Wolfe sat amid the wreckage of the bunker he was using as his command post, clutching one hand over his left thigh where shrapnel from the exploding Chimra had ripped through flesh and muscle and cracked the bone beneath. Beside him Dorlan was having the fractured chunks of his skull set by a fourth battalion orderly named Origas. Viado was curled up inside a disabled salamander that had slid in before they arrived, tending to his shattered tools and sockets. A torn and bloodstained map of the positions the fifteenth had managed to hold was unfurled before him and weighted down by four empty las pistol magazines he had expended shooting from the ditch he had fallen into at the bloodletter while it chewed through a column of loaded chimeras. His sword was mangled in its holster, melted into a useless hunk by an imp's blood when it had stepped unwarily beside his position and he had stabbed at it. Wolfe glanced around with dead eyes. Guardsmen were streaming through the bunker, many wounded and bloodstained, all soaked dark brown in mud. A Leman Russ rumbled rearwards outside, through the shrapnel holes in the wooden partition Wolfe could see its turret gone. Above the wail of the wounded and the grind of machinery, he could hear the artillery-the batteries left unscathed-firing indiscriminately into the enemy lines to prevent their jeering masses from following the retreat back. Wolfe wondered how many abandoned wounded got to be sacrifices tonight to please the thirsting gods, his responsibility, and his failure.
"What's the situation manpower wise?" Wolfe asked the four tacticians seated around a stack of emptied medical crates pouring over charts and data slates.
"You better read this yourself" Staff Captain Amin Illiun said, getting up and handing him a dataslate. Wolfe read it, mentally slowly shutting down along the way. Four thousand men still in condition to bear arms, including the walking wounded. Two thousand were dead or missing outright and another thousand were casualties, many of which would die in the ensuing days. Fourth battalion was at forty percent effectiveness, and Wolfe quickly ordered for it to take up guarding the artillery and baggage. The other four battalions had fallen back to their original positions. Tanks were at half-strength and wrecks were being salvaged.
"Nearly half the regiment gone, for nothing" Wolfe murmured, dropping the slate on the table. A bloodied squad from third battalion, twentieth platoon stumbled past: half a dozen thousand yard stares and blank, shell-shocked faces.
"If it matters colonel, the Cadians and Airys took sixty percent apiece, we're not the worse off here" Amin tried to encourage him.
"Great, so now we have on paper only regiments guarding our flanks, get the remaining armor to anchor the extreme ends of our lines incase they break in the next assault" Wolfe ordered. "And tell Magos Helindral and his tech priests to comb the trenches for any more hidden teleporters."
"Already on it, they've been at it since the last daemon died." Wolfe nodded, somewhat relieved that his officers could still think. It could have been worse, he admitted to himself as a commandeered flatbed carrying several dozen mangled guardsmen from the front rolled past outside, adding its heaving engine to the steady murmur of the cries of the wounded and soldiers searching for their comrades.
It could have been worse. He had to admit. The Kragar ninth and the Salvians had lost their entire armored support in one fell stroke to teleporting attacks. Captain Morrison had been delayed getting to the front, and so had been directly behind the onslaught instead of amidst it and bore the brunt of the assault long enough for Wolfe to reluctantly pull the entire regiment back. Better to have reinforcements and no gains than be caught unsupported in a salient. Morrison had suffered though, and had three tanks left in his own platoon and another thirty, out of sixty from the battalion.
"Colonel, the heretics have started the assault, all commanders report morale is close to breaking, and-"
"Where's Fury?" Something in the man's distraught expression answered Wolfe's question.
"Fury was last seen leading the assault with elements of the fifth platoon, he has been reported MIA along with its Lieutenant and most of the men, presumed dead." Wolfe sighed and sagged.
You are an officer of the Imperium so act like one! He imagined Fury scolding him, giving his weary body enough fire to continue. Wolfe glanced down at his leg, which was soaked red and would be life-threatening soon, and Origas was still busy saving Dorlan's life. He glanced around and singled out a relatively intact squad regrouping by the corner. It took him a moment to recognize their leader: "Sergeant Karfan" he called. The bearded man looked up and snapped into an exhausted, sloppy salute, his five guard soldiers following suite a moment later. "Find me a Chimera and another medic, I need to get to the front," he ordered over the din. "Amin keep me updated." He grabbed a vox set off the table, pulled a staff Lieutenant out of the crowd, and handed it to him. "You're with me-Maverin" he said, recognizing the missing nose, then turned to where Viado was healing.
