The high keening of falling bombs and the thuds of explosions preempted the assault. Sweat trickled down Kilroy's face, carrying grime and dust along with it. He cradled his lasgun in his hands and glanced behind him at the commissar. Farallon looked more nervous than himself, visibly shaking. Kilroy expected this was his first real trench combat situation; even though Kilroy had taken part in hundreds of attacks across no-man's land, his heart pumped fear-filled adrenaline throughout his body and filled his nose with the rusty smell of blood. He almost pitied the commissar his inexperience, but reminded himself that this was the man forcing him to get out of his comfortable trench in the first place and leave all his friends behind. He looked down at those friends, quiet, sleeping. He smiled, happy, thinking of all the memories they had together, but sad because he was leaving them. He knew he'd make new friends, though. He always did.
He turned to the commissar, whispering so as not to disturb his slumbering compatriots. "We're going to have to be quick and quiet. Attracting attention will be a sure way to die. Third platoon recieved full reinforcement this morning so some fire will be distracted to our right. Stay low, and stay behind me. Sir." Farallon eagerly nodded, his face pale. Kilroy's eyes narrowed. "And sir, if you do something stupid, you're on your own." The commissar swallowed around the lump in his throat. Abruptly, the friendly bombardment ceased.
Kilroy hauled himself out of the trench as whistles blew from other parts of the line, the commissar fumbling behind him. He darted forward, bending low and dodging between the strips of razorwire and the other wreckage on the field. The reek of decaying flesh hit him in the face; where the bodies in the trenches gave off the cloying stench of old, slow rot, this was the smell of rancid meat, sour and pungent. Chunks of that meat hung from the razorwire. He could imagine, could remember men rushing forward in their desparate attempt to reach the other side only to become snared in the wire and cut to shreds by enemy fire. He had even seen monofilament wire once on a Forgeworld. The man who had passed through it continued to run until he collapsed, legless, a few paces on, small beads of blood left behind on the wire the only indication something was there. He stopped in a small crater surrounded by the remains of an old centaur armored vehicle as bolter rounds raked across his assault path. He was surprised to see the commissar slide into the crater behind him, alive and physically undamaged. "Ready for more?" Kilroy blithely asked, and rushed back out of the crater as fire was redirected back toward the advancing allied forces on the right.
He was almost halfway when he hit the landmine. His whole body went numb as he felt himself lifted off his feet. Sounds jumped out of his range of hearing, ringing in his ears, and the world slowed down, the streaks of bolter rounds smeared across his vision with contrails of red fire. He felt a great pressure on his chest, like a gauntleted fist boring down into his heart and lungs, seeking to crush whatever lay beneath it. Impact.
He hit the ground and slid into a ditch, tumbling and coming to a rest on his back. He turned his head groggily at the shape of Commissar Farallon's blanched face examining his legs. His leg. Feeling returned to the rest of his body, but not to his right leg. He looked down and saw five pink toes with four rotten webbings between them. He also saw shards of shrapnel embedded in his calf. Lucky. He began to regain his senses, and his leg throbbed with pain, the metal slivers digging into his nerves with every convulsion. Not so lucky. Instinct taking over, he groped with his hands for his lasgun and found both pieces it had been broken into. Farallon was frantically wringing his hands. "Kilroy, what should I do? Tell me what to do! We have to keep going; no, we have to go back. Kilroy, please!"
Kilroy grunted in pain, his words strained. "Take my pack. Inside there are bandages and a knife. Use the knife. We stay here for the night." With that, he lost consciousness, head slipping into the mud. Farallon froze, alone, for the moment. Then he remembered how much he would loathe being alone, and worked the pack off of Kilroy's back. Explosions from small munitions and bolter fire still filled the air with the sound of war, but he concentrated on the task at hand, remembering his first-aid training at the progenium. He grabbed the knife, hesitating. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and shoved the knife in between the shrapnel and Kilroy's muscle, pulling at the metal with his other hand. The twisted scrap came out of his leg and blood came with it, but the commissar was quick to spray the synthetic bandage onto the wound.
When all that he could do was done, the bolter fire had ceased. It was clear that the attack had failed, just as Kilroy had said it would. Farallon sat back, exhausted, and sighed. "This was supposed to be my cadet training, with a whole squad of troopers at my back. All I have is him now, unconscious, stranded in the middle of no-man's land, with night fast approaching, with a bolt pistol, a knife, and some shovels. This is going to be one hell of a cadet exercise."
Night fell swiftly, like a shroud on the faces of the newly dead. Flares burst overhead like sickly, pale fireworks, and Kilroy pulled his eyelids apart from each other, the collection of filth on his body making the process difficult. He turned his head and looked around. There sat Farallon, the flares lighting his gaunt visage as the moon illumines the face of a man long drowned: weakly, and without intent. Kilroy stirred, raising an arm to block his eyes as another star exploded overhead, the streams of fire raining from the sky. The commissar turned to him, and the shadow playing about his brow lifted, Farallon sliding over next to the wounded soldier.
"Kilroy, you're awake! How are you feeling?" he asked, concern in his voice. Concern from a commissar? Perhaps humanity was not extinct yet, Kilroy mused.
"I feel alright. I'd feel better in a trench. We need to move as soon as we can; we're corpses at sunrise if we don't get fortified." Farallon nodded in agreement, but looked at Kilroy's leg with doubt.
"What of your leg? Your injury debilitates you and makes traversing no-man's land impossible."
Kilroy frowned. "I'll let you know what's impossible here, commissar." Pushing back on the ground and with some assistance from Farallon, he managed to raise himself into a low crouch. He winced in pain as mud squished between his toes. He could feel the burning of the infection, yes, but also of the very ground he stood on, polluted and destroyed. The gritty earth was poisoning him. "Tell me if you see some boots. I could use a new pair."
Farallon permitted himself a small grin at the statement. "See us through this, and I'll give you mine." Kilroy raised his eyebrow at the political officer, then smirked back.
"Let's move. I'll take the lead; even with my injury I stand the best chance of spotting possible obstacles." Farallon nodded his assent. Both men moved forward slowly so as not to attract the attention of any lookouts. They darted from cover to cover when the flares lit up the sky, and stuck low to the ground the whole way. Where before Farallon's uniform had been spotless and neatly pressed, now it was almost indistinguishable from the filth wrapped around Kilroy's figure. It took over three hours to finally reach the other side of no man's land, Kilroy slowed by his leg, Farallon by his inexperience. They slid over the side of the trench and onto a pile of corpses. Evidently the situation for the Enemy was similar to their own.
The trench was a ghost land. Farallon stooped to examine one of the dead, and reluctantly pulled his boots from his feet. They were a good fit for Kilroy, who was glad for the chance to remove his feet from the environment around them. He was fairly certain his pinky toe had fused to his ring toe somewhere over the course of their journey to the trench, leaving behind an odd, brown nub.
Kilroy looked around for a weapon among the bodies, and found instead a crutch. A genuine wooden crutch, complete with brass fittings and a cushioned auxiliary support, somewhat decayed by the fatigue of trench life. He wondered how the crutch had come to be there; the idea that such a thing could be found in that wasteland dumbfounded him. He also found a small autopistol almost empty of ammunition. At least he would be able to kill himself.
They crouched together in a small cubby, much like Kilroy's own, and lay down to sleep. But Kilroy never really slept, never really escaped the nightmare he lived and breathed every day. It followed him into his dreams. Farallon slept like an innocent child.