(I) - The Mad Game

by PhantomStag458

A continuation of the novel Fifteen Hours, detailing the frontline experiences of a young soldier named Larn. During his tour across the Imperium and his struggle to keep his body and mind whole, he finds that not everything is as clear cut as good against evil. Consequently, the lines between friend and foe slowly begin to blur.

2. Chapter 2

The Pit, Butcher's Rock, Bastille-73

A pair of green paws clawed at the mouth of the tunnel, the sinewy arms dragging the overgrown body out in to the open. Flattening myself against the wall, I slid sideways, glancing up at the baying Vardans, my jaw quivering. "Please."

Snorting up nasal mucus, the Ork scratched at the floor, its tiny nostrils wrinkling. Hunched over, it was three feet tall, with a chest size double mine and hands that could pop my head like a cherry.

"Ooh, he's on to you, boy!"

"Go on, put 'em up."

"Don't just stand there."

What the hell am I supposed to do? My eyes fixed on the Ork, I groped for ruts in the wall, edging right, when the Ork padded left. On all fours, the Ork stooped, sniffing the ground, its pointed ears twitching.

"Weren't leaving it all in his favour," somebody crowed. "Use your eyes, ya little prick!"

Eyes?

Gouge marks scarred the Ork's brows and cheeks. Green blood stained its skin. Underneath its jowls, stumps grew from black gums.

Throne, he's blind.

"Ha-ha, he's getting it!"

"Go on, get in there!" A Vardan hurled a piece of mouldy fruit at me. "He's blind and he's got no teeth. Fucking hit him!"

Barking up at the crowd, the Ork's maimed hands tore at the walls. Making fists, it beat upon the earth, desperate to get at the meat mob.

"He's there. Right opposite you."

More fruit and other gone-off morsels bounced off the Ork's flat head. Flicking its tongue out, the beast licked the mould-ridden compo, lathering it with slobber then re-doubling its efforts to clamber out of the pit. Shielding my head, I squatted against the wall, sliding downwards to sit in a pool of rotting food. Jeers from the Vardans burned my ears. The sniffling grew closer.

"Go on, stand up and fight, you little rat!"

"Grow some balls."

"He's harmless!"

Wiping mess from my face, I scuttled away from the Ork, gasping as it lunged wildly at me. "Aw, shit!"

"You're running out of time. I'm losing money here!"

A flurry of grubby hands exchanged credits. What the hell use is money here? I thought, slipping through the mud, away from the Ork. A swipe at my ankle jerked my leg back, slamming me on the ground. "No!" Twisting, I kicked back at the paw, driving my hobnailed sole along the Ork's wrist, grazing the skin. Letting loose a snarl, the Ork's grip slackened.

"Oi, help!" I cried, skidding out of the Ork's way, receiving nothing but laughter and applause from the Vardans. "Please!"

"New Fish!"

The nickname cut through the roar of blood in my ears, jerking my head up.

"Feed it him." A hunk of green-tinged grox-meat thumped down in front of me, splattering my boots and puttees, coating what little material remained clean in more of the cold mud. What good will this do? I scooped up the meat, retching at the sickly-sweet stench it gave off. Misjudging my footing, I slipped, narrowly missing a swipe at my head.

"Feed him!"

Squeezing the meat, my fingers found a hard, ridged surface embedded within it. Grenade. Mymush-covered fingers tore at the shreds, uncovering the shining pull-ring. "C'mon, c'mon, c'mon."

"Give yourself the shits eating that!"

"Yeah, him too."

Drawn to me by the rancid meat, the Ork opened his arms, gathering me in its sweating, stinking embrace, dousing me in hot breath. Scrunching the meat up, I found the grenade spoon and worked the pin free, stuffing the grenade in to the Ork's mouth with the flat of my palm. Choking itself, the Ork stumbled, dropping me and clutching at its throat. On my shoulder, I rolled sideways, away from the Ork, curling up in to a ball. A muffled explosion preceded a wet splatter. Warm liquid drenched my mud-stained uniform. Hunks of smoking flesh plastered the walls of the pit. Over my ringing ears, the tumultuous racket from the crowd frittered away; in its place a dead quiet. Cheeks stained with tears and sticky with blood, I opened my eyes, shaking the warm scraps of Ork-flesh from my shoulders. Where the Ork lay, the space where its head had been had flooded with green blood, soaking everything in a wide radius of mud, skin and bone. A single red eye stared at me from the centre of the mess.

"New Fish!"

Clamping my teeth together, I dug my hands in to the mud, pushing my body away from the Ork.

"Up here."

A coiled rope landed in my peripheral vision. Balling my hands, I worked them up and down my chest, leaning to one side and expelling a white dribble of vomit from my stomach.

"Take the rope."

My impotent limbs leadweights, I flicked the rope away with my shoulder, spitting the last of the lumpy liquid from my mouth. Leave me alone.

"I'm not playing with you, New Fish. Take the blasted rope. Let me bring you up out of there."

"Cheater. You tossed him that grenade!" Another Vardan growled.

"Easy ganging up on one boy, when it's the whole lot of you outnumbering him, isn't it?"

"Bah, Chelkar, you're lucky you're a sarn't, else it'd be you in there too."

Chelkar? I twisted my head. At the edge of the pit, a Vardan with a grey-tinged explosion of a beard gestured down at me.

"Yes, it's me, boy. Haul your arse up from there. I'll pull."

Taking the rope in both hands, I pressed it between my knees and let Chelkar carry me upwards.

"Aww, is he crying?"

"Might need to change his nappy there, Sarn't."

"Silence, the lot of you!" Chelkar boomed. "Animals, cretins, bullies! You laugh because he is young and green, because he can't stand up to you. It's so funny. You find it funny, do you? Laugh, c'mon, laugh. Let me hear you laugh at him for standing up to an Ork without blade or rifle. Does it not give you entertainment, you savages? Use your feet, New Fish, keep your body away from the wall. You're dragging me down. That's it, grab the lip. Help me and I'll help you. Now, get your leg over."

Sweating, stinking, and exhausted, I flopped on my belly, leaving one leg dangling over the edge.

"Alright, you're alright, New Fish." Chelkar's hands slapped my back. "Nothing broken, nothing bleeding? Good."

"Toss him back in, he's worthless!"

"Oi, gimme that money." Chelkar waded in to the money-toting Vardans, swiping it out of hands, hurling the wads down in to the pit. "You like it so much, you go down there and get it. All of it, worthless dogs. See how you like it with greenskin blood all over it now. I don't care if you owe each other paper. Worse than lifers, all of you!"

A snick of a knife unfolding was followed by a yelp. "My arm!"

"People get hurt here. You'll live, Private." Chelkar slapped the aggressor across his mouth. "Next time I toss you in the pit, huh. Might leave the Ork with his teeth and eyes this time! Give that jacket back, loggerhead."

A jacket was thrown across my shoulders. Hands hauled me up on my feet. They belonged to Chelkar. "Come, New Fish."

Head drooping, I mumbled, "my name is—"

"No-one cares."

Scattered by Chelkar's wrath, the Vardans made way, pressing their bodies against the concrete walls, and avoiding making eye contact with him. Sniffing and sobbing, I let Chelkar bear me up in to the biting Bastille night.

"Make way there!" Chelkar snarled at a gaggle of onlookers crowding at the factory gate. "No show tonight. Back to your billets."

"He coming back to your billet with you, Sarn't?" A Vardan leered at me.

"Not smelling like the greenskin he just went hand-to-hand with, he's not." Chelkar laughed. "Leave me, leave me. Get away."

"Fuck me, did he win?" the Vardan called after Chelkar.

