SIX
After a brief deliberation with Captain Sulla and the squad leaders, it was eventually decided that the patrol would still proceed but Captain Sulla and the other wounded would to return to base. While Sergeant Kronnin would be the ranking officer, Sulla decided to pass command of the patrol to me. That worked in my favour as I was going to assume command of the patrol regardless of what Sulla's decision had been. While I had nothing against Kronnin personally, he had too much in common with Sulla in that he had a passionate hatred for Eldar and he was an impatient man. I didn't want him leading a patrol that required both restraint and patience. When I needed an attack dog I could turn to him but in the meantime I didn't want to accidentally chase down the wrong Eldar. If Kael's Eldar were helping us then I was going to give them a bit of space (not that I trusted them entirely). Help from Eldar was rarely in a conventional fashion so it was entirely possible that they would assist without us even being aware of it. Sulla, as to be expected, was initially reluctant to hand over command or even back down from the patrol. She argued that her 'minor wound' wasn't going to stop her from completing her duty. However, the medic remarked that if Sulla stretched her neck too far to one side she could tear open her jugular. But even with the squad leaders and medics all in agreement, she still refused to back down. In the end I gave Sulla an ultimatum: she would either return to base to receive medical treatment or I would give her an injury that necessitated returning to base for medical treatment.
She was far more agreeable after that.
Sulla and the others returned to base with team one's chimera and the depleted squads were reorganised into new teams. With five squads but only four chimeras, I decided to have the command chimera run on its own with the extra squad of troops. I let Heilmit sit behind the heavy bolter while I kept watch inside the chimera. The tension in the air was thick now that we had been ambushed. While it was unlikely the Eldar would try another ambush so soon after their initial attempt, these things take time to properly prepare, but we weren't going to take any chances. We advanced more slowly and with a tighter formation save for our two scouts (one of whom was Watz) who walked several meters ahead of us. Concentrating our forces meant we moved slower and covered less ground but any ambush would require a larger Eldar force and therefore take more time to coordinate. "Any word from Commissar Cain's team?" I asked the vox operator. He regretfully shook his head. Cain's vox channels were still silent and none of the other teams had reported making any contact with him. As for the Eldar, while a few of our other patrols reported spotting Eldar scouts, none had met with any resistance. It appeared as though the Eldar were simply watching the other patrols, which meant there was a good chance that we were close to something important - perhaps a forward observation post or a listening station.
"Major Broklaw is on the line, commissar," the vox operator alerted me a few minutes later. "He wants a status report."
Though not surprised that the Major was keeping a close eye on the patrols, I wasn't expecting him to ask for a second report given that Sulla had sent one shortly before we sent her back to base. For a moment, I thought it might have been because he wanted first-hand confirmation that I was unharmed but I dismissed that notion immediately. Broklaw was too professional and it was egotistical of me to think I held that much sway over him. "This is Commissar Abel speaking," I greeted promptly but politely.
"Commissar, I was just recently informed of your situation. What's the status of your current forces?"
"Four dead, seven wounded, and one wrecked chimera. I've sent Sulla and the wounded back to base and continuing the mission with the remainder," I replied, feeling a bit odd given that I had repeated everything that Sulla had reported a short while ago. "But Captain Sulla told you all this about fifteen minutes ago."
"True but she insisted she was still able to fight," Broklaw said. "I wanted to make sure things were still under control. Also, Lt. Upham's patrol just returned with no results so once we've refuelled the chimeras we're going to send them to join your patrol."
"The extra numbers would be greatly appreciated," I said with a hint of relief. "You can tell them to advance to rally point one-five-five and then make their sweep through the south-westerly route. We'll meet up with them at point two-three-two and figure out how to handle the rest of the route from there." While it was tempting to hold position and wait for the reinforcements, the Eldar were aware of our presence in the area. If there was any sort of Eldar encampment or installation in the vicinity, then every moment we wasted was a moment that they could use to pull out and destroy any evidence or equipment. Even ten minutes could spell the difference between finding an Eldar listening post and a smoking crater.
