TWELVE
When I was told that the patrols were to start investigating the city walls at dawn, I had mistakenly thought that this left me with adequate time to get a decent sleep. Unfortunately, with its short planetary rotation, night lasted under seven hours and I was still operating on the standard twenty-four hour Imperial clock. The only thing operating in my favour was that I was dead tired after the day's events so trying to get sleep at 0900 hours as easy as falling down. What was difficult, however, was trying to pry my face off of my pillow (which was just a rolled up coat) after only five hours of sleep. I was half-tempted to put a lasbolt into the offending perpetrator who was trying to rouse me out of my sleep. Luckily, for the guilty party, it was Watz and he happened to be carrying a mug of recaf along with a plate of hot food. He was always a careful planner I'll give him that much even if his caution did sometimes come off as more defiant then thoughtful.
"Transfer went through already?" I guessed haphazardly as it was the only thing I could think of that would warrant him being here. I didn't have a billet assigned yet and I was so tired from the night that I had collapsed into the first available spot I could find, which happened to be a cot in one of the command posts many make-shift barracks. He would have had to ask around to find me, which was apparently a lot harder than one would suspect despite being the only female commissar on the planet.
"You sound surprised," Watz commented as he handed me breakfast. "I was told a commissar put in a good word to the Colonel Kasteen to facilitate the process." I knew for certain that the commissar in question wasn't me so that left only Cain and I had no clue why he went made the effort. However, I wasn't about to question Cain's generosity, especially when it resulted in me getting a nice, hot breakfast. The recaf was most welcomed as it was the only reason I was able to get out of bed without falling face-first onto the ground. Watz had even planned ahead and had grabbed a thermos full of recaf for me so I could make it through the rest of the day. If he was trying to butter me up he pretty much had me completely marinated by that point.
Sadly, I should have expected that he brought gifts not only to ward off any morning crankiness but also because his first duty was to be the bearer of bad news. Well, technically it was good news overall since it was to inform me that the Trojans had gone unharassed through the night, which meant the morning's patrol would be outside the city walls. Now I had little to look forward to other than spending the day trudging through a jungle likely filled with bugs and xenos with the hope that I could stay awake long enough to make it back without being eaten alive. As the Lord General had emphasized the importance of getting the task completed quickly, I had to wolf down my breakfast and drink my recaf on the way to our assembly point.
"How's Heilmit holding up?" I asked as I had noticed the young man's absence once the recaf had taken effect. One rarely saw the two apart so I was actually a little worried about him.
"It'd take a lot more than a lasbolt to keep Spike down; he's just down in the medicae facility hamming up his war wound to the medical orderly," Watz explained with a slight hint of jealousy in his voice. "He's got her all enthralled with his 'I got to save Cain' story. Absolutely no shame that kid…"
"Somebody sounds bitter," I teased with a playful smirk.
"Am not!" he snapped back.
"Then go around and woo some of the Valhallan girls with your heroic story of rescuing Cain from the evil Tau soldiers."
"I…can't. It wouldn't work," he said and I noticed a hint of reluctance in his voice. He must have known it showed as he continued, "Spike likes wearing his mask because he's proud of it. I have to because…well, there was an incident a long ago involving a plasma grenade and my face. Suffice to say I won't be winning any beauty pageants."
"Oh…sorry to hear that," I said softly. War was an ugly business and Kriegans were often sent into the ugliest parts of it, which led to a lot of stories and rumours about what the typical Kriegan looked like under their mask. Such rumours were grossly exaggerated of course but that didn't stop the more gullible civilian populations from eating it up. Truthfully, Kriegans looked like any other citizen of the Imperium, if only a little bit on the pale side depending on how old they were (which is why Kriegans usually refer to recruits as 'whities'). In Watz's case, though, it held rather true…from what he told me once he could 'make a grox burger look pretty.' Having firmly planted my foot into my mouth I decided to keep quiet until we met up with Cain and the others.