"Let the rumour spread that a wetnose threw some hands with a greenskin and came out smiling," Chelkar muttered to me. "Let's get you squared away now, New Fish."

"I'm a… I'm a…"

"Hush up for now. You'll shower and hand your uniform in for disinfecting."

Chelkar flashed his yellowing ID card to the Vardans manning the outer perimeter gate, whisking me through as the gate rose. Ahead, the walls of the triangular building disappeared up in to fog. The sentries passed Chelkar with little more than a nod and a wink. The few words exchanged between them made no mention of me.

"Got no business in there, New Fish, that's officer-only territory. Beware of lifers too. Lifers inhabit that command post in abundance."

Seeing nothing of the route Chelkar took me on, my muddled brain half-registered that it was not back towards Cain Med, rather along the command post's south wall then – turning right – past the front, west-facing, entrance; all sandbags, reinforced concrete, and small boulders kept inside square cages. Greeting the Vardans manning a plentiful array of man-packed weaponry, Chelkar steered me on to the causeway that led up to the entrance then down into a bivouac set about four feet beneath the road. Tents aplenty were arranged in ordered rows, and decking, similar to the articles at Cain Med, gave a stable path above the treacherous mud.

"Now, normally you'd strip and burn everything that came in to contact with the greenskin. Jacket, gloves, trousers. But, you'd need issuing a full set of kit after that, and the only stuff they issue now is paid for on the black market; quadruple price, I might add. Here, the Crotch issues you with a bodybag, but sometimes not even that, so we make do. You will keep your clobber after it's been gone over. Don't want you looking like us, after all, New Fish."

Nearing an unmarked tent, Chelkar whistled. "Kaulewicz, outside."

A hand undid one of the toggles holding the tent halves together and a head poked through the gap. Bearded, as with all Vardans, the man squinted at me. "Uh, who's this, Sarn't?"

"Remember him?" Chelkar shook me by my collar.

"Nah."

"I do, so you do. Prep a shower detail. This runt needs a bath and a full sterilise."

"Snip-snip?" Kaulewicz mimed a pair of scissors. "Need the hot knife for that."

"Kill yourself, Corporal."

"I'll get a private to do it."

"Get Delta Fireteam of Fourth or do it yourself."

"Well, they owe me money…"

"Find Davir, Bulaven, or Skargo. He was in their fireteam before."

"That blood on him?"

"Not his. I want his uniform gone over immediately with decon, washed, and hung out to dry for him in the morning."

"Well, he can do it himself. He's responsible for his own kit."

"And what does he wear whilst he's washing his clothes in the dark, with his cock shrivelling up between his legs?"

"Do it tomorrow, first thing."

"Now, Corp."

Grumbling obscenities, Kaulewicz's head disappeared. "You go with Corporal Kaulewicz, New Fish. You do what he says, when he says it," Chelkar said. "Wait here. He will take charge of you. Make sure you scrub quick and get in to every hole. For tonight, your uniform will be taken care of for you. Tomorrow, it's your problem. D'you understand me?"

"Mmm." I bobbed my head up and down.

"Well?"

"Thank you, Sergeant," I whispered.

"Wake-up at zero-five three-zero, New Fish. Don't oversleep or I'll punch your heart out." Chelkar grinned behind his beard. Slapping my back – something that brought me forward a step – Chelkar pottered away.

Lifers. The Crotch. What the hell is going on around here? I stamped my boots upon the uneven decking, blowing a cloud from my nose. A minute later, Kaulewicz burst from the tent, his abrupt exit provoking an outcry from the occupants to shut the flap. "Your fireteam's off whoring, pencil-prick." Kaulewicz spat near my feet, tying the flaps together. "So, I'm stuck with you tonight, sweet-cheeks. Now, we're gonna have a lot of fun, you and I. Well, when I say you and I, I mean just me. Though the fun I'm gonna wrangle from this outing will be mild and fleeting, so don't take too long or I'll keep the towel for myself and run you naked round the bivouac to dry you off."

Pushing me ahead of him, Kaulewicz pointed out a tent with two sides open to the world and a single screen bordering a shower area. Above it, a single bucket hung from a hook. Underneath it, a long pole attached to a hinge rested against a post. "Now, are you carrying?" Kaulewicz jiggled the pole. "Aha! Plenty left in there. You, abortion, strip smartly, leave your luggage outside and take your boots with you. Don't stare at me. Show that white arsehole and hairless cock, now!"

"…Fucking nuts," I murmured, fiddling with the zipper on my trousers.

"You don't talk to me like that." Kaulewicz jabbed a finger at my chest. "You don't talk to me like that, rude piece of shit. You're nothing. Nothing. You're less than nothing, 'cause Vardans are nothing. This is my world, not yours. Don't talk back at me."

Passing Kaulewicz the clean parka, my jacket, shirt, vest, trousers, and puttees, I paused, grimaced, then gave him my grey, baggy undershorts. Kaulewicz snorted, "pitiful. Get in there."

Shivering in my boots and socks, I stepped beneath the shower, undid my laces and left both pairs of boots and socks outside.

"Oi." Kaulewicz held a single cigarette up. "You've got till I smoke this to get yourself sorted. Y'understand?"

"Yes, Corporal." I yanked the curtain across, glaring up at the shower head.

You've got till I smoke this cigarette. I replayed the words in my head. Smoke a cigarette at night? You don't show lights at night. How long does he mean?

"One minute." I mouthed, steeling myself for the rush of water jetting from the rusted filter. Kaulewicz laughed, hearing my scream. Spitting and swearing, I snatched a piece of black soap, hard as a brick, and lathered it over my numb body, inwardly cursing all Vardans and all non-commissioned officers.

Forty-seven seconds, I counted, leaving the shower with water still to drain out. See how he likes that. Taking a towel from a peg, I scoured my body, fingers breaching many holes in the thin cotton.

"Corporal?" I called, once I had my boots and socks back on. "Can I 'ave the parka? That's a clean piece, that. It doesn't need washing."

"Outside."

In defiance of all common sense, Kaulewicz carried a lit cigarette between his finger and was leaning against a tent post, facing west. "If you were a real man you'd have nothing to fear, nothing to hide. That is why you can never be one of us." Kaulewicz nodded down at my clasped hands. "Okay, you may have survived the fifteen hours. But, it's just an average. Now, you may be a rung or two above the sad, sorry ballbags getting intimate with the rats out there between the lines, but don't for one second think you're anything special." Kaulewicz dropped the glowing butt and smothered it beneath his boot. "I've been putting pieces of special people in mass graves for ten years." From underneath his arm, Kaulewicz produced the grey parka and threw it to me. "Chelkar's probably told you already. Tomorrow you take charge of your own shit."

As itchy as the fur was on my bare skin, the warmth it gave lifted my heart from the rock-bottom depths of my stomach, hitching it up like a cripple finding his legs worked once more. "Thank you, Corporal."

"Aw, you won't be thanking me come wake-up tomorrow." Kaulewicz aimed a finger at the tent rows. "Second row back, third from the right, or fifth from the left if you're wrong-handed. Nobody in there right now. Just make sure you take a vacant cot before you make sleeping sounds tonight. Remember zero-five three-zero. If Chelkar don't punch your heart out, I will. Run off, now." Kaulewicz clapping his hands behind my head broke the stupor stiffening my limbs. "Away!"

Lurching along the boards, I buried my face in the parka's fur, ruffling the collar to cover my ears. Where's the bloody tent? Laughter carried between the tents, jibes hurtling around like a hurricane. Oh no, go away. I'm sick of bloody Vardans. I hunkered down in the shadows, gathering the parka around me, turning my face away from the trio of jubilant Vardans lolling along the duct boards.