Unfortunately, I was sadly mistaken if I thought that anything today would be accomplished with great haste. While being bored watching over a gaggle of troops comb through ruins is usually infinitely preferably to being shot at, it didn't change the fact that after four hours you yearned for something to shoot, just to break the monotony. After eight hours, I was willing to volunteer for any duty if it meant I could let loose with a few rounds in anger. "Patience my ass, I just wanna kill something", was becoming my unofficial motto. Some people, like Cain, were capable of taking combat naps in these kinds of situation but the still-present threat of an Eldar ambush kept me edgy and irritable with my mind racing through possible scenarios. After all, how were we to know that they had all buggered off after the failed ambush? A good-bye note would have been nice but I imagine the bastards were all having a good laugh watching us flinch at every odd-shaped shadow and tumbling rock. After several hours I started rotating the troops, cycling them through short breaks in the chimera so they could rest their feet and scarf down a ration bar. Even I took turns between riding in the chimera and walking with the troops so another Guardsman could take a sort break. I needed as many as possible to be fresh and alert otherwise we risked walking into another ambush. Watz was the only person who stubbornly refused to take a rest until I ordered him to. Like all Kriegan he objected to taking a rest while the mission was still underway. I suspect it was partly because of the blue-armoured Eldar that were running around somewhere out there. He preferred his battles to be simple – see the enemy, engage the enemy, kill the enemy - and Eldar never made things simple. Whatever was going on, he just wanted to figure it out so he could get on with the killing. So in the end, I only managed to get him to sit down for ten minutes. And somehow during those ten minutes he managed to eat a whole ration bar without anybody in the chimera seeing him take his mask off. It wasn't the first time he had managed the feat nor the last, but I've never figured out how he did it.
"When is it safe to say that we're never going to find anything out here?" Heilmit commented when his turn to take a break came up. Though I shared in his sentiment, I knew I couldn't turn back with the mission incomplete and I knew he was aware of that fact. "I say we bomb the whole area again. That'll flush any xenos out."
"There you go again with your big explosions again," I said with a sigh. "The people on this world fought long and hard to keep this planet loyal to the Imperium. It's hard enough keeping people on our side without us rewarding their loyalty with a megaton bomb."
"Faith in the Emperor should be reason enough."
"It should be but not everybody is made like Kriegans or Valhallans. Sometimes they just need something tangible to hold onto. And as loyal Guardsmen it's your duty to inspire the faithful. Remember that it is not guns or armour that has allowed the Imperium to stand for ten thousand years but the strength of our faith. It is faith that holds the line, faith that vanquishes the enemy, and it is faith that will ensure our continued dominance in the galaxy. We're not here to just blow shit up." My impromptu speech would probably have been far more inspiring had somebody not just fired off several rounds at a suspicious shadow in the ruins, hitting a broken gas valve, and triggering an explosion that ripped across three city blocks. But it wasn't for nought, as the chain of explosions seemed to have clear away some of the rockrete that had been interfering with the vox casters and seconds later we started receiving a faint signal.
"Commissar Abel!" the vox operator suddenly spoke up with marked enthusiasm. "I think I'm getting a signal from Commissar Cain's team."
"Cain? Let me hear it," I said as I snatched the headphones from him.
"This…Commi…ain…does any…read me?" The signal was definitely weak and I was straining just to make out the individual words through the static that was almost overpowering but I could definitely make out his name. "We're in the…heading…please respond…"
"I can't make out a location," I muttered in frustration.
"If we're only just getting it, then it's probably underground and it must be close by," the vox operator explained.
"Can't you fix it like…boost the signal?"
"It's already boosted. That's the first thing I did," he replied with a hint of annoyance. Specialists never like it when you try to pretend to understand their job and the kind of effort they put into it. I had basically asked him the equivalent of 'is the safety on?' "He has to be close by. We should try searching for an access to the underground tunnels or something."