"As you wish sir," the three men responded simultaneously.
…
Vinnecen poked the gaping muzzle of his shotgun around the corner, sweeping the dugout with the beam of his under barrel luminator. To his relief there was nothing there but deep puddle in the center of a widening in the tunnels and a horrific altar to the ruinous powers. "Clear" he whispered back, and leapt in, aiming down the nearest trench opening. Eight men followed him quietly but swiftly. Koll was immediately behind, limping badly on his left leg but still determined. Then came Krane and his autocannon, then Shoeggoth and Krin, both somehow impervious to mud and fatigue. Gerring followed, growling with more fear than anger, his eyes darting side to side frantically. Bringing up the rear were Curze and Rane leading a barely conscious Donnel, Allis who seemed to be in a daze, and a barely recognizable man, covered as he was in gore and injuries: Fury, still strong enough to boot the rear of anyone lagging behind.
"Ignore the shrine" Koll warned in a barely-controlled voice. No one was going near the semi-submerged swirling portal of iconography and glowing architecture. As they skirted the edge of the cursed waters, there was a faint splash amidst there depths. Gerring glanced over- and leapt back several feet with a jarring splash. Krin spun around and grabbed him, glaring.
"Something moved in there," Gerring explained in a shaking voice.
"Ignore it." Another, louder splash in the center of the altar. Koll tried to look away but something drew his gaze: mangled bodies clouding the water with their blood, slowly being devoured by glistening blue fish with oversized jaws full of teeth protruding from their heads. "Keep moving damnit" he growled, unwittingly letting fear slip into his strained voice as the column began to come to a halt. How far had they gone? Must have been at least three miles since they had been cut off by the retreat, and no sign of heretic or loyalist, just winding trenches filled with steadily more intricate altars. They had destroyed the first, dry few before realizing just how many there were and the danger of them attracting attention. He was just the third in command here. Krin was the ranking officer and tactical leader, but in actuality Fury was leading them through sheer force of will and his bolter pistol.
"What do you think they're doing with those?" Krane whispered as they passed the next altar twenty yards down. Fearful glances out of the corners of their eyes revealed that this one had the bodies impaled on spears poking out of the water. Only their torsos and half-rotten faces remained uneaten.
Koll shrugged. "Don't think about it," he warned.
They rounded the corner-and came upon a semicircle of heretics, their faces ground off into featureless bloody horrors, seated cross-legged around an unlit altar in a depression, swaying in unison, watched over by five red clad khornate cultists with carpace armor covered in the boy parts of their victims. A surprisingly elegant female priest with glowing eyes was chanting, and one by one the runes on the altar began to light as water gushed into the depression from emperor knew where. A strange chill crept over the men as they hid unnoticed in the trench.
The squad froze up, each man too terrified to act as a glowing whirlwind of energy sprang up over the altar, crackling with the power of the warp. Then Fury came up. "Why are they not dead yet? You afraid to die?" he growled, aiming his bolt pistol at the priestess. "Or do you need a reminder that you are guardsmen?"
Its not the dying I'm worried about, that would be rather nice compared to what chaos would do to me. Koll glanced at Krin, who nodded. "Koll, take Gerring, Shoeggoth, and Allis and flank them on the left, Krane you're with me on the right, we'll catch them in a crossfire, the rest of you watch the rear and wounded." They waited until the guards were all facing the priestess, then crept out. Koll led his group up a small rise on the edge of the bunker where they fanned out and took aim. Krin took Krane left, behind some twisted metal.
