apologize if the combat didn't exactly measure up.

Please, constructively, inform of how I could improve.

Anyway, I hope you all enjoyed this.

Ave Imperator. The Emperor protects.