"Who's that?"

"What's she wearing under that parka?"

"It's a man!"

"Man? That ain't no man."

"It's…"

"Larn."

Stirring, I uncovered my eyes, seeing three familiar faces looming over me.

"Erm, caught short, m'boy?" Bulaven, with Davir and Scholar at his shoulders, wiggled his eyebrows.

"Where's your uniform, boy?" Davir prodded my bare knee.

"Might ask you the same about earlier, D." Scholar shoved Davir sideways. "Thrashing around, trying to find your clobber. I swear you're gonna catch venereal disease one of these days."

"Veneer-what? I've had stuff go through me so much, I reckon I've built up an immunity by now."

"Don't…" Bulaven's palm engulfed Davir's head and he too shoved him aside. "Let no single sentence, not one word passing from D's mouth be taken to heart. His jaw flaps and sound comes out, that's about it."

"Enough, enough." Scholar placed his fur hat on my damp head. "Let's be out the cold. Hellfire, he's freezing to death. Help him inside, boys."

Borne between the three Vardans inside a tent, I was deposited upon a cot and covered up with many blankets. "Who's Skargo?" I whispered.

Davir, lighting a lamp hanging from the ceiling, flicked the lit match out and tossed it at me. "Never mind that, where's Zeebers, huh? How comes we haven't seen you in a month?"

"Shush. Shush! No questions, now, D. Leave it till the morning. We'll chat then." Bulaven turned Davir away from my cot, slapping the smoking match away before it could set anything alight. "Sleep now, Larn. Don't worry. We'll be here when you wake up."

"Why you calling him that?"

"That's his name." Scholar, sitting on his cot, removed his rewired glasses and folded the arms. "Yeah, I'm Skargo, New Fish. You make sleeping sounds. Don't be wetting the bed, now."

Sleep came readily. With the Vardan's chatter growing quieter, I entered a realm of pitch-dark, with only the scratches and sniffs of blind, toothless Orks keeping me company throughout the night.

"Arise, Larn." Bulaven's gloved hand squeezed my shoulder. "We're ten short of five-thirty. Kaulewicz left your clothes beside your boots. Better be getting dressed."

Through gummed-up eyes, I noticed shapes moving around me. "Why so early?"

"Alpha's on a mess-detail – that's us. We get to play dogsbody to the mess lifers this morning."

"Uhh, lifers?" I wormed my way up from the half dozen or so blankets burying me, sniffing in the chill air. The lamp above my head had long since burned out.

"Hurry, hurry, New Fish." Davir pushed past Bulaven, carrying his greatcoat in one hand, and service weapon in the other. "Chelkar will punch our hearts out if we're late for roll-call."

"Punch our hearts out, yeah…" I leant over the side of my cot, searching the folded clothes for my shorts and trousers. All three Vardans, readying themselves far quicker than I had, stood waiting by the tent flap for me to finish sorting my puttees. At the sound of a whistle, Davir slunk off. Hesitating for a moment, Skargo glanced at Bulaven, who shook his head. "Go."

"Sorry." I tied off the long tab, wiggling my foot inside the hard leather.

"Sleep well?"

"No."

"Sleep will come easy soon."

"I'm freezing."

"Aah, that'll become second nature, too. Here." Bulaven passed me my parka. "Turn 'round."

"Ta." The fur lining was an extra layer of comfort over the fleeting warmth my olive grey Jumael uniform provided. Svenk's scarf, I wore beneath the parka.

"Follow me now, Larn." Bulaven drew the tent flap back, letting the wind over the threshold. Drawing the Parka around me, I buttoned it up to my chin, pulling the hood up. Bulaven, bareheaded, stamped his feet. "Nice morning."

A sorry sight, fewer than 100 men, lounged around beneath a marquee, smoking or chatting quietly, many sitting upon mothballed armchairs or foldout seats. Uncovered gas lamps hissed, lending warmth to the gathered company.

"Here." Bulaven squatted beside Davir and Skargo, motioning for me to do the same. "Eh, ask away. It'll keep you awake."

Not like I'm going to fall asleep out here. "What's a lifer? What's the Crotch? Why aren't you on the line?"

"Oh, simmer down, son." Davir rubbed his eyes with thumb and forefinger. "Hoped Sawbones would put you on the straight and narrow after Mister Green zipped you but no, you're still small and twatty."

"Well…" Bulaven scratched his head, batting a small flask out of Skargo's hand. "'Ey, not now, Scholar, too early! Straight off, I can say we're on the line ten days, in reserve for six, and two resting. We've just had our six. It's light duty for forty-eight hours now. The eighty swinging dicks here are a third of Alpha, so we sort of operate in thirds. Aah, you know our strength. We told you on your first day, remember?"

"Er…"

"His mind's like a sieve at this hour." Skargo chortled. "A lifer is someone – quite often an officer – that exercises authority they don't deserve to have. Lots of rear-echelon cogitator-commandos like to think they can throw their weight around over us. Last lifer-type led us out beyond the wire and got wasted for his trouble. No tears shed there, I can tell ya. Thought he could get us killed and win a medal. We skuzzy grunts are too tough for that."

"D, enlighten Larn on the Crotch."

Grasping his groin, Davir explained, shortly, that the Crotch was a simple nickname. "The Guard: that's us. We're stinkin' like a crotch too by now, 'cept you, butter-balls. Odd one out…"

"There." Bulaven thumped me on the back. "Feel better?"

Coughing, I bent double. "Oh, God."

Kaulewicz, stopping beside me, nudged my arm. "Didn't need to overturn his bunk, did you?"

"Nah, Corp, Larn's squared away." Bulaven patted the back of my hood. "Sorted his own shit himself."

"Hmph. Teach him everything, Bull." Kaulewicz moved away. "Sarn't closing fast."

True to Kaulewicz's word, Chelkar made his appearance. No officers anymore. Only corporals and sergeants.

"Anybody missing?" Chelkar's narrowed eyes travelled across the sea of fur and beards, awaiting any calls of absence. "Alright then. Mess detail, forty-eight hours."

A chorus of groans, intermixed with exclamations of general discontent, rippled through the Vardans. Crushed cans and bits of muck were lobbed at Chelkar, who never moved or flinched once "Uh-huh. Well, the joys of serving the lifers look to be lost on you then." Chelkar placed his hands on his hips and paced around. "Last night, a member of the present company was wrongfully placed inside the pit with its resident, going hand-to-hand with the horror and coming out on top."

The groans were swiftly silenced, leaving hushed whispers in their place, as Vardans quizzed one another on which of their number had fought.

"I say wrongfully. What I mean is, tonight one of you lot will be tossed in there by me, intentionally that is, if you do not all muck in with the mess detail."

"What if we all refuse to do the lifer's bidding?" A Vardan piped up. "Can't toss us all in."

"Then, it's back on the line for all of us." Chelkar rubbed his hands together. "I know you all very well by now. I'd like these forty-eight hours just as much as any of you would. I'm sorry it's with the lifers, but we're either taking their shit in the rear, or taking Mister Green's shit up on the line." Chelkar tugged off a glove and wiggled a finger in his ear. "These poor, tired ears need a rest. They've got the old ringing. Yours have too, haven't they?"

Ringing? I probed my own ear, finding nothing of the like Chelkar described. Must be a Vardan thing.

"As one." Chelkar led off. "Be sure to hand in your arms before assuming mess duty. I don't want to see any cocked pistols underneath aprons."

"Bayonets, Sarn't?"

"No bayonets, knives, sharp sticks, or even evil thoughts, as I know many of you harbour towards our pals in the rear."

