TWENTY
In the war between truth and lies, truth is the ninety-eight pound scrawny, pasty-white juvie while lies are drunken, belligerent scrumball jocks who bully and bitch-slap truth at every opportunity. In a perfect world, truth would be a radiant light that destroyed the shadows of lies but in reality, truth can barely stand on its own. Because people are simply more willing to accept a lie when it is wrapped in a neat, simple and convenient package for their acceptance. Convincing people to accept the truth is an uphill battle, even more so when the truth is complicated enough to have the appearance of an old mystery holo-drama. Scrawny, complicated truth or man-mountain, simple lie. Which should the guards, standing before us with their weapons drawn, believe if we tried to explain to them that their Governor's death was the result of the deception orchestrated by an Eldar psyker? Why should they when it was much more convenient to believe that Cain had merely talked his way through layers of security in order to isolate and assassinate their beloved Governor? Commissar Cain was already a legend for having single-handedly turned the tide in the liberation of Perlia so Magnus Viridis seemed to be par for the course. Were I not already privy to the truth of the matter, I doubt I would have believed it either.
Regardless, the truth of the situation for Cain and I was we now had a half-dozen armed and angry guards shouting into their comm-beads alerting the entire Aedans garrison of what Cain had supposedly just done. Understandably, we were not given a chance to explain ourselves as the guards immediately readied to fire. I bolted for the nearest piece of solid cover, the Governor's desk, and vaulted to the opposite side. Cain was not as fortunate as he still had a dead Governor stuck on his chainsword. However, he kept his head down and the body supported and used it for a shield, banking on the guards having enough respect for their deceased commander to not desecrate his remains with lasbolts. The guards hesitated but Cain and I knew it wouldn't be long before one worked up the courage to take action. He carefully inched towards them until he was close enough to act.
"Catch!" Cain shouted as he activated his chainsword once again and kicked the Governor's body free. Two of the guards were knocked back as the body fell onto them, giving Cain an opening to charge in close and dispatching two other soldiers with rapid strikes. Distracted by the chainsword-wielding legend in their midst, I was free to pop up and drop a few more with carefully aimed shots. Cain was as ruthless as he was efficient, thrusting his blade into a third guard before he got a chance to get back to his feet after being knocked over by the governor. The last guard would probably have gotten a shot off on Cain had I not stopped him with a shot of my own, generating a hole from one side of his helmet to the other.
"Now what the frak do we do?" I asked since our brilliant plan to convince the Governor's forces to our cause had gone in the completely opposite direction.
"I suggest we worry about getting out of the city first," Cain said, readying his laspistol in the event more guards arrived. However, when we heard gunfire from outside, a realization crossed both our minds. "The others!" we shouted in unison and raced out the office. After word of the Governor's death spread throughout the building, the palace guards quickly turned their weapons on our comrades. Judging by the volume of gunfire, however, our friends had not been caught off-guard. When we emerged into the main atrium, a number of guards were firing down at the main entrance, including the heavy bolt set up at the top of the stairs. They probably thought the six guards who entered the Governor's office would have been enough to finish us off, so Cain and I caught the soldiers completely by surprise. We were able to shoot down several before they realized they were being attacked from the rear and I made sure my first shot went into the back of the gunner on heavy bolter.
"Watz, Cain and I are at the top of the stairs. Are you guys okay down there?" I shouted over the comm-bead while I took cover from incoming laser fire.
"Thank the Emperor you're both okay. We got suspicious when we lost vox contact with you," Watz replied. "Everybody down here is okay and I'm guessing you have a good explanation for what the frak is going on."
"Abridged version: Kael killed the Governor but the guards think we did it. We'll explain the rest when the gunfire dies down." With Cain and I harassing from the rear and Watz and the others pressing from below, the guards caught between us did not last long. With the heavy bolter down, Garrick began charging up the stairs. A few were brave (or stupid) enough to try and hold their ground against the Astartes but the vast majority realized their weapons were as useful as fresh fruit against him and they promptly tried to run for cover. Whether they stayed or ran, Garrick's boltgun made short work of the palace guards. When the last of them were finished off, we quickly regrouped on the stairs and Cain gave a quick explanation of what had transpired in the Governor's office.
"That xeno bastard," Heilmit remarked angrily. "I bet he was planning that from the start."
"It's very likely," Garrick acknowledged. "But we have a greater problem on our hands; the greenskins have been funneling their offensive towards this location and the palace guards started coming under fire not too long ago. If we don't hurry, the Orks will overrun the front gates and we won't be able to get back to the transport."
It was far too well-timed and inconvenient for the Ork offensive to have been a mere coincidence. There was little doubt in any of our teeny-tiny military minds that Kael had a hand in directing the attack to the palace. "So much for your theory of Kael going easy on me," I remarked.
Much to my surprise Cain disagreed "Not necessarily. We probably couldn't fight our way through all the PDF and Cadians but with the Orks distracting them, we might be able to slip out through the chaos. We'll need to get back to the salamander immediately." There was no argument to that idea, not even from Garrick. I doubt even an Astartes was interested in being caught between too armies.
The situation out front, however, was far worse than Garrick had made it seem. What had been light contact only a few minutes ago had already rapidly degraded into an all-out assault. Hundreds upon hundreds of Orks were throwing themselves at the front gate. The palace guards were bravely fight back and cutting them down in droves but even after a quick glance I could see that the Orks were gaining ground and there simply wasn't enough firepower to hold them off. To make matters worse, the Orks weren't packing lightly either as evident by one of the guard towers exploding in a shower of steel and rockrete, and several rockets that screamed over our heads before impacting the palace façade. Most of us became wary of falling debris, except for Garrick who barely flinched when a piece of rockrete the size of my head bounced off his shoulder.