"On my mark" Fury said, taking aim. Koll saw him pull the trigger out of the corner of his eye and a low whoosh. He didn't wait to see it hit as he opened fire on the two nearest guards. The silence exploded as they gunned down the heretics in three brutal seconds, mutilating their bodies beyond recognition of humanity. Koll shifted his aim to the altar to see the priestess swaying on her feet behind a glowing personal shield, gathering up a ball of warp fire in her outstretched hands, face twisting into a hideous silent scream. Fury put two more bolts into the shield, then as she raised her arms to smite him a fourth blew her head off. The warp fire, unguided by psychic touch shot skyward in a roaring pillar of flame that blinded them and caused exposed flesh to blister.
Gradually, it faded. To be replaced by the sound of the startled shouts of several hundred cultists and the splash of several hundred feet sloshing through the wet ground, steadily growing closer. "Up the trench!" Fury ordered. No one needed additional prompting. They sloshed up the trench, passing multiple side passages winding off and increasingly incomplete altars. Splashes behind them and flickering shadows in the faint light of the dying flames indicated swarms of heretics leaping into the trenches. Cries of pain sorrow billowed out as they found the altar, catching up to the squad as it ran, followed by roars of anger.
"I think we made them a bit angry" Curze managed to gasp out between labored breaths. Behind them, the splashing grew louder. More shouts, this time from ahead.
"Hold up we're surrounded!" Krin yelled, bringing them to a halt twenty yards from the nearest side passage. He felt his heart rate rising as the enemy closed in, growing louder and more inhuman with each second. "We need a place to hide, these side passages won't do, they dug them," he said frantically, whirling around. The men leapt into action, digging through the mud with bare hands and bayonets while Koll and Krane took aim in either direction. If they were trapped they would be sure to take several times their number with them. Allis kicked aside several submerged rotting wooden beams and painfully hit metal with the toe of her boot. Bending down for a look, she probed blindly with her fingers, wrapping her hands around a two foot circular disk. Lifting, it came away with a sharp sucking noise and water began to flow downwards.
"I've got us a manhole of some sort" she called, examining the cover. A single star was engraved in the center. Something in the back of her mind recalled that it was the planet's crest.
"Water aqueduct from the river to the main city, this must be a maintenance hatch" Fury said. Krin wasted no time in ordering everyone in. Flickering shadows began to appear in the edges of their swirling luminator beams. Vinnecens leapt in first. He passed through the cascade of water and dropped seven feet before landing hard on his knees, wincing. A frantic sweep of the tunnel told him that it was empty save for a trickle of water running a foot from where he kneeled.
"Clear!" he called up. Allis came next, followed by Rane and Donnel, who hit the ground and collapsed, sobbing.
Koll spotted something: a person standing on the lip of the trench at the next bend, facing away. He raised his las-rifle. Three eyes flashed, and it turned, no, jerkily swiveled like a poorly made automaton to face him. The body he had seen was only a massive round head with six triangular eyes. It smiled, and reared up, revealing it to be so tall it was in fact standing in the next trench over. "Daemon!" he yelled, and pulled down the trigger. The weapon coughed unhealthily and spat a volley of lasbolts at the creature, which merely opened its mouth and ate them. It clambered onto the elevated ground, revealing a skeletal avian body twelve feet high and twisted wings. Krane and Fury opened fire as Gerring and Curze dropped into the tunnel, leaving only Krinand Shoeggoth with them. Its eyes flashed, and suddenly Koll was sailing through the air, smashing into the ground ten feet away, his lasgun sliding from his grasp. He glanced up just in time to see a Tzeentch flamer teleport onto the rock beside him. It spun around, maws glowing with eager flames as he dragged the las pistol from its socket. He fired a split second earlier, the red beam of the emperor's fury kicking the daemon onto its back, flames spewing into the air from its spiteful mouths as they desperately grasped for the prey they had been cheated of. He put three more shots into it before it stopped moving and spun around just in time to see Fury and Krane back to back, beating down three more. A fifth materialized above them, and he put six shots into its writhing body, killing it messily.
"They're in the trench!" Krin was shouting. Koll spotted him backed up against the wall, firing into the first group of heretics to round the bend on his side. Overhead, the Daemon, visibly angered by the death of its brethren began to gather up a ball of warp fire.