"That's kinda vague. Can you triangulate the signal and get a location…or something like that?" There I went again trying to pretend I knew a damn thing about how vox casters worked.
"You need three points to triangulate, we only have two. You can't triangulate from a straight line! I can analyze the signal strength and get an area of probability but that's as good as it gets!" He was a little irked but in all fairness I had it coming so I couldn't hold it against him. In hindsight, those were some pretty stupid questions of me to ask but if Cain was close by then I wanted to find him and quickly. He subsequently boiled down all the technical jargon of interpreting vox signals into a simple point of the finger and a suggestion of 'try that way.'
I ordered the patrol to change course before returning to the maps in hopes of figuring out where Cain might be. Between the craters, the ruins, and the tunnels, the chances of finding them were almost non-existent. However, the limited range of communicating through tonnes of rockrete improved the odds from 'infinity to one' to a more manageable 'sanity's chance in the warp.' The soldiers began scouring the ruins along our new heading while I continued to monitor Cain's transmissions. We tried sending a response but according to our vox operator the portable unit lacked the signal boosting strength needed to make out our signal. At best they would get some static that a vox operator might be able to interpret as speech but even that was slim in our current situation.
"The signal's getting a bit stronger. We're definitely getting close," the vox operator informed me after a few minutes. I asked how close we would need to be to send a message back. "If he's still underground, we'll need to be right on top of them to get a message through." In other words I'd have more luck if I stepped out of the chimera and started yelling. But just as our odds seemed daunting, the Emperor smiled upon us. The chimera suddenly lurched to a halt, almost causing me to hit my head on the back of the driver's compartment.
Watz, on point as usual, had signalled the patrol to halt though he did not make it clear why until I voxxed him personally. He replied that he spotted Eldar up ahead and asked for me to come up and see for myself. I wasn't sure why he needed me to see it with my own eyes but I trusted his judgment and disembarked. I was quickly growing curious, especially since Watz told me to 'keep low and quiet as humanly possible.' I headed up the line making no sound until I found Watz crouched behind a small pile of rubble with his head just peering through a crack between two large chunks of rockrete.
"We got a problem – Eldar up ahead," Watz explained upon my arrival. While Eldar are always a problem wherever they show up, I was having trouble pinpointing Watz's concern given that he had spotted the Eldar and nobody had started shooting at us yet. Either the Eldar were feeling extraordinarily generous in letting us have a free shot or they hadn't seen us. Somehow, the concept of 'sneaking up on an Eldar' seemed as alien as 'vegan Tyranids' so I had trouble shaking the feeling that something was horribly awry. And that was when I realized what Watz was so concerned about. He had reached the same conclusion that I had – things were simply too good to be true. "Look there, Commissar…third story, bombed-out room with the tattered drapes."
Now if Watz hadn't pointed them out to me, I likely would have only seen the Eldar through a pair of surprised and dead eyes. Down at the very far end of the road, around a hundred plus meters away, was a partially destroyed apartment hub with an extremely large crater where the courtyard used to be. The room he pointed out seemed like any other room that had been redecorated with a demo-charge. Amidst the broken furniture and partially collapsed walls, were a couple of Eldar – one crouched low while the other peered cautiously through what remained of a window overlooking the massive crater. When I finally acknowledged seeing them, Watz directed my attention to several other points on the building, all of which had Eldar lurking just barely in sight. But there was one other unsettling fact they all had in common.
"They're all looking the wrong way," I commented when I noticed their common orientation.
"Clearly they're not waiting for us," Watz replied.
"What if Commissar Cain is somewhere over there?" I postulated.
"Entirely possible. There are probably a dozen underground passageways that connect Cain's last position to here. He must have stirred up a hornet's nest if they're willing to risk setting up an ambush while we're still patrolling the area."