The space marine looked on at the fighting, traitors and xenos slaughtering each other in droves. Were we not about to get caught in the middle it would have made for an entertaining afternoon. "They fight on while we flee…hardly seems right," Garrick muttered.
"You're welcome to stay if you'd like," I said, making my sarcasm quite evident just in case he took it as an open invitation.
He shook his head, however, which would have surprised me a few days ago but made more sense now that I had a better understanding of the space marine. "A pointless death is a dishonourable one," he remarked. Just as we began to descend the front steps, an earth-shaking explosion ripped apart the main gates, throwing xenos, humans, and debris into the air as though they were confetti. A disheartening, elated roar echoed from the Orks as they began pouring through the fresh opening, hacking apart anybody caught in the rising green tide. Our party came to a halt when it became obvious the Orks would overrun the salamander's position before we reached it, prompting us to immediately turn about and race back up the stairs with an unnecessary shout of 'back inside' from Cain. Watz and Jurgen shut the doors behind us while Heilmit worked on a nearby control lectern to activate the lock-down protocols (because every self-respecting Governor has heavy-duty locks on their front door in the event of a civilian uprising).
"If anybody has a brilliant plan I'm open to suggestion," Cain said as we hurried back into the front atrium.
"Don't these palaces always have secret escape routes?" Jurgen suggested.
"True…but they're called secret escape routes for a reason," Cain replied, despite hating the answer. He knew we could spend the entire day searching the walls without success and anybody who knew the location would have no reason to share that information with us. I suggested checking the Governor's office in the hopes there was a building layout or something that could help us. The office had a number of computer lecterns and dataslates lying around so we quickly began to scour for any sort of useful information.
"Aha!" Heilmit cheered joyfully, prompting Cain to rush to his side. "This lectern has a number of building directories. I should be able to find something useful on this."
"How long will that take?" Cain asked.
A heavy explosion echoing from the front provided the answer. Time was not something we had in abundance. "Probably longer than we have," Heilmit said reluctantly.
"Keep working, we'll buy you time," Cain said as he motioned for us to head back out into the atrium. The corridor leading into the atrium would funnel the Ork numbers, reducing the effectiveness of their numbers. Emperor willing, we might even be able to clog the hall with dead bodies. Garrick and Jurgen took up firing positions while Watz and I manned the heavy bolter. We could hear the thunderous pounding of footsteps growing louder, accompanied by Orkish cheers and whoops.
"Commissar Abel," Watz spoke up after we finished loading a fresh box of ammunition into the heavy bolter, "for what's it worth…serving with you these past few weeks has been better than all my other years of service put together." It was an unexpected comment to hear, not so much the fatalistic attitude (because you'll always get that from a Kriegan) but the sincerity of how he said it. Looking back, I had appreciated Watz's service but I had been taking it for granted as a perk of the profession. I knew he enjoyed the benefits of being a commissar's aide and how it kept him away from the front lines but until that point I hadn't considered how much it really meant to him. Like me, Watz had spent most of his career serving under leaders he cared little about so having somebody to follow that had a vested interest in them brought a great, reassuring sense of purpose much like the one I got from working under Cain's tutelage. Words failed me but thankfully there was about a hundred Orks to provide ample distraction.
"Show them the true face of fear!" Garrick shouted as we all opened fire. High-caliber bolter rounds began tearing apart the Orks as they raced into the atrium. Within a few seconds the bodies were already starting to pile up and bog down the Ork advance. Though firing at the limit of its range, Jurgen's melta gun was still able to cut out gouges in the Ork mob. The foul-smelling, bloody paste left behind by the Orks hit by the intense heat blast coated the floor and creating a slippery obstacle for the rushing Orks. Eventually, though, they started to use what little brain power they had and the influx of Orks began to lessen and some were using corpse mounds as cover while they fired volleys back at us.
Tunnel-vision began to set in and I became fixated on whatever target happened to be caught in my crosshairs. With less Orks coming in my suppression fire became more precise and controlled bursts gouged out chunks of the enemy line. But just as I was starting to make a dent in their lines the heavy bolter fell silent. "Empty!" I alerted the others as Watz and I began loading a new belt into the gun. The Orks were quick to respond to the sudden lull, surging forth into the atrium and up the stairs. Just as the Orks neared the top, Jurgen unleashed a deadly sweep of his melta gun, liquefying the first couple rows of Orks, which bought me the precious seconds I needed to finish loading the heavy bolter. The gun roared to life once more, blasting the closest Ork into a bloody and chunky mess and then plowing a path of carnage down the steps.
"Commissar Cain!" Heilmit shouted as he emerged from the Governor's office, waving a dataslate about enthusiastically. "I got us a way out of here! The Governor has a personal aquila lander located on the rooftop of the eastern building."
"Please tell me somebody here can fly one of those things," Cain replied.
"Don't ask me to do any barrel rolls Commissar," Watz spoke up, "but if you can get me to that bird I should be able to get us out of the city." Since any escape route was better than our current situation, I wasn't about to question where a guardsman picked up such a skill. Cain likely thought the same as he nodded back to Watz.
"Lead the way trooper," Cain instructed as he signaled for us to pull out. Heilmit took point and began racing for a door a short distance away along the balcony. Once again, when the heavy bolter fell silent the Orks began another pushing, forcing us to shoot and run. We threw what frag grenades we had left to slow them down but an Ork charge was nigh-impossible to stop without destroying it outright. Garrick, in a surprising move, went for the heavy bolter when Watz and I abandoned it; he grabbed the heavy weapon, tore it from its tripod, and took it with us. Some Orks