"Get into that tunnel now" Koll ordered, snatching up his las-rifle. A sixth flamer leapt up beside him only for Shoeggoth to kill it in the first shots of his incredibly accurate barrage in the opposite direction. The first bolt of flames singed Koll's helmet top off as it narrowly missed him. He fired a grenade at the daemon, which it simple deflected with a ten-fingered hand. Krane and Shoeggoth dropped down first and second, and then Fury shoved a protesting Koll inside. He crashed to the cement below on his bad leg with a wince then began shouting incoherently upwards with concern for the men he had unwillingly abandoned. They stood, silhouetted in the rim, firing with bolter and las. A spindly shadow projected over them, and Krin leapt forward, shoving Fury down. Koll rolled to avoid him as he landed heavily. Krin tried to make the jump, but something grabbed him. He let out a scream, face twisted in terror as with an explosion of red the daemon's hands filleted his flesh from his bones. Koll and Gerring screamed and began firing upwards as a that hideous face appeared in the opening, and would have kept firing until it came for them had Allis and Krin slammed the manhole shut and welded it in with prolonged las-fire.
"Sergeant!" Fury held out a hand. Koll took it and was pulled upright. He would have fallen again had Shoeggoth not grabbed his shoulder. Though he was as emotionless as ever, the rest of the squad was horrified by Krin's demise. "You're in command. These aqueducts go straight to the-" he was cut off by a screech as a long talon stabbed straight through the manhole cover.
"Fall back" Koll ordered. He stopped Gerring from setting up a pressure-activated tube charge, "waste of explosives." The group turned back down the way that seemed to lead towards their lines.
"Other way, we advance!" Fury ordered. The talon began to saw away the manhole. They ran onwards, deeper into enemy terrain with nothing but their luminators lighting up the dark tunnels ahead and each other for protection against what lay inside.
….
Wolfe peered out at the advancing tide of heretics through his field binoculars from his position in a dugout just behind the main trench. For a moment his vision was obscured by a red and brown fountain as an earthshaker round disintegrated several dozen heretics, then the nonstop wave of running men pushed through the plume, charging headlong into the regiment's barrage of las fire and bolter shells with predictably fatal results. A call for ammunition went up from the twenty-third platoon three hundred yards down and he assigned one of the loaded ammunition haulers to them. He frowned, at the rate they were going they'd be out of ammo within five hours.
"We can get a couple convoys from the resupply drops brought up by nightfall" Amin said.
"Do that then, and am I really becoming that readable?" Wolfe said.
"You were mouthing 'ammo' sir, it doesn't get much easier to decipher than that." Wolfe nodded, slightly embarrassed. The lines ahead lit up as the basilisks fired a volley of inferno shells, momentarily staving off the assault while the mountains of bodies were scorched by flaming pyerite. A heavy bolter team began setting up their weapon a meter down, then saw him and leapt away.
"No, go ahead, you get a good vantage point from here" he hurriedly corrected them. They saluted and dropped to their knees, folding out the weapon's tripod and setting it up on top of a half-submerged sandbag. The gunner fired a couple shots off to clear the barrels.
"Wolfe, you better hear this, the Salvians are getting fracked up the rear" Staff sergeant Ellian Grimmnar reported, one ear pressed to a Vox-reciever.
Frack. "Watch your language, and let me hear." Wolfe leaned over, careful to avoid ripping the hastily done stitching on his leg, and took the link.
"I repeat, the heretics have heavy armored support, they're flanking us on the left" a voice called. Several other colonels and Buell were talking in the background. Wolfe hit the receiver once, letting out a short burst of static to announce his presence. He heard a second as Demnin did likewise, then much to his surprise four more in rapid succession. "The entire east wing is going to be cut off, they have baneblades and Rubric marines, where is our heavy armor?" the voice called, more panicked now. Wolfe winced: they were in the eastern wing.
"Captain Laurit, where is your colonel?" Buell demanded, ignoring the situation.
"Dead, his chimera was disabled and a Baneblade rolled over it; we need any heavy armor you can provide" Laurit practically screamed back. Gunfire and shouting became audible in the background.
"The Armageddon heavy armor is busy leading the assault on the western wing, can you hold for six hours?" Buelle replied curtly.