"Then perhaps we should go and substantiate those risks."
Watz let out a quiet sigh, "It'll make a nice change to be the ambusher rather than the ambushee." I was expecting a few more complaints from my aide but he stayed uncharacteristically quiet for a change. Maybe the Eldar brought out the soldier in him or perhaps he was more tired than he let on. Indeed, Watz was never one to admit weakness, even when he had to march half a day on a sprained ankle while carrying a full kitbag. Either way, I returned to the chimera to pass the information on to the rest of the troops.
Sergeant Kronnin and I quickly drew up a straight-forward plan; the chimera would head up the center and make the initial assault while our infantry again split into two teams and assaulted the apartment hub from both sides. While the Eldar were entrenched in a position that was perfect for assaulting anybody who may emerge from the bottom of the crater, it offered less protection from a street level assault. Relocating to defend against our assault would ruin any chance of an effective ambush and, if the Emperor blessed us once again, force the Eldar to abandon their plans. While I much preferred to destroy my enemies utterly, since 99% of the time dead people don't keep fighting (the remaining 1% is a nightmare I'll share another day), I did not want to get drawn into a protracted firefight and risk attracting more Eldar. Plus, if Cain was somewhere nearby I imagined he would appreciate the ride.
Since I was in command of the patrol, I had to stay in the chimera as to properly coordinate the assault. I felt a little guilty because to me it felt as though I was using it as an excuse to stay away from the most dangerous fighting but I tried not to let those thoughts undermine me. Perhaps a lesser guardsman would use it as such but I reminded myself that command meant looking past luxuries like personal glory.
"All teams are in position, Commissar. Awaiting your order," reported the vox operator.
"Okay, it's payback time," I replied. "All units move in and engage the enemy."
The chimera began its approach, its arrival heralded by its churning engine, plumes of promethium smog, and the thunderous roar of its heavy bolter. Accuracy wasn't as much of a concern as we just needed to make as much of a ruckus as possible and, luck allowing, make fighting us as undesirable an option as possible. What remained of the apartment hub's outer walls was quickly being torn apart by the chimera's explosive rounds, leaving the Eldar inside with even less cover to operate with. If there was any return fire I couldn't hear it over the sound of our own weapons. Once again, Valhallan fury and resolve were proving more than a match for the Eldar but I was not focusing on the battle's progress as something else had drawn my attention.
"Can you hear me Abel?"
I know not how to describe it other than a soft whisper that seemed to echo from within my ear, as though spoken by a man who stood mere inches from me and yet left no breath or presence. Understandably, I was taken by surprise and it took a moment for me to realize that it was neither the vox operator nor anybody over the vox network.
"Kael…" I muttered to myself. It had to be him. There was no other explanation. With complete (and idiotic) disregard for my safety, I popped open the roof hatch and looked for anything suspicious nearby. What I saw wasn't Kael but it was just as suspicious – it looked like some sort of canine-like creature. I saw it only for the briefest of moments before it fled down an alleyway but given my past experiences with coincidences (or the complete lack thereof) I knew it had to mean something. And I was willing to bet a week's salary that it was the same one I spotted when I first arrived on Erebus. "Stop the vehicle!" I shouted. The driver obeyed but followed with the expected 'what for?' to which I did not answer. "I'm stepping out. Tell Sergeant Kronnin he's in charge until I get back."
"But…where are you going Commissar?" asked the vox operator.
"Hopefully, to finally get some answers," I replied. I wish I had a better explanation but anything more would just prompt more questions or make me seem like I was off my rocker, which at that point I should have seriously considered. Thankfully, the Commissar's cap meant I didn't have to explain anything to them but I knew that if I came back empty handed I would probably be explaining my actions to Cain and Broklaw later. I popped open the rear hatch and raced off in pursuit of the creature I saw.