"Pals? Sarn't, Mister Green's a mere adversary. The lifers and their snuffies are our enemies." A Vardan put. "Enemies of grunts one and all."

Staying put with Bulaven, Skargo, and Davir, I rose with them, tagging along in their little group. Where are we going?

"With us, Larn. There's a good lad." Bulaven brought me forwards to walk beside him.

"Wouldn't know anything about the pit, would you?" Skargo looked over his shoulder at me.

"What's that?" I glanced at Bulaven.

"Aw, don't worry about it. Nothing to do with us." Bulaven patted my shoulder. "No danger where we're going."

"'Cept from the lifers and their snuffies." Davir snorted. "Yes, sir. No, sir. Please, be gentle, sir."

The four of us, tucked inside the crowd, trooped through the gate of the command complex, past the Vardan weapon teams, the wire, and the concrete barricades, in to the shadow of the triangular building.

"It's where the generals live, boy." Davir scratched his ratty beard. "It's a dream of mine. Jack a six-inch battery and CFF on the very tip-top of the general's bunker."

"We had track-mounted rocket arty in year one. Should've done it then, my friend." Skargo smiled. "You'll get 'em someday."

Around on the north side, the Vardans were admitted through a blast door, guarded by who, presumably, were snuffies under the thumbs of the lifers. Their greatcoats bore little dirt, and their hard covers were without camouflage, leaving a shiny drab that would glint in the sunlight. Too good to bother with us, I thought, lowering my gaze as I passed by the armed guards.

"See the lifer in his natural habitat." Somebody commented.

"Not a single hair on these bloke's chests."

"Step away, my boy." Bulaven took me by the shoulder and glared at a clean snuffy with a shiny bayonet. "Boys with clean cocks are sought after here. Do a little favour for an officer here and there then you'll never be put on the line again. You're too good for that though, aren't you?"

Nodding along with him, I waited as Alpha handed in their arms to a crisply-attired lifer sitting in an office behind a mesh screen; a world entirely different to ours. Once the Vardan's arms were handed in, I followed the crowd in to a narrow room filled with benches and wooden pegs to hang clothing on. Well accustomed to this, the Vardans donned white cotton coats, taken from lockers, in place of their greatcoats and furs, removing their covers too. So many had streaks of grey in their hair, or were grey outright. Does combat age a person?

"What do I do?" I whispered.

Snapping the buttons on his wide-breasted jacket, Bulaven turned to me. "Hmm?"

"Help me."

"Hang your jacket up and grab your whites from the locker over there. We'll be sterilising our hands after this, then it's off to the kitchen for us all."

"I never worked a kitchen before…"

"Neither did I." Bulaven pointed out a small group of Vardans, crowding around an open locker. "Be quick now, all the small jackets will be gone."

The diminished pile of folded whites, left in the locker once the Vardans had finished sifting through for articles their own size, only deepened my gloom. Fifty-four inch? Nearly fit two of me in that. Label after label read sizes above fifty inch. Throne, they're like a tent on me.

"Alright?" Bulaven asked, once I'd returned wearing the jacket. Giving a shake of my head, I trod in the threesome's wake, stopping by a steel sink to apply sterilising gel to my hands. Is this necessary?

"Yup. I can tell what you're thinking just by the look on your face, Larn." Skargo chuckled. His glasses were tucked in his whites' breast pocket, leaving him looking a little strange to me with them off. "Morbid disgust, I think we'll call that."

"Oh, is he too good for this too?" Davir straightened the blue cap he wore, tilting the brim forwards and the rear seam up. "Entitled piece of shit. We work for our living. You do too."

"Aw, stop needling him, D. It's us against the lifers, remember? Let's not divide our house, now. We're doing vital work for the war effort, here."

"Feeding officers? Nah, worse. We're feeding pencil-pushers and paper-shifters. They'll never set foot where we live. Never lug ammo or cover a sector. Mister Green in't nothing but a nuisance."

"Well, we're all in the same shit."

"Yeah, just they wouldn't see it that way. They don't think like us, the lifers. Might as well compare them to Mister Green or a stickie."

"What's a stickie?" I had never heard of such a term used before. Some other murderous xenos race they didn't bother to tell us about in Phase One?

"Pointy-eared pricks. Nothing more 'an pirates with lasers and flashy ships. Kill ya as soon as look at ya."

"Why stickie?" I frowned up at Bulaven, who shrugged.

"Anyway, they'll split us up in to separate teams for the different stations in the kitchen. Not sure where you'll be, Larn. Can you cook?"

"No."

"Potwash, then."

"Will you lot be with me? I don't want to be on my own."

"I don't know, Larn, I'm sorry. It's up to the mess sergeant."

Through a set of double-doors, the pale green walls became a stark white. Chaos, at least that was how the kitchen appeared to my eyes, was in full swing. Chefs in crumpled grey hats bustled around, firing up the gas stoves and cooking surfaces, ordering the white-clad Vardans to man the many empty stations.

"Let's talk to the mess sergeant. See where he wants you." Bulaven led me to a clean-shaven Vardan standing in the centre of everything, who, by the sound of his voice, was in charge.

"Where d'you want the boy, Sarn't?"

"Uh?" The mess sergeant's brow furrowed. "Same station as before, Bulaven. Don't fuck with me this time of the morning."

"No-no, this one hasn't done mess before."

"Can he cook?" The mess sergeant's gaze roved around the kitchen's stations. Spotting a misdemeanour, he shouted at the pair of Vardans guilty. He never once looked at me, only giving Bulaven a disinterested glance.

"No, 'fraid not."

"Potwash. Get him scrubbing. Change the bins and just keep everything tidy."

"Alright. Larn, you're over in the corner, by that sink. See it?" Bulaven pointed out the station to me. "Your job's to keep the piles of dirty plates and cutlery clean. Make sense?"

My heart sunk. "Yeah."

"Good, good."

"Am I gonna be alone?"

"…Well, we're all just over here on the fryers. You won't be alone."

"Got no one else to talk to…"

"Please, Larn. You need to stand up on your own two feet, for once. I'm sorry about this. It's a shit detail, we all know that. You've just got to muck in with the rest of us and accept it. I'll show you, c'mon."

Letting Bulaven lead me to the potwash station, I stared at the yellow water filling the sink up to the brim, and the heaps of plates and pots submerged in its depths. Bulaven tutted. "Bastards should have cleaned all this up last night instead of leaving it all for us in the morning. Lazy of them." Rolling up his sleeves, Bulaven reached down and picked out a pair of saucepans. "I will help you clear this mess, then you're on your own, Larn."

Ably assisted by Bulaven, I cleared the two dozen or so plates and pans from the sink, stacking them on the worktop beside it. The water level remained precariously high, even with all the big things lifted out. "Some clodhopper's only gone and stuffed the drain with bits of food," Bulaven grunted, his bare arm submerged up to the elbow. "Dumb lifer stooges."

"Eurgh, what's that?" I stepped back, covering my nose, when Bulaven showed me a slimy mess of green and grey gunk in his hand.

"Crap they tip off from the plates. Leftovers, unused ingredients, you name it." Bulaven tossed the wastage in to a bin beneath the sink. "God, they'd better not have tipped oil or fatty stuff down there, 'cause that'll block the drains and give us a shitter time than usual."

"Erm…"

"Ah, look, if you need any help. You find yourself overwhelmed, come find me. I'll do my best to drop everything and help you here, Larn."

I rested my hands on the sink, staring down at the brown residue left by the draining water. "Ta. Thanks for everything."

"Mmm, better fill that sink up again. Hot, clean, soapy water. There's a sponge in one of the cupboards over your head. Take care now."