Morning had brought about a renewed sense of energy in the regiments, a fact apparent when I first stepped into the courtyard outside our headquarters. Though it seemed like soldiers were running in every direction, a military-trained eye could see the precision and order that underlay it all as every soldier moved in cue with those of their regiment. With several regiments all in one area it looked like a mob but everybody moved with purpose. Thankfully, being a commissar carried certain perks with it – such as being able to part a busy crowd of soldiers just by walking through it. The morning had also brought with it a light rainfall but between my lack of sleep and my clothes being thoroughly drenched the day before, I barely even noticed the precipitation.
Unfortunately, being new to the frontline I still had yet to develop the flexible sleep cycle that the others enjoyed so even though I had been woken up fairly early I was still the last to arrive at the front gates. Cain, Kasteen, and a few officers from the Catachans were already waiting when I arrived, though it took a few moments before Cain brought my arrival to the attention of everybody else. Luckily, the layout of the mission was fairly straightforward so it didn't take long to bring me up to speed – scout the walls, mark the location of any breeches, keep an eye out for the Tau, and try not to get lost (for some reason everybody looked at me when that was brought up). The wall was divided into several sections that each squad was responsible for scouting and I, being the last one to the party, got the worst of the batch – a lengthy stretch of wall that ran alongside densest part of the jungle. Once the little briefing was finished, our little cabal parted ways to round up their squads, save for Cain and I who lingered for a few moments.
"Don't worry about it," Cain reassured me, "from what I've heard, the jungle here is almost completely harmless. There is a slight hitch though…"
"What's that?"
"You'll be doing it with them," Cain said as he pointed out a squad of troopers standing near a parked chimera. I immediately recognized the sergeant who was briefing the remnants of his squad and cursed inwardly at my ill fortune. Dealing with Sgt. Jydais during a firefight was one thing but having to spend the bulk of the day traipsing through the jungle with him was another. I wouldn't have been half-surprised if they tried to accidentally 'lose' me during the mission. One of his men, Avruch, was killed during my high-risk maneuver around the enemy lines and I had no doubt that he held me personally responsible for it. Were they not also the smallest squad in the mission I would have tried to attach myself to another squad. Alas, my sense of duty and dedication to the mission wouldn't allow me to let my personal feelings get in the way, regardless of how much I hated that sergeant. That wasn't to be the end of my woe, however, as Cain said a moment later, "It gets worse I'm afraid."
"How could it possibly be worse?" I groaned.
"I think he means me m'dear, which I'll try not to take offense to," an eerily familiar voice cut in. It was that cocky tone that belonged to the man from the tavern the night before and now he was standing behind me with an odd grin plastered across his face as though he was thrilled to see me.
"What…are you doing here?" I asked bluntly since there wasn't any point hiding my displeasure. I think he actually took amusement in my reaction; that or he just chuckled at everything, which could have been just as true.
"Well I did as you two ordered and volunteered my expertise. A lovely young colonel read my file and was absolutely thrilled to have me on board…well, she was actually rather skeptical at first but once I threw your names into the mix everything fell into place and she was happy to have me on board. Charming young woman she is…don't suppose she's single is she? I'm not technically part of the military so it's not against regulations, right? Hm…maybe I should worry about that after the killings over and I can see if I'm still breathing." The guy's mouth sped like a neurotic junkie on stims and a pint of recaf and despite several attempts to interrupt he kept on talking. "Ah but I digress; once your names were involved her doubts subsided and since this was mostly your working, Miss Abel, she decided that it would be best if my considerable talents were put under your watchful eyes…er, eye." What he didn't realize, or maybe didn't mention, was that Kasteen's decision meant he was solely my responsibility. His success and failures reflected upon me so I actually had to give a damn about what he did and how he did it.
On the bright side, the scrawny bastard actually looked like a proper soldier now. Though his uniform looked a bit on the worn side, the jungle-pattern fatigues were still in good condition and the flak vest he wore didn't even have a scratch on it. Given his reputation, it was no surprise than he had the look of a scout with a customized long-las slung over one shoulder and his entire figure hidden beneath the swath of a large, green cloak.