Looking back, it was incredibly foolish of me to give after a small animal through ruined alleyways. If I had run headlong into an Eldar ambush party I would have been obliterated faster than gaunt on the receiving end of a meltagun. Somehow, I managed to keep the creature in my sight as it bounded over a rock pile but then lost it when it scampered up a flight of stairs into a building. I was led into a neighbouring apartment hub building, very much like the ones the Eldar were hiding in including the massive Navy-designed and installed skylight that let the light in straight through all twenty some-odd floors. I slowed my pace once inside, taking out my laspistol as I approached the giant hole in the floor ahead of me. Judging by how contained the damage was, it was more likely caused by a crashing airship than a bomb or shipboard cannon. The rest of the building was in as much disarray as one would expect from a former warzone. Broken doors and shattered walls lined narrow corridors. There was very little light thanks to the lack of power but the occasional leftover portable luminator provided pockets of visibility. Signs of the civil war were still present as I walked past long-forgotten ammunition boxes, fallen weapons, and broken pieces of armour or equipment. There were even bodies of rebels and soldiers exactly where they had fallen during the war; the toxic atmosphere, interestingly enough, inhibiting decomposition and preserving the bodies as if they had died only moments ago. I spent several minutes walking through the halls in hopes of picking up the animal's trail or finding something that would keep this insane detour from being a complete waste of time.
Then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw movement in the shadows. It was fast and small so it might have been my mystery animal. Unfortunately, with some many branching corridors and alternate passageways through broken walls, if I lost sight of it again I would lose it for good, so I raced as fast as I could. I lucked out as the critter kept running down long, straight corridors…until it hopped through a hole in the wall into an apartment unit. The corridor I was in ran along the outer perimeter so my prey had hopefully cornered itself. Still, I exercised caution as I approached the slightly ajar apartment door, keeping my laspistol levelled and my shock maul in hand. Just as I reached the door, I noticed some of the dust on the ground had been disturbed – somebody had been here and recently. Unfortunately, that meant if somebody was still on the other side, I was unlikely to get the drop on them. Waiting them out was not an option either so I had no choice but to move in quickly and pray I don't run headlong into a bullet-storm.
Despite my best efforts, the person on the other side of the door still got the drop on me; quite literally in fact as the person had hid over the doorway and the second I stepped in, fell onto me like a raptor. Predictably, my assailant immediately went for my gun hand, seizing control of it and slamming my hand into door frame to knock the gun loose. Instead of trying to fight it, I used the distraction to elbow the person off of me before spinning about and bringing my shock maul into play. My assailant was agile, though, ducking under my first swing and striking me with two quick punches to the gut and kidney. I tried to recover with a backhand swing but my opponent moved within my reach, blocking me at my forearm before punching my elbow. The impact must have struck a nerve because my whole arm seized up and lose its grip on the shock maul.
Whoever I was fighting, I had long since realized it wasn't Kael but the poor lighting and my frantic effort to keep him at bay kept me from getting a good look. I used my good arm to block a follow-up kick and then my shoulder into him in order to get a comfortable distance between us. That was when I managed to get a half-decent look and noted two things: firstly, it was actually a woman, not a man; and secondly, she was wearing a cloak, which made it hard in the dim light to gauge her movements. The tingling sensation in my left arm was fading so I was able to properly defend myself when she struck at me. I blocked a rapid series of jabs, missing only a couple of gut strikes, before parrying a right cross and countering with a quick kick to the side of her knee. The hit disrupted her balance, giving me an opening to deliver a solid punch to the face (which I couldn't make out due to the hood and low-lighting).
"Okay, you're coming with me," I said. My punch had knocked her into the wall which she was now using for support. I had hoped it meant that she could take punches about as well as she could throw them.