With no means of telling the time, I laboured through the stacks of dirty plates and pans, cursing the shit detail I was saddled with. "By the numbers," I said to myself. "You had a good home but you left, you're right. You had a good home but you left, you're right."

The narrow ray of sunshine poking through the impenetrable murk was that nobody was adding to the pile, everybody being all to busy with preparing breakfast for the officers. "What time is it?" I asked Bulaven, when he sauntered over.

"Urm, 'bout seven-thirty. The lifer flock should be rolling in shortly. Hey, you've done a great job here. Nice and spick."

"I just…"

"Nah, it's great. Oi, I've got something over here to show you, quick."

"What?"

"Come."

Skargo and Davir, both overseeing a pair of steaming pots, giggled in hushed whispers. "Present from Deadly Delta, lifers." Davir's lips drew back, showing me blackened, animal teeth. "Ready, m'boys?"

"Been building mine up all morning." Skargo made a noise in his throat. "Careful the mess sarn't don't see."

In unison, the Vardans gobbed inside the stew pot. Only at Bulaven's insistence did I contribute.

"Don't feel right, doing that." I wiped a thin dribble of phlegm from my chin, as Skargo stirred the contents with a wooden spoon.

"No, no, no, they're only officers – and better, they're lifers and rear-echelon paper-peddlers." Davir grinned. "Now…" His hand slunk down the front of his trousers. "Something special."

"Oh, we at stage two?" Skargo copied Davir and came out with a curly hair.

"Really? You want the lifers to suck you off, D?"

"Any rear-echelon mother-fucker can suck my big animal cock off. They're jealous 'cause they ain't got anything down the front o' their trousers. Might add another to the recipe…"

"Larn, don't copy D or Skargo. They're a bad influence." Bulaven flicked soup on a wooden spoon at D's whites. "Animal. Beast."

"To counter the Ork, one must think and act like the Ork." Davir chomped a floury crust Skargo passed to him.

"Act like the Ork?"

I jumped, hearing the sound of Chelkar's voice behind me. Two large hands – one wearing oven gloves – rested on mine and Bulaven's shoulders. "Well, that's you down to a T, Davir. Only one that could give you a run for your money, and that's Zeebers. Shame he bought the farm. Alright, you two?"

"Alright, Sarn't. Just having us a stew." Bulaven nodded at Chelkar.

"How's our newest wetnose?" Chelkar beamed down at me. "Settling in alright?"

"Larn just blitzed the potwash. Reckon he's on his way to chef."

"Who? Didn't know he had a name." Chelkar frowned.

Seeing the mess sergeant, Chelkar wandered off to talk to him, leaving me with yet more questions on the odd jargon the Vardans used. Davir of all people spoke first. "Nobody dies here. People get hurt, sure. But, nobody dies. They take on real estate. It's all about real estate, see."

Skargo, working the stirring spoon, offered his own opinion. "We've been fighting over the same patch of real estate for so long, we can't even remember why we're fighting."

"Uh? Yes, we do." Bulaven jerked his thumb over his shoulder. "It's the prom refineries and the mines underneath. The ore, boys, the ore."

"Or what?"

"Or something else!" Davir bounced up and down on his heels. "Can we keep him, Bull? He's making me laugh."

The mess sergeant swooping down broke up our collective. "Potwash station's unmanned. Get your smooth arse over and work it, boy."

A sharp slap on my rump prompted me to scoot away from the mess sergeant's advances, something Davir and Skargo found extremely amusing. A little later, Bulaven came over. "If you ever find yourself alone in a room with the mess sergeant, leave immediately."

"Eh?"

"Hah! Sorry, Larn, you lose your inhibitions a bit when there's so little female company out there. Aha, did old Svenk take you out one night to a certain seedy dugout?"

"Wha – no, I swear I never…"

"You didn't? I was right in there, my first time. Don't be so shy. Nobody will laugh." Bulaven thumped his chest. "Rite of passage, so it is. Need to find you a cute little thing your size sometime."

"Um, I don't…"

"Be a boost to your confidence, I can tell you. What colour hair do you go for: brown, red, yellow?"

"…I've gotta go take the bins out." I sidled away from Bulaven, leaving my sodden sponge in the sink.

"Help you?"

"N…" Clamping my mouth shut before I could rebuke Bulaven, I sighed. The two of us, a pair of binbags over our shoulders, stepped out of the back door, in to a walled yard occupied by wheeled bins.

"Aah, mine's leaking! Disgusting." Bulaven lifted a lid up and swung his first bag in to the bin nearest the mesh gate. Tottering under my load, I made for the beckoning Bulaven. An urgent twinge in my back and both binbags slipped from my hands. Swearing aloud, I bent nearly double, clasping the small of my back, dimly hearing Bulaven rushing to me.

"S'alright, I got you, Larn." Bulaven walked me over to a ledge outside the kitchen and sat me down upon it. "You okay there?"

My head between my knees, I groaned, "mmm, no, just a twinge. Felt like a tree-branch through my back."

"What happened to you, Larn, eh? Svenk never said."

With the patient Bulaven listening, I took him through the period between waking up at dawn and our reunion. It was partway through this when Davir and Skargo interrupted, prompting Bulaven to shush them.

"Don't shush me, I'm at liberty to speak how I want here." Davir flicked open a lighter and danced the flame underneath a cigarette poking out of Skargo's mouth. "Nabbed the smokes off lifer scum. Ain't we enterprising!"

"Mmm, have one, Bull." Skargo plonked himself on the step next to Davir.

"Many thanks, Scholar." Bulaven stuck the cigarette behind his ear and touched my shoulder. "You were saying, Larn?"

With my tongue clinging to my dry mouth, I finished recounting my tale to Bulaven.

"Can he stop crying and act like a grownup." Davir sneered. "Only grownups here."

Stepping over to Davir, Bulaven leant forwards on one knee, pressing his face up close to Davir's.

"Larn, is that your name?" Skargo slipped away from Davir and put an arm around my shoulder. "You don't have to stop doing anything. Here." The cigarette, now held in Skargo's fingers, hoved in towards my mouth. The strange warmth touched my lips, and the moment I inhaled, the hot smoke, tickling my lungs, brought on a fit of coughing.

"Never smoked before?" Bulaven dragged Davir in to a headlock, lifted him upright and took him for a walk around the yard. "First time, yeah? Gets easier, trust us."

"Ehh, sorry for the shit detail. We'll pull through. Always do." Smiling at Bulaven and the struggling Davir, Skargo retrieved his cigarette. "A couple for you, Larn." In his palm, three cigarettes sat.

"Ta." I sniffed and wiped the wetness from my cheeks, pocketing the smokes.

"Hey, look." Skargo nudged me. "We get to nab the officer's leftovers, once they've had enough. Hmm, like the sound of that?"

Running Davir back over, Bulaven let him go, sending him on his way with a boot. "Right, you've had your exercise. Back in your cell."

After one last drag, Skargo ground his cigarette underneath his heel, tapping me on the arm. "C'mon, Deadly Delta, back to work now. Up you get, Larn. No smoking inside, now."

"Wonder if the lifers are tasting our delicacy?" Bulaven snorted, straightening his cap. "Courtesy of Delta Fireteam, First Squad, Fourth Platoon, Alpha Company. Yea, we deal in death and lead. Killing is our business and business is booming."

---

Noon came and went without remark. We served – the officers, coming and going in hordes of sharply creased tunics and buffed boots – ate. Our own mealtime – fifteen minutes – we took standing up and under the hawk-eyes of the mess sergeant, who then ordered us to dispose of the rest in to wastage then get back to work. It was Chelkar, the unlikely saviour, who presented a portion of our number with an alternative to working mess in the afternoon in the form of an announcement.