"We can hold for ten minutes, twenty tops, our tanks are running out of augur mark two rounds."
"All commanders, begin preparations for a potential rapid withdrawal" Wolfe ordered over his own Vox. Several dozen officers ranging from the embattled Werner to acting Lieutenant Carnigan replied with a chorus of acknowledgements and the occasional question. Good men think about their orders.
Buelle was speaking again. "All regiments heading for the eastern front, redirect to back up the Salvians, I want that front secure!" he bellowed with unnecessary force.
"They have a titan, I repeat, they have a-." Laurit was cut off by the deafening roar of a plasma cannon of gargantuan proportions.
"There's maybe twenty heavy tanks in the entire force, it'll be a slaughter" General Bringler of the Laritian Hundred-Second armored protested. Several other generals including the Narmenian General Bradley voiced their agreement.
"Then we will form a human wall to meet them, now get on it before I have your commissars execute you for disobeying a direct order." The line ended. Wolfe winced in sympathy for the affected regiments, which a quick glance at the dataslate in his hand revealed included the Kragarian fiftieth armored regiment.
"So what are the heretics up to?" Amin asked, his fellow staffers staring at Wolfe expectantly.
"The enemy has sent in the cavalry to flank us, as cavalry is usually used for. Buelle should've known that they'd try this. Rather than defend properly against what appears to be an onslaught of Baneblades and leviathans, he has opted to drown them in our reinforcements." Amin sighed.
"How predictable" Ellian noted dryly.
"Aye, and knowing the way Tzeentch thinks, he's probably got some other-" Wolfe's eyes crossed as something horrifying occurred to him. "The Cadians and Airen are the weakest links on the line, correct?"
"Aye."
"Then wouldn't an attack be likely to come in their sector?" the gears were turning rapidly now in his brain. "Which means, what if the assault on the Salvians and whoever is on their flank is just a diversion to draw off any reinforcements?" A plan formed in his mind.
"Then we would have a major problem, but why? He can just massacre our people easily enough from there."
"Because we can always send in more reinforcements, retaking territory is a challenge. We stormed their initial defenses by surprise when we landed, next time they'll know we're coming" Amin cut in.
"Exactly, we need to get this to Buelle, where's that inquisitorial interpreter when you need him?"
"He left a couple days ago, and there won't be another inquisitor here until we've retaken that city." Wolfe sighed resignedly and flicked through the vox channels until he found the one specifically designated for the Kragarian units. The fires began to die down and the heretical assault started up again, thousands of bodies charging through the fog.
"This is Colonel Wolfe, fifteenth, can anybody hear me?" he asked. It took a couple minutes before replies came in from the half-dozen regiments on world and a seventh still in its transports, yet to deploy. "I believe that a large assault is going to come withing my sector within the next few hours and you heard Buelle's orders. Is there anyway you could sneak a couple companies over to shore us up a bit? We're running at about two-thirds strength at the moment?" Three regiments, the twentieth, hundred-fifth, and ninth airborne were on the opposite side of the beachhead, but promised to offer a few air units.
"I'll spare a couple of tank companies" General Nallin of the fiftieth promised.
"Our reserves showed up, we'll send them your way" Domnin said. "You owe us one though."
"I'll buy you some liquor when we take their capital" Wolfe promised, "and a couple Baneblades." Kragars always watched each other's backs in foreign lands.
"I'll hold you to that." Wolfe closed the line and returned to directing the battle. Morrisson began to dig his tanks into a two-tiered defensive line, the infantry still in the rear were ordered to double time. A beam of sunshine broke through the clouds. Wolfe gazed upwards.
"At least it stopped raining."
…...
"Have you ever been in a cave?" Curze asked to nobody in particular as they trudged through knee-deep water. Thirty minutes had passed and the tunnel seemed to have no end.
"Nope, I lived in a space station" Allis said. Gerring had blown the tunnel shut twenty five ago, ending any chance of pursuit.
"Several, but dry ones" Krane said. His farm had had a couple of natural caves under it.
"You wouldn't believe how many, our mine punched through a natural cave system and they sent the kids into the smaller tunnels, I was ten" Vinncens said. He adjusted his small handlebar moustache with one hand.