Turns out I was mistaken and she had a lot more fight left in her. I was able to narrowly avoid a sudden snap kick counter-attack but was less fortunate with the follow-up roundhouse. She may not have been able to throw a punch but she could definitely deliver a kick. And while I was laying face-down in my blood and spittle, my assailant made a break for the door. I hate it when they make me run. With adrenaline numbing my pain, I scrambled back to my feet and took off after her. Somehow, I managed to keep pace with her but I wasn't gaining ground and since I didn't want to risk killing her, shooting her was out of the question. Luckily, she turned a corner and I noticed that the apartment ahead of me that she had just passed had a broken section of wall. Rather than continuing after her, I hopped through the opening and cut through the apartment. The short-cut shaved a meters off my trailing distance, putting me within reach of her. Or, more specifically, within reach of the black cloak that was trailing behind her. And just as I had hoped for, when I grabbed and pulled, the cloak was secured tight enough that her head snapped back like she caught a lasbolt between the eyes.
But before I could deliver a knockout blow, she suddenly rolled over and spun quickly on the ground to kick my legs out from under me. When I tried to get back up, she jumped onto my back, locking her arm around my neck in a sleeper-hold. When properly executed, a carotid restraint can render a person unconscious in about fifteen seconds. I had to think quickly, which wasn't easy considering my brain was about to become a blood-free zone. I drew my spare laspistol, flipped it around so I held it by the barrel, and clubbed my assailant on the noggin. It was most certainly not the most eloquent or Munitorium-approved method of utilizing a laspistol and any tech-priest would cringe at my blasphemous barbarism of technology but it got the job done. She hit the ground faster than a wailing greenhorn.
"You are one annoying bitch," I groaned as I got back to my feet. Unfortunately, other than lean against the wall I couldn't do much until the hallway stopped spinning. I was just about ready to haul my quarry to her feet when I heard a loud growl and the patter of tiny feet. The small little creature had returned with a vengeance, clearly bent on defending its master as it lunged at me with fangs bared. Instinctively, I threw an arm up to shield myself and the little bastard sunk its teeth into my sleeve, clamping down like a furry vice grip. Thankfully, the sleeve was thick enough that it should have been little more than nuisance but there's always a bit of panic involved when snarling beasts are playing tug of war with your arm. It wasn't a very large creature but it was heavy enough to cause me to stoop over as I struggled to free myself. It was then that I finally got a good look at the thing and noticed that, like most other living things on Erebus, it had bionic augmentations, which I had not noticed earlier as they blended in with its steel-grey fur. Along with a bionic eye, it had robotic legs on its left side along with a portion of its left chest wall. Thankfully, its jaw seemed to be all natural so it was just a matter of discouraging it from clinging. "Let go you stupid mutt!" I shouted as I tried to shake it off. "Fine…you asked for it!" Fed up with the mutt, I grabbed hold of my sleeve with my free hand and pulled with all my strength, lifting the creature of its feet and slamming it into the nearby wall. It let go with a yelp and then scampered off in a hurry, which I initially took as a good sign until I realized it only left because its master had also ran off.
By the time I realized this, my assailant was already at the far end of the corridor. With that much of a head start I had almost no hope of catching up to her. I say 'almost' because my only chance of catching up was to hope she was heading for the same exit that I came in through. Having spent a decent amount of time scouting the building before finally stumbling upon the assailant, I had a reasonable idea of the building's layout (assisted by the fact that most Mechanicus architects are a dreadfully uncreative lot). It consisted of a hub-design with square blocks of apartments arranged into larger blocks, which are further arranged into larger blocks, and so on and so forth. So rather than give chase right after her, I headed down the hall next to me that ran along the outer rim of the building. The structural damage meant that many apartments that were once separate were now continuous, allowing me to bypass corridors, jumping from one block of apartments to the next. Thus, while she was hopefully taking the hallways on a roundabout path, I was cutting through the apartments on an intercept course. Of course, I would be quite the fool if she had simply taken another exit or just hid in one of the numerous apartments but I counted on the dose of pistol-to-head to dull her sense of judgment.