"A platoon is being sent on a mine detail. Today is Fourth's turn. Fourth Platoon. One quarter of our number."

"Aw, shit!" Davir exclaimed. "We're getting it good today."

Mine detail. Mine clearing? Swallowing hard, I looked to Bulaven, shaking my head. "No."

"Right, fall out, Fourth. Hand your whites in and form up outside the eastern gate in ten minutes." Chelkar clapped his hands. "Move 'em out!"

"Hurry now, Larn." Bulaven whisked me out of the kitchen and back to the locker room, after Davir and Skargo had beat a retreat from the mess sergeant.

"I've never done mine-clearing before," I mumbled, unbuttoning my white jacket and dumping it with the other dirty clothing. Hearing this, Davir gave a hoot.

"Mine detail – down the mine, Larn. We're now on a dig detail for the rest of the day." Bulaven tossed me a pair of leather and cotton gloves. "Protect your hands from blisters, they will."

"Why's he get gloves? He don't deserve 'em yet." Davir shook his fist. "A good afternoon's back-breaking labour will do him good. Might even set his gammy back straight."

A fluttering in my stomach and my hand strayed to my back, rubbing the numb patch of flesh where the surgeons had operated. Blinking, I turned away from Davir, a warmth rushing to my cheeks.

"Chin up, you." Bulaven held out the officer's parka to me. "We're all going to the same place, doing the same thing as you are. Whatever hardship come our way, we all share it together. That's how Vardans work."

"But, I'm not Vardan…"

"…Someday."

Raising my hood against the wind, I shadowed the other three on our march out of the compound, taking a dangerously close route to the entrance of the pit, though the party made no turning, heading straight past it and on in to the gutted city, settling my queasy stomach. In the shadow of an imperial cathedral, whose glory was now nothing more than a shell-peppered box of ruined stone roof and crumbling walls, an artillery park sat. Surrounded by a sandbag wall and bunkers on the corners, the field artillery battery, described by a wooden sign with white lettering on it, was known as the 377th. A snuffy Vardan, wearing a naked helmet with a white stripe ringing it, waggled a wooden baton at me. "You, brown-pants, fall out of that funeral procession and pick up that shovel."

"Don't." Bulaven gripped my arm.

"Uh-uh, stand fast, shit-stain." The snuffy launched himself forwards, thwacking me in the side. "You pricks, leave."

"Nuh-uh. Number ten. This fireteam's on a dig detail." Davir sneered.

"And this wetnose is on a working party. He's going to fill sandbags for my bunker. I'm a corporal. You do as I say." The corporal hooked a thumb towards the guard bunker behind him. A big bite had been taken out of the corner. A mortar or rocket shell had blasted through one layer of bags and split another, second layer, spilling sand.

"Sandbags for my bunker, many, many of them." The corporal smiled smugly.

"Number ten, pig." Skargo's nostrils flared.

"Alright. Okay, you can all fill sandbags for my bunker."

"Look in to my eye…" Bulaven pressed his finger to his eyelid. "Dumb animal. Skuzzy lifer-whore—"

The deep shade of beetroot darkening the lifer corporal's face turned a frail white. Davir, taking the corporal's momentary lapse of situational awareness in his stride, slunk around behind the snuffy and drove his boot up between the snuffy's legs. With the windbag deflating on to the ground, Davir seized the baton and poked at the bruised pride. "Fucking turd," he spat.

"Aren't they gonna hear?" I gaped at the prone and groaning corporal.

"Cannon-cockers lose their hearing after ten years working the 132's," Skargo droned. "They use hand-signals."

Spitting on the corporal's clean jacket, Davir hurled the baton away. "You'll get used to this place. You'll change. You'll understand."

"Move, Larn." Bulaven, taking my shoulders, hustled me after Skargo and Davir, both beating a retreat before the corporal could call his friends.

"Tonight, I'm gonna be an Ork sapper. Set one off underneath that prick's bunker." Davir whispered, shaking Skargo's arm. "Keep the lifers on their toes. Too long since infiltrators got this far in to the rear."

"That happen often?" I asked Bulaven.

"No." Bulaven threw a glance over his shoulder. "We're alright. Less skuzzy grunt next time, D."

"Fuck needed the boot, else he would have jumped on our programme, hard."

"Number ten?"

"This is bad. No questions now, Larn."

"Satchel underneath that bunker tonight. Blow him right off his throne."

"Pace yourself, D."

Further in to Butcher's Rock, over a drained canal and sets of disused railway tracks, a siding led up to a warehouse, where the roof was open to the sky. Civilians, in similar garb as the three crones, shuffled about, carting wheelbarrows of what looked like rubbish. Oh, God… Lead filled my boots, gluing me to the spot. My nightmare of entombment whilst conscious and paralysed had – in a way – come true, only without the danger of burial, but of the Ork.

"Larn?" Bulaven alone stopped to wait for me.

Hanging my head, I avoided looking at any of the civilians, treading in Bulaven's wake.

"Here, Larn. Put this on." Bulaven gave me a hard hat with a lamp attached to the brow. "Gloves too."

"Hurry up!" Skargo gestured from the centre of the tightly-packed 4th Platoon. "Going down, Car One."

"Oh, oh, he gets the gloves, does he?" Davir pawed at the pair of leather and cotton gloves, formerly belonging to Bulaven.

"Aw, shuddup!" The skuzzy grunts of 4th chorused.

Elbowed by Davir, I was promptly dragged back by Skargo. Two halves of a steel grate shut us out from the surface, nearly slamming in to me. Rattling loudly, the lift shuddered down. In the gloom, Skargo's voice sounded in my ear. "Can you hear me?"

Nodding, I listened.

"There's a network of tunnels beneath the city. Some connect with the sewers, others go elsewhere. We hack where the diggers tell us to, and hopefully we can cart up some ore today. Each tunnel is named after one of us. So, Repzik and Zeebers should be some of the newer branches."

Okay, why does he need to tell me this? I scuffed my heels across the rough grate beneath me.

"Light." Bulaven, touching something on my helmet, powered the lamp. "Aah, might not need that." Jiggling my head, Bulaven turned the helmet-light off. "Plenty of light here."

Cables hung down shaft. At intervals, lamps were pinned to the rock. No sooner had the shuddering stopped, when a voice called at us to offload.

"Come on, Larn, get moving." Skargo and Davir, both behind, pushed at me to disembark, upon the doors parting. At the head of the platoon, somewhat against my will, I came face-to-face with a Vardan – most looked the same to me – wearing a hard hat similar to mine.

"Ten men down Zeebers, another ten down Repzik." The miner squinted down at me, his chin level with my eyes. "Quickly, quickly."

Again, bustled along by those behind, I gawked up at a large gallery, decorated with floodlights and dotted with many smaller tunnels snaking off in all directions, each one ripe with the chink of pickaxes. Where do I go?

"Hold on, hold on." Bulaven, helpfully, moved around me. "This way, now."

"This gallery's the collection point for the ore," Skargo said to me. "See those sledges waiting over there?"

I followed where Skargo's finger was pointing, noticing a line-up of repulsor sledges crammed with buckets of freshly-hacked ore. With a free lift, the miners were now ferrying the loads inside, ready for transportation to the surface. Ahead of me, Bulaven slipped through a round opening in the tunnel wall, trailing a length of cable through his hand. "Cable's come unhooked."

With only the bobbing back to follow, I paused, on Bulaven setting the fallen cable where it had been hooked to the wall by a peg. "Lamps on, boys."