"Sounds fun" Curze remarked dryly. He stumbled in a small pothole, sending his luminator beam flickering over the tunnel wall.
"It was, until we found the genestealer hive." He sighed, Krane put an arm on his shoulder, Rane cursed, Koll shook his head.
"I remember that, my first combat assignment, got to watch half my platoon get eaten alive" Koll said. Vinncens held a hand back and he shook it.
"That's where I found this" Vincenns said as he held up the red painted shotgun, "I spent a week hiding in this little cave where a couple guardsmen had made a last stand. I killed twenty genestealers with it." He brushed away some mud on the receiver to reveal a name scrawled in red paint. "Anyone known anyone called Cal Murnin?"
"Nope." The tunnel abruptly ended with a solid steel vault door. Fury steeped forward and examined it as the others fanned out around him.
"Looks like some kind of pneumatic security door," he ran his fingers across a series of pipes running across the outside of the frame. "Only openable from the other side judging by the lack of a handle, we're stuck." He kicked something in the shadows and bent down to examine it: a doorknob.
"Well what do we do now?" Gerring demanded. Behind him, Donnel collapsed into the water. Allis and Rane pulled him back up.
"Blow that door off its hinges" Koll suggested, pulling out a tube-charge.
"And bring the tunnel down on top of us" Fury objected, playing his luminator over the cracks in the ceiling. He took one step to the left-and his leg plunged into an unseen hole. "What the?" Koll and Vinncens leapt forward and pulled him back up, completely soaked.
"Well that must be the actual aqueduct" Koll said, shining his light into the foot-wide hole. Water swirled beneath in a pipe of unknown girth. "You think I could use that to get around the door?"
"You're insane, you'll freeze in ten minutes" Gerring protested. Koll stripped off his gear webbing, flak vest, and boots and handed them to Krane. "
"I'll drown in four if this fails" Koll responded. He stripped off his jacket and flack vest and handed them to Krane, leaving himself with a T-shirt and pants. He twisted the luminator off his weapon and put it in his belt with the knife and las-pistol.
"He knows what he's doing" Fury said, "A model guardsman we have here, take note."
"Suicidal" Gerring whispered. Shoeggoth elbowed him.
"What happens if there's guards on the other side?" Allis asked.
"Then I suppose they'll be wishing they weren't when I'm done with them. " Koll assured her. He clenched his arms to his sides, took a deep breath, and jumped. His nose scraped the stone as he splashed into the frigid, pitch back waters. Pulling his mouth tight over any loose air bubbles, he kicked forwards. The aqueduct expanded at least five meters into either direction and dropped far out of sight below him. Something brushed his rhythmically thrashing feet, and he recalled the fish. He swam about six meters down then played his light across the blank ceiling, nothing. His lungs began to ache and the cold was already numbing him. He kept going as his chest began to burn, contrasting painfully with the icy tendrils worming their way into him, how long had he been under? Two minutes? He kicked two more times and fumbled with the knife, even he knew he could never cut a hole in the now minute and a half he had left. Then he spotted it: a small gap in the ceiling, barely the size of the one he had entered in. Spots began to appear in his vision. No choice but to chance it. He swam upwards and pushed his head above the surface. Stale, fetid air, but air none the less greeted him as he took a deep, ragged breath.
"What was that?" something hissed. His ears began to burn, not just from the onset of frostbite. He was in a passageway identical to the one he had just left, this one lit by a flickering lantern.
"Go look" a second, guttural growl said. Koll's heart raced, well tried to anyway, it was nearly immobilized by this point. He pulled the knife out and grabbed the side of the hole with the other hand. Something stomped over. A pair of metal boots appeared. Without waiting to see its face, he slashed out clumsily. There was an explosion of blood and it screamed as he severed the leg below the knee. Koll twisted his hand so the knife was pointing straight up, and a heavily tattooed man collapsed onto it. His slit eyes widened as their gaze met, then rolled back into his head as he bled out through a hole in his chest.