It was strange; on any other day, I probably would've pursued as usual and eventually resign to the fact that I could not catch up. I was a very determined individual but one-in-a-million chances weren't usually my thing unless my life was on the line (then, in one man's famous words, 'any chance was better than no chance'). Perhaps it was just the thought of Kael that was pushing me to give it everything I had - the thought that he would have a good chuckle about this afterwards if I let this opportunity slip through my fingers. I would do anything to wipe that smug smirk of his off his face. It enraged me…it pushed me faster and further than I ever thought I could possibly do. I even pictured her as Kael right up to the point where I dove headlong through a hole in the wall, slamming right into her as she came running across in the hall.
Alas, in my haste there was one small thing I had forgotten and that was the giant hole in the floor. More specifically, I neglected to realize that our point of interception and my subsequent crash-tackle, took both of us right over the edge. Thank the Emperor, though, the hole in the floor below us was significantly smaller and we landed just on the edge of it. And times-two lucky for me, my assailant took the brunt of the impact, leaving me only slightly dazed by the sudden drop. "Really need to watch that first step," I groaned as I propped myself up on my elbows. But just when I thought it was over, the ledge we were on started to creak loudly before swinging out like a trap door and dumping us to the next level down. Second time was a lot more painful and I was beginning to develop a severe disdain for gravity. At the very least, I didn't have to worry about dropping any further as it appeared we were now on the ground floor. I groaned and muttered a few choice Kriegan cusses as I slowly got to my knees, at which point I noticed my assailant was slowly regaining her wits as well. Seeing how I was fed up with playing 'Inquisitor and Heretic' with her, I just decked her in the face once more, knocking out whatever lights had remained on.
"I think that's enough 'playing hard to get' from you," I muttered without realizing that it would've been a more worthwhile thing to say when she was still conscious. Sore and weary, I took my sweet time in picking up my cap and dusting it off. Eventually, I decided that I should vox the rest of the team to get a status report and well as report my own findings. I hadn't received any messages from them so either things were going well or they couldn't get a signal to where I was, which was unlikely considering I didn't appear to be deep underground. "This is Commissar Abel, does anybody read me?" I called out over the vox.
"We can hear you," Cain's voice replied, though not through the vox but from several feet behind me. I quickly turned about to see the Commissar standing at the head of a cluster of people (of which the only one even resembling a proper soldier was Jurgen). The others wore non-standard garbs but were fairly well-armed; most likely hired guns. Judging by the defensive formation most of the others took, it was a safe bet that the most important people in the party were the two standing next to Cain, who stood in the center of the ring of guns. "I take it you got my message?"
"Uh…y-yeah, we did. The others are attacking an Eldar ambush party that appeared to be waiting for you," I answered.
"Yes, we saw that," Cain explained. "We were about to step right into it when you're troops opened fire. We decided to find an alternate route."
"Good…glad to be of assistance. Umm, and your friends are?"
"Oh right," Cain said as if he had somehow forgotten that there were about a dozen unfamiliar faces (in gasmasks) around him. For a brief moment, he looked to the blond-haired woman that stood next to him as if checking for permission from her, which she gave with a quick nod. "These are Inquisitors Vail and Hakim," he explained, first directing my attention to the woman beside him then to the large gentleman on his other side. "Inquisitors, this is my fellow Commissar – Ariel Abel."
"Yes, yes, that's all well and good," the larger Inquisitor, Hakim, interrupted, sounding terribly impatient and perturbed. "Would the commissar care to explain why she has punched out my subordinate?"
"Subordinate?" I repeated with a sudden, crushing weight of despair dropping onto my shoulder. I looked down to the woman I had clocked out, my first actual close-up look at the person. She was not Eldar…something I should have picked up on earlier and while her face was covered with a gasmask, there was a notably brass aquila pin on the load-bearing harness she wore. I had just chased down and pummelled an operative of the Holy Orders of the Emperor's Inquisition. There were not enough words in all the human tongues to describe how big a pile of shit I had just stepped in.