"Who the frak are you anyways?" Watz asked since he was clueless as to what was pissing me off so much.
"Formerly Corporal Kael Mynar, now most people just call me Kay and you're more than welcome to it," he introduced himself and then turned to look at me." Don't look so down luv," he continued in his usual smarmy, cocky tone, "it's a beautiful day to go out for a stroll. The real beauty of this planet is outside these drab, old walls, you'll see. Plus, tell you what I'll do; I'll pick you out a nice Verten Glory while we're out. It will go perfectly with your eyes…um, I mean eye. Not that your other one isn't very lovely in a high-tech sort of way. You know what, I think I'll wait for you guys in the chimera, ta!" He didn't even wait to be dismissed before hurrying off to join Jydais at the chimera. I wondered, and hoped, that the sergeant would have a similar reaction to the man but that wouldn't be the case. Jydais would quickly pick up on how much I loathed the man, which meant that Jydais had all the more reason to like him.
"Should I just shoot him now, commissar?" Watz asked plainly as though he were asking if I wanted a refill of recaf.
"Leave him, he might still be useful," I groaned and followed to face the inevitable frustration that was Jydais. He was about as pleased to see me as I expected but he wasn't surprised by my arrival as he had been briefed on it. "Morning sergeant, are you going to be civil today?"
"Depends. Are you still going to be a pretentious blow-hard?"
"I could shoot you for that sort of talk," I reminded him though, not surprisingly, he didn't flinch at it.
"You're still welcome to give your best shot," he said. Judging by the harsh glare from all of his troops I wouldn't be able to even reach my holster before being filled with holes so at least I knew where I still stood with the squad. As much as I hated the man, he wasn't worth getting killed over. "Original offer stills stands – you can stay in the chimera and we'll just say you tagged along."
"And you can still get stuffed. Now get in the chimera." I knew orders weren't going to fly very far with Jydais or his men but since those were the orders they had to follow from the colonel they complied and we filed into the vehicle. While Watz was smart enough to sit between me and Kael, it unfortunately did not prevent the man from carrying on his conversations with everybody in the chimera. The troopers kept Kael preoccupied enough with questions about what to expect once outside the city but much of what Kael described supported Cain's previous comments about the jungle being fairly tame. Given I had little interest in him, I paid little attention to the conversation and only caught various snippets about how very few predators in the jungle would even consider attacking something as large as a human and that there were virtually no poisonous species on the planet. In short, a person was more likely to get hurt walking along the city streets than spending their afternoon in the jungle.
Of course, most people don't take their walks during a military campaign.
We disembarked from our chimera at the edge where the paved rockrete courtyards surrounding the city met with the fertile growth of the planet's flora. I imagined that when the city was first built the separation between the city and the surrounding jungle was more abrupt. But over the years the jungle had crawled back and begun encroaching on the rockrete and the buildings. Vines and sprouting foliage carpeted the rockrete as we headed out, gradually growing thicker until we couldn't tell if we were still technically walking on the rockrete. Luminator posts were gradually replaced with towering trees whose thick canopy blocked out not only the vast majority of the daylight but also the rainfall. The shift in the atmosphere was staggering as we moved further from the main gates and we soon found ourselves in a dark, dawn-like mist. Were it not for the massive city walls a few meters to our right, it would have been easy for our party to have gotten lost in the mist.
I was relieved to see that, despite Kael's reassurances, Jydais and his team fanned out into a standard advancing line as if we were in hostile territory. Lalee and Kael took point several meters ahead of the rest of us and both had a penchant for disappearing into the brush for long periods of time. To mark the location of each breech we carried a bag full of luminator posts that the engineers and techpriests could later track on their auspex units. Watz surprised me by volunteering to shoulder the load, which worked out well for me as it kept me close to Watz while the rest of the troopers needed to keep an eye on the guy carrying the posts. By extension, it meant I didn't have to worry about Jydais or his team ditching me in the jungle by 'accident.' They may not have had any need for me but they needed the posts to complete their mission.