"What was that?" a third voice demanded, followed by incoherent babbling between several different voices. Koll dropped the knife and drew his pistol as he heard more footsteps approaching. He fired into the half-naked cultist as it came into view. Its companions began to shout and he swiveled around, firing towards the source of the horrific sounds. A small cylinder bounced out of the darkness with a distinct metal clank and rolled to a stop against his chest. Grenade He plunged into the water and managed to get half a stroke in before it went off, shattering the ground and sending a concussion wave that knocked the air from his lungs in a burst of bubbles and threw him thrashing into the murky depths. The water darkened as his luminator sank from his nerveless fingers. Ah well, only in death does duty end. His limbs flailed uncontrollably. Something, probably the bottom of the aqueduct smacked into the back of his head. You're time isn't over yet Fury's voice echoed in his mind. We still need you, get back to the surface and frack those cultists. He nodded and struggled to right himself.
Get up son, you're duty's not finished yet.
A new voice, Dad?
Colonel Gramman to you, now move. Koll shoved off the bottom and shot to the surface, water rushing down his throat. He broke through the now two meter wide hole with a gasp and brought up the las pistol. Two heretics, one with a harvester fused to his hand, the other holding an autocannon. Both took multiple shots to the head. He heaved himself out of the water and collapsed in a shivering heap, sidearm pointed down tunnel with a trembling hand. He glanced back and saw the other side of the door, how damn big is this thing, and a lever alongside of it. He tried to rise, his leg wouldn't hold his weight, so grunting in exertion he hauled himself over to it and put his weight against it. The grinding of internal gears wrenching the double doors open was the last thing he heard before passing out beneath the surface, weapon still pointed off into the darkness.
"Found Koll" Curze called as he and Vincenns leapt through the doorway. He leapt down and pulled the motionless figure's head above water. "He's not moving" he dropped down beside him and put a hand over his mouth, "he's breathing!"
"Not for long probably" Gerring muttered, Shoeggoth elbowed him again.
Rane stomped over and knelt beside him, doing a quick examination. "Hypothermia and a weak pulse, get his shirt off and that jacket on him, we need to keep his arms and chest warm, vent a las-clip on him." Krane handed him the abandoned jacket and lasgun and the group waited for a minute for Rane to get to work. Koll suddenly coughed up a large amount of water and sat up abruptly. His pistol snapped up for a moment before his vision focused enough to see who was standing over him. "Sergeant, can you heart me?" Rane asked, venting the clip over him. Koll felt a rush of hot air that brought some of the feeling back into his fingers. The squad clustered around him.
"Loud and clear Rane, thanks" with the medic's aid he pulled the jacket over him and buttoned it up, grateful for the warmth. Allis put a hand on his shoulder.
"Welome sarge, can you stand?"
"Not really, legs are numb right now." Shoeggoth put an arm around his shoulder and pulled him up. "Aye, thanks."
"Welcome Koll."
"You okay there Koll?" Krane asked.
"I'll live, I've been through worse." Donnel silently swore he'd pass the story on as he looked back to examine the black depths.
"Enough with the warm and fuzzy feeling, we've got a war to fight" Fury growled. "This water's rising, we need to move."
"Aye, Vincenns gets point, lets move" Koll ordered. He coughed up some more liquid before stumbling forward, Shoeggoth keeping one arm on him. They set off.
Curis whirled through the bloodstained tent, treating soldiers from all regiments. He and the aides had switched to native Kragarian due to the influx of Airen and Cadians. Still, the injuries he was treating from his own regiment were the worse: Daemonic burns and gashes, unhealing ever painful bullet wounds from chaos marines, and guardsmen with their internal organs torn apart by the powers of the warp. He stitched together the stomach of a teenage girl in soldier's clothing and moved on to applying holy water and bactericide soaked bandages to a Lieutenant who had lost half his face to some warp spawn's teeth.
"The casualties are starting to slack off" Glanner reported, sparing a quick glance out the tent flaps before returning to work.
"Either we lost or we've routed them" Curis responded.
"We were winning when I was pulled out" the boy to his right with the bloodstained vest gasped. Curis turned to examine him: stab wound through the back and into his lung, slash marks across his face that would leave deep scars. He began the job of stopping him from bleeding out through his lungs. E caught sight of the dogtags: Private Gardner.