Fingers searching for the on-off switch, I felt a prod from behind and a growl from Davir. "Shag it, wetpants."

"Let me…" Skargo sidled past Davir and touched a spot my fingers had missed entirely.

"Ta." I settled the red glow on Bulaven. "Why's it red?"

"So you don't get blinded, when you go back outside." Davir thrust me in to the wall, pushing past. "Where's that sled, then?"

"Nuh-uh, Larn's taking the sled," Bulaven said. "D…? Larn takes it."

"Aw, stop motherin' him, Bull." Davir kicked at an empty sledge, left resting against the tunnel wall.

"Now, D, come on." Skargo took a pickaxe from a pile of tools the other Vardans were helping themselves to. "Dig out." He reversed the pick with one hand and held the haft out to Davir. "In both senses," he added, sniggering.

"D, you ran from no-man's land that night, tail between your legs. Larn crawled out; in daylight too. You cannot speak about him." Bull glared, raising his voice over the clack of pick-heads on the bare rock. "Took shrapnel, so he's born again, I say. A grunt through and through."

"Bah." D raised his pick high enough above his head that I shrunk away, bashing in to another Vardan.

"Watch yourself, foolish boy!"

"Sorry." I scooped up a chisel and hammer from a miner's satchel. Both were tools I recognised from my father's workshop back home, though applying them to rock, I had not the faintest idea of the technique needed. "What we looking for?" Curious, I shone my lamp across the craggy wall that ended Zeebers.

"The harder the better," Bulaven replied. "Mind yourself, Larn. Don't sneak up on any of us. You might get a pick in the eye."

I gulped, slipping in next to Bulaven, before he could swing. What am I supposed to be doing? Much fruitless chipping later, I received a tap on the shoulder from Bulaven. "Mind carting the stuff up to the collection point?"

"Uh?" I swept my lamp over the fully-loaded sledge. Warm air from the repulsors wafted over my toes.

"Hey…" Bulaven rested his pick-head on the tunnel floor and leant on it. "Push with your knees, not your back. If you have to bend down and pick up something heavy, bend your knees also, and keep your back straight."

Meeting Bulaven's glinting eyes, I nodded and stuck a shoulder in to the sledge. The gentle hum of the engine grew as the sledge gained momentum. A request from Skargo to bring the sledge back, once it was empty, I responded with nothing more than a stifled grunt. If you want it back so badly, you push it.

As in the kitchen, time did not exist in the subterranean tunnels of Butcher's Rock. Dour-faced, bearded shadows swung pickaxes in time with one another, murmuring hymns. Hands, reaching out for the sledge from the darkness, forced me to halt every now and again as foremen examined the quality of the ore, which, to my eyes, was just rubble. Eventually, I found the large gallery and shunted the sledge in behind the others, awaiting loading. Slumping against it, I tugged at my collar. Oh, God, that nearly killed me. Why did I wear the parka? Underneath the hard hat, my hair was plastered to my head. Everything from my shoulders downwards ached.

"Are you supposed to be up here?"

"Um…" My head snapped up from where I was resting it in my arms. Blinking up at a foreman, I mumbled, "just bringing the ore up to…"

"And now you will return to your dig team, Private." The foreman tapped an axe haft upon the sledge's flank.

"I – I need an empty…"

The foreman slammed his baton down, the polished wood producing a sharp clang, enough to send me scampering off in to a tunnel, sans sledge. Skidding to a stop outside of the foreman's sight, I switched my lamp on and played it up and down the tunnel. Oh, no, this isn't the one. I peered at the way ahead. What's that noise? Catching my ear, a strange hum, of an entirely different vein from the gentle repulsors, drew me to a corner. Light came from an open chamber, wider than the gallery behind me. No, I need the sledge. Braving the foreman's wrath, I returned to the gallery and snuck back down to Zeebers, my curiosity piqued at the other chamber and the glow inside.

"I couldn't grab an empty. I'm sorry."

"…Ah." Bull leant on his pick. "One of the foremen giving you trouble?"

"Mmm, yeah…"

"He gonna get himself hurt going off on his own?" Davir shook his head and spat on the ground. "Now we've got no sledge."

"Lift one from another tunnel?" Skargo suggested. "Lots to choose from."

"Yeah, and only a few we know the ins and outs of. Oi!" Davir tapped my elbow. "Don't be wandering off down any other tunnel, 'cause we're the ones who're gonna be looking for you if you do. So don't."

"Well, it's just sewers, innit?"

"Don't talk back to me. Before you know it, you'll be knee-deep in blood, guts, and piss-water. There's worse things than us down here."

"Right, I'll go see the foreman. Get this sorted out." Bulaven leant his pick against the wall.

"Any toilets here?"

"Find a crack in the wall and go."

"Yeah, what D said. Nothing formal here. If you have to go, just go."

Is this what all sixteen weeks' training was for? I asked myself, finding a suitable orifice in the wall, and unzipping my trousers. Washing dishes and carting rocks around?

A harsh whistle, followed by a cry to put down tools, rolling up the tunnel, ended the day's labour.

"Ooh… time is it?" Skargo stretched his back. "Normal knocking-off time?"

"Dunno. I dunno, Scholar." Davir's thumbs rubbed his biceps. "Always gets me, that."

"We knock off at ten," Bulaven said. "Eat, sleep, back to work before first light."

"Great," I said under my breath.

"Well done, today."

I received a pat on my back from Bulaven, my stomach gargling in response. "Hungry."

"We'll eat then head back to the billet."

"I've got to go do something."

"Yes. Eat first, though."

"Doc Svenk. Let him know I'm alright."

"Ah, yes. Good fellow."

My breath came out a white cloud on our return to the surface, leading me to button up my parka and raise the hood. "Lovely Broucheroc evening," somebody said.

Throne, it's freezing. I stamped my feet, tucking my chin down against the fur lining.

"Tea with a little to spice it up, huh, Larn?" Bulaven ruffled my hood. "Just the job for a warm summer's night."

"Warm—?" I missed the raised rail, flying forwards in to Skargo.

"Whey-hey, he's keen!" Skargo absorbed my momentum, turned and righted me. "You alright, there?"

"Picks his moments, doesn't he?" Davir tutted, skipping over the rails, without incident. "Might've done that down Zeebers and got your eye poked out."

"Say nothing of it, D. Let us eat and be thankful all of us – Deadly Delta – made use of ourselves this day."

Once back inside the perimeter, 4th Platoon gathered in the yard behind the officers' mess where the wastage was thrown, to eat off a line of foldout tables, where food leftover from the officers' meals had been laid out. "Grox meat, grain gruel, buttered bread, tea. Anything you want…?" Bulaven made a space for me, which was quickly filled by the ravenous Skargo. No longer able to see what I wanted, I reached between Bulaven and Skargo, acquiring a slice of bread and gobbling it down.

"Yep, more where that came from." Bulaven passed back a bowl of soup. "Vegetables and protein. Slurp that down. Some tea, too?"

"Ta." I tilted the bowl up, drinking from the rim, the liquid a viscous blessing from the Emperor. Not a lost soldier anymore. I've found a place to be.

"You heading over to Cain Med now?" Bulaven said, once our stomachs were filled. "Want some company?"

"Nah, I'm alright. I'll dodge the patrols." I dangled a strip of grey grox-meat above me and chewed on it.

"We're past curfew, so watch it. See you back in the billet."

Pockets bulging with bags of bread and meat, I hurried around the command centre, wise for roving pairs of Vardans, bent on giving grief to paperless unfortunates, materialising. Outwardly, Cain Med was unchanged, still the same long tent, protected by concrete blocks. Slipping through the flap, I ran my eyes along the rows of beds, each one bearing a recuperating Vardan, with the serious cases nearer the far end, where the operating theatre was hidden behind a curtain. Doc? I tiptoed past the sleeping Vardans.