Chatter was generally kept to a minimum, again another sign of professionalism that I was pleased to see. For me, having spent most of my years on a world where little more than moss and lichen could still grow, a lush and fertile jungle was a wondrous sight. I rarely got opportunities in my career to see so much life free from the suffocating confines of rockrete buildings and cages. Unlike cities which were just crowded with people, never once did the jungle give a sense of an all-consuming presence. Dense as it was, it never stopped feeling open…for me at least. My decision to leave my rebreather mask back at base was rewarded with the mist's refreshing coolness against my face. For a brief moment, I wanted to remain outside but then a huge bug tried to nibble on my neck and I was immediately reminded why I preferred to stay in cities.
Our advance was occasionally interrupted by our forward scouts when they uncovered tracks left behind by the Tau. However it only took Kael a minute or two to ascertain that they were all old tracks left from the previous day's attacks. The first major incident to occur took place when Watz took a moment to admire a small creature that hung from a nearby tree. At first I thought it was a plant as it had a somewhat amorphous body that hung from several tendrils from an overhanging branch but when Watz approached it the thing shuffled across the branch a couple of inches. It was no bigger than my fist, covered in a fine brown fur, and made a strange clicking noise whenever Watz leaned in for a closer look.
"Heh, the little guy is kinda cute," Watz commented.
"I'd keep my distance from that if I were you," Kael responded from the front.
"Why's that? Looks harmless enough." Almost on cue, the creature suddenly flung from the branch and latched itself across Watz's face, or at least his mask. The tendrils wrapped tightly around his head, sending him into a frenzied panic as he tried to pry the thing off but to no avail. "Get it off! Get it off!" he shouted. It took a few moments of arm-flailing and fruitless tugging but eventually Watz realized that it wasn't actually harming him or obstructing his breathing – it merely obscured his vision. He calmed down but that didn't help his situation very much.
"What is this thing and what the warp is it doing?" Watz asked our local guide.
"We call them tree jellies and it is harmless so don't worry," Kael explained as he came over to help. "Does it feel like it's prodding you in the face?"
"Yeah…what does that mean?"
Kael grinned slyly, which would have been unsettling for Watz if he could see it. "It means its trying to lay eggs in your mouth. Again, it's perfectly harmless so long as you don't panic."
Now Watz easily could stare down Ork hordes and daemonic beasts without flinching in his resolve because as a guardsman it was his duty to fight the enemies of the Imperium whatever they may be. His job description, however, did not include getting face-raped; even death seemed preferable to such an ordeal. Watz immediately went back to full-blown panic, taking the butt of his weapon and smashing it hard into the creature. After the fourth hit, though, the thing didn't budge and the only one who was injured was poor Watz, who collapsed in a daze.
"We call them tree jellies for a reason – no bones and all that" Kael said apparently indifferent to Watz's plight. "Now hold still and I'll get that off you." Flicking out a lighter, Kael waved the flame close to the creature and it quickly lost interest in Watz's face and scuffled off back into the trees. Thankfully, Watz was always diligent in following the safely advice for any guardsmen – always bring protection – and the only thing that got violated was the mask. He was dazed (due to his own efforts) and slightly traumatized but otherwise unharmed and once all the other troopers were finished chuckling we were able to continue on with our mission.
"I have stared into the dark abyss…and now I know what true terror feels," Watz muttered in a haze while I helped him back to his feet. "Didn't even have the decency to buy me dinner first."
"I know that feeling," I jokingly reassured him, "you'll get over it."
Our squad continued on its way but now we gave the indigenous life forms a wide berth. We found our first breech in the wall about a half-hour into our trek. It was hard to miss since the Tau had used a fairly powerful demolition charge to make the whole, which left a sizeable portion of the jungle in splinters. While Watz and a few others went inside to scout out the extent of the damage as well as mark the entrance and exit with the luminator poles, I remained outside and kept a vigilant eye for any signs of danger. Even though I didn't expect any kind of trouble to lurk in the jungles, I didn't want to be caught unprepared by one of those face-humping critters.
"In this kind of jungle, you'll hear things coming well before you ever get a chance to see them," Kael suddenly spoke up. He startled me slightly as it came from a tree above and to my left, which was about a dozen meters away from the last place I saw him. He was perched on one of the lower branches, his body pressed against the trunk and his cloak wrapped tightly around his figure, making him almost impossible to see if you didn't know where to look. Only his eyes were easy to spot, especially since they were staring down at me. Hopefully I had managed to keep my surprise hidden but I half-suspected that he could see right through me. "Then again I am here to make sure the non-existent predators don't eat you all so I suppose there's no reason for you to bother keeping a look out."
"Well what would you expect me to do then, hm?" I replied.
"Who says you need to do something? Just have a seat and rest, enjoy the scenery, stop and smell the flowers as people say."
"Doing nothing doesn't really sit well with me," I insisted. Though I wouldn't have minded taking a seat for a little while, I remained standing if only out of spite and pride. It was all very typical-Kriegan of me to punish myself in order to prove a mundane point.
Kael dropped to the ground, barely making any noise in the process, a few feet ahead of me and approached me with a cautious look in his eyes. "Miss Abel, I don't want to panic you but I need you to hold very, very still," he said in a whisper. Immediately thinking back to Watz's fateful encounter, I tensed up and while I was tempted to look about, I heeded the advice. Looking about as much as my good eye would allow I saw nothing that would suggest trouble but there was a whole world behind me that could have been ready to eat me or worse. Slowly and deliberately, Kael took a few steps closer and though I asked what was wrong he didn't say what, only to keep holding still. The only clue he gave me was that there was something near my head. In one quick and deft motion, his hand reached out over my shoulder and plucked a small blue and purple flower from a nearby branch and then slid it into my hair just above my right ear. He did it so quickly I didn't realize what had just happened until I saw his goofy grin when he backed away and said, "There we go. Now you look absolutely radiant!"
I gave him the angriest glare I could muster but I don't think he was perturbed in the slightest. In fact, he appeared to have found it comical, which only irritated me further. "We're on a mission here, not flower picking!" I shouted furiously at him. This only elicited more laughter from the man, who scampered back into the tree when I tried to throttle him. "This is no time for playing around you bleeding idiot!"
"Always so serious, aren't you Miss Abel? Normally I would say you'll get grey hairs being so high strung but it seems you've already taken care of that," the cocky little bastard teased from his hiding place in the trees. I was close to just whipping out my laspistol and firing a few rounds off but I could have set off a panic amongst the other nearby units so I refrained from attempting murder. I could have – I was well within my rights to do so but Cain would have probably disapproved of executing a perfectly good soldier. Besides, after that indignity I would only settle with seeing Kael suffer and he'd need to be alive for that to happen.
"If you two lovebirds are quite finished, we have a mission to get on with," Jydais shouted from nearby. I hadn't noticed that Watz and the others had returned so it was time to the squad moving again, which meant I could put some distance between Kael and I.
"Mynar! You're on point," I shouted at the trees. Kael's figure swung down from the branches, hanging upside-down for a moment as he snapped a quick salute with a 'yes ma'am.' I was ready to scream again but Kael hurried on his way so it became moot. Instead, I merely buried my face into my hands and let out a drawn-out groan of annoyance.
"Is everything okay Commissar?" Watz asked since he had missed the whole ordeal. I waved him off and told him it was nothing important, which he accepted without further questioning. "That flower looks good on you by the way," he commented idly before heading out after the others. I plucked the flower and took a closer look at it – its blue and purple pedals were arranged in a star-like pattern around the center, which had a trio of little stamens tipped with yellow buds. It had a rather sharp, sweet scent to it despite its small size and had it been given to me by any other man I probably would have kept it. Since it only reminded me of his idiocy, I promptly flicked it aside and joined up with the rest of the squad.