"Doc?" A Vardan stirred. "Uhh, my stomach…"

"Ssh, s'alright, mate." I dug inside a thigh pocket, bringing out a bag of bread slices and tearing off a piece for the Vardan. "'Ere."

"Oh, thank you." The Vardan, pale and clammy, ate the bread up. "Water."

"No water, sorry. Just the grub."

Throne, when were these men last fed? Weighing up the food I had on me, I began distributing my bread and meat to any Vardans who were awake. Sick men needed nutrition more than an able-bodied lad. Able-bodied? I rubbed the crink in my back when it twinged.

"Larn?"

"Doc!" I set the rest of my food upon a small table and went over to shake Svenk's hand. In medical whites and a surgical mask, the good doctor's ashen face had regained some trace of colour, seeing me alive and well.

"God, I thought you'd wandered off in to the night and got yourself lost. What happened, Larn?" Svenk shook.

I explained, in the short-term, of my ordeal in the pit, Chelkar's intervention, and my antics with 4th Platoon during the day.

Svenk's upper lips quivered, upon hearing my story. "Why, those bullying thugs. Look at us. Look at what ten years does to a man! Turns him in to an animal."

"Um, I'm alright, though." I shrugged. "No lasting harm."

Svenk scratched the back of his head. "Look, I'm sorry for dragging you along to something you didn't want to do. It's my fault you were thrown in to this mess."

"Aw, no, Doc. Don't blame yourself. I'm alright. I'm back with Bulaven and that…"

"That puts me at ease, that does." Svenk sighed. "You've got a lucky star shining down on you, young man. You'll pull through this, I know you will."

A tremor underneath my feet, rattled the steel frames of the cots. "Ork artillery?"

"No, no, you'd hear the shells in flight before the reports. Just a tremor. Been getting a little more frequent these past months. Could be what they're using to dig…"

"I, um…" I waved at the food I'd left for the convalescents. "Left some scran for the men 'ere. Just bread and bits of meat. Took it from officer leftovers. Go to waste otherwise."

"Well, it saves one of mine a trip." Svenk smiled, the corners of his bloodshot eyes crinkling. "You've a good heart, Larn. Take care, now."

"Be seeing you, Doc." I shook Svenk's hand again and walked out of Cain Med, heading for the billet and some shut-eye. Unchallenged, I reached Alpha Company's billet, unlacing the tent flaps and ducking inside.

"Whoo!" Davir barrelled at me, a rectangular object taped to his forehead. "I'm an Ork sapper!"

"Wha—?" I stepped back against a tent pole, quailing as Davir thrust a green clacker at me.

"Press it." Davir smirked.

"Don't touch—" Skargo swiped at the detonator of the mine Davir was part of, flicking the safety bar back in to place. "That's live ordnance!"

Hastening past Davir, I sat down on the empty bunk next to Bulaven's. "Why's he…?"

Clearing his throat, Bulaven aimed a finger at the mine Davir was prying off his head. "That's a Walloon anti-personnel mine. Tonight, Ork sappers are going to infiltrate as far as the 377th Field Artillery's position and set explosives beneath a boundary bunker."

"Ork sappers?"

"Yup." Davir lifted a bulging canvas bag up from beneath his bed. "And you're gonna be the one to arm this, young whippersnapper.

"What is it?"

"Satchel charge, numbnuts. Pawn your parka, we're ditty-bopping over to the three-seven-seven's bivouac." Davir tossed the Walloon aside, dangling the satchel charge in front of me. "You want to be born again? Take the fucking boom-bag and follow."

"Bull…?" I stammered, holding the heavy bag at arm's length, at least until my arms gave out.

"You want to play the victim all your life, Larn?" Bulaven said, his eyes dull. "You do what Davir tells you. I was in your place once."

Tugging the strap over my shoulder, I asked what it was Bulaven had done in order to be born again.

"Never you mind. I tell you, Larn, never look back on the past. Learn from it, but never brood on it. There is only the way ahead for you." Bulaven swept a hand across his chest. "Follow Davir. Do as you're told."

"We're getting one up on the lifers and their snuffies, Larn." Skargo winked. "It's how things work here."

What the hell am I doing? I plodded outside, after the hunched form of Davir, tightening my collar and hood. Bombing a friendly position. I could be shot for that!

"Hey." Davir slowed his pace. "Know the best way to kill an Ork? There was a skuzzy grunt I knew once, who told me that shooting Mister Green was a waste of time, 'cause they come back to life. So, he tied a satchel charge to the body and blew him in to invisible pieces. Most wondrous thing I ever saw. Flecks of steaming green shit. Course, the same grunt could only relax by tossing frags. More times he tossed 'em, the longer he let that fuse burn. Till, one time he pulled the pin and just stood there with it in his hand." Davir mimed a miniature explosion and whispered, "boom."

"Can you…?" I made to pass the satchel charge to Davir and take off back to the billet.

"Quit your bellyaching, scumbag. Come help Uncle D on a job." Davir hauled me on by the arm. "Not brown-streaking your way outta this one."

Once at the perimeter, Davir wormed his way through a gap in the wire that was well clear of the gate. "Don't want anyone seeing us on the way out," he whispered. "Careful with the satchel. Don't pull that red tab, 'cause we won't get far enough before it pops."

I scurried through the streets after Davir, dropping to my knees when he stopped on a rubble mound, burying a street corner. "Right where we need to be." Davir beckoned, seizing the satchel charge from me. "You see the slits?"

Throne, he doesn't want me to throw it actually inside, does he? A flush of warmth rolled down my back. Fingers tightening on my trouserlegs, I thought for an alternative. "How do I arm it?"

"Ssh. Pull the red end of the cord. See it? You've got four seconds."

"…Okay." Davir's hands pressed the bag against my chest.

"Oh, don't even think about leaving it outside." Davir chuckled, training a black muzzle on me. "I'll tap your knee. You'll be the victim of your own work then, see? I'm off free. Don't be warning the lifers, either. An Ork sniper might take a potshot."

Trembling beneath the fur, I slithered over to the partially-collapsed bunker, blinking through the brimming tears. God-Emperor forgive me. But, I don't want to die here. I found the pull igniter, squeezed it, and pulled, launching the bulky charge through the nearest slit. Wriggling back towards Davir, a wave of dirt sprayed me and an invisible fist wracked my body, a muffled roar boxing my ears. Davir's shrill voice sliced through the haze, "Ork sappers!" followed by him shooting off his lasgun in to the air. "Sapper attack!"

Within seconds, the artillery park lit up, with startled grunts blasting their pieces off everywhere. Davir's grinning face laughed at me. "Cor, that was terrific, my friend." He bundled me away from the cacophony of confused bleats, the artillerymen firing off everything at their disposal; an extravagant lightshow without an audience.

"Showed 'em up good, huh?" Davir cackled louder once we were far enough away from the artillery. "You're a proper grunt now. No more New Fish, no more wetpants." Davir slammed a fist in to my shoulder, knocking me off balance. "Welcome to the fireteam. You're in Deadly Delta of Fourth now, Larn. Number one!"

My left shoulder, limp and numb, I rubbed gingerly. "Number one?"

"Number one: this is good!" Davir skipped ahead of me. "Race you back to the wire."

With leaden boots, I made the trip back through the wire, a cloud of misery hanging over my head. No, not number one, Davir. Number ten. Number ten-thousand. Wasn't it the Orks that did bad things, not us? Why are we doing this to each other?