The remainder of our mission proved rather fruitless as we reached the end of our designated section of wall without coming across another breach. I voxed our status back to headquarters and then we proceeded to head back the way we came. From what I could gather from the vox chatter of the other squads, the extent of the damage to the walls was far less than we had estimated. In hindsight, it made sense since the Tau never had any intention of taking the city when they first attacked and thus no need to create various means of gaining entry. Nonetheless it was still important to plug the holes in the inevitable case the Tau reconsider their battle plans. When the rain had been light, the thick canopy overhead had kept us relatively dry but as the day progressed the rain grew heavier and started dripping through. Though nothing in comparison to yesterday's weather, it did serve as motivation to keep moving as I had a nice, dry room and a hot mug of recaf waiting for me back at the command post, which was all the comfort I needed at the moment. As we neared the first and only breach we marked, everybody started feeling a bit more at ease with the prospect of soon having a chimera to take shelter in.
"There's the luminator post – we'll be back in time for a late lunch," Kael said to me as we had gradually moved into a tighter formation over the past several minutes. "I hope you're not always so angry and serious when you're off-duty."
"A commissar is never off-duty," I said smugly, mostly out of spite. To be frank, I took whatever downtime I could to relax and unwind. It was almost necessary if only to avoid losing my sanity, especially considering some of the things I went through during the later years of my career. "However, it will be nice to be out of the jungle for a while."
"Oh come on, it's not that bad of a place," Kael insisted and sounded almost a little offended by my insinuation. "You just need to take a moment to stop and just…listen to the beauty around you." As if trying to prove his point, he stopped and motioned for everyone else to follow suit (they didn't hear our conversation so they thought it was for a legitimate reason). Frankly, all I could hear were various birds chirping and insects buzzing but he seemed to hear something that we couldn't because his head started scanning the distance. "Everybody get down," he whispered suddenly as he crouched behind a tree. That cocky tone of his was gone, which meant he was being serious for a change and the entire squad took up firing positions in a shallow arc towards the jungle.
"Did you hear something?" I whispered from my position a few meters to Kael's left.
"Somebody's out there," he replied before he started climbing up his tree. "Wait here, I'm going to check it out." As he vanished into the treetops, the rest of us were left in tense silence as we tried to figure out if Kael was correct. The problem, however, was that the jungle got exponentially denser as one ventured away from the city, making it impossible to see much further than twenty or so meters from our position. How Kael could suspect anything other than bugs and critters were out there was a mystery but he was the one who had decades of experience in the jungle so we weren't about to question his judgment. Not just yet.
After a few minutes, though, trooper Malakan started getting impatient. "For Emperor's sake, there's nothing out there. Let's just keep moving."
I was just about to agree with the trooper when the silence was broken by the sound of heavy crashing as something massive fell from the treetops, smashing every branch on the way down before hitting the jungle floor a few feet ahead of us. Falling leaves and broken branches clouded our vision at first but once things settled what we saw left us stunned. It was an ork – a hulking, green barbarian complete with an equally vicious-looking axe and autogun. However, he was also very, very dead as there was a large hole blown through his face.
"Where the frak did that come from? We should have heard him a mile away?" Watz finally spoke up, voicing what everybody was thinking. The one man who could help answer that question thankfully dropped down from above, landing on the ork's chest gracefully.
"Some orks can be very sneaky," Kael answered. "Better vox back to command because there's no way this is the only one out here." Unfortunately, the ruckus made by the falling ork alerted every other one nearby, who then immediately decided that stealth was no longer an option since we had apparently found them out.
"Humiez!" A deep, menacing voice echoed from the jungles, followed by the characteristic war cry that made even hardened veterans start to worry. Suddenly, the jungle exploded with activity as scores of guns began rattling off bullets wildly. The air was quickly clouded with exploding branches and torn leaves as gunfire rained from all directions and shredded the jungle apart. They couldn't see us, though, so all they succeeded in was making a huge mess of the area and forcing us to keep our heads down. Fortunately, we were in a well-defendable position with our back against the city walls and plenty of trees to keep us safe from the random gunfire. Conversely though, it also meant that we couldn't see the orks until they were practically on top of us, which was the last thing you want when dealing with orks.
"We can't stay here! We have to get back to the chimera!" Malakan shouted, his voice strained and showing signs of breaking.
"Keep your head down dammit!" Jydais ordered but even his words were falling on deaf ears. Malakan broke cover and began sprinting behind our line. By some miracle, though, he wasn't hit but I wasn't about to let him just run off. I should've just shot him for cowardice but I needed every gun firing if I wanted to make back alive. When he came within arm's reach of me, I latched onto him and used his momentum to swing and slam him into a nearby try. He was caught completely by surprise and when he finally realized what was going on I had him pinned against the tree and my laspistol shoved into his face.
"I should just shoot you right now but if we're going to win I need you shooting the enemy! Now you can either fight by my side or you can die by my hand but make up your mind quickly! What's your choice?" Fear could make a man do crazy things for a man afraid does not think. If you could get them thinking again, though, you could bring them back from the brink. For what felt like an eternity I stared into Malakan's eyes and watched as reason began to take a foothold in his mind once more and the fear slowly subsided. When he silently nodded I knew I had the soldier back and I released him. Immediately he fell into position, leveling his lasgun just in time as orks began to break through the foliage and into view. Concentrated laser fire ripped through the first group of orks, making the few lagging behind think twice about rushing into the open. Now that we had revealed our position the incoming gunfire became slightly more focused, though they still sent most of the rounds well above our heads.
"This is Commissar Abel to all allied units, we've got major ork activity outside the city walls. We are under heavy fire and request immediate support!" I called over all the major frequencies.
Cain was the first to reply, though his message wasn't what I had wanted to hear. "You too, huh?" he commented. I could gunfire in the background of his communication so he was clearly in just as bad of a situation as I was. "We got ambushed just a few moments ago. We've already lost half the squad but we've managed to take shelter behind a tank's wreckage. Do you think you'd be able to make it to our position?"
"I'm kind of up to my tits in orks here," I replied as I snapped a few shots into a greenskin's skull.
"Malakan kind of had a point," Jydais interrupted. "There's no way we can stay here with this many orks. They'll eventually smarten up and rush us." It didn't take a genius to realize that we were heavily outnumbered and while the orks were staying put at the moment, the second one of them managed to whip the others into a frenzy we would be steamrolled like a bug under a baneblade.
As much as I hated to admit it, running was actually the most strategic course of action. It was at times like those that I reminded myself that even an Astartes had to make a strategic withdrawal once in a while. "All right but we leave as a group," I replied.
"Okay boys, frags and smokes – throw everything you've got and we make for the chimera," Jydais ordered. Watz handed me a few of his extras and when Jydais gave the signal we threw every we had at the orks. Explosions rippled through the trees, blanketing the entire area in smoke and shrapnel. Now came the hard part – running. I grabbed Watz by his coat and pushed him forward. As a commissar I couldn't be the first one to start running and once Watz was moving the rest of the squad followed suit. Whether by foolishness or simply underestimating the others, I somehow wound up being the last one to leave as Kael rushed past me and shouted at me to get moving.
It was pretty stupid of me to have taken up the rear given that I had the shortest legs and stride in the squad. I was taking comfort in the fact that an angry horde of orks could motivate a planetary governor to become a marathon runner so I wasn't lagging far behind the others. At least, I wasn't lagging behind until a rocket slammed into a tree a few feet ahead of me, knocking me off my feet in a shower of bark and splinters. The biggest problem with being the last in line is that nobody notices when you go missing and even though I was knocked senseless for only a few seconds by the time I cleared the cobwebs from my head the others had completely vanished into the undergrowth
I was alone in a jungle with an angry mob of orks readying to hack me into lunchmeat. Just as the first one was ready to bring a cleaver down to end my miserable existence, its chest suddenly burst in a shower of blood and pulped guts as did the next several orks in quick succession. It was the trademark evisceration of bolter fire, which didn't make any sense since the only bolter was on the chimera a few kilometers away assuming it too hadn't buggered off when the orks made their presence known. My curiosity didn't last very long as the answer strolled casually towards me and I found myself before the blood-splattered armoured carapace of a member of the Adeptus Astartes…and he had his bolter pointed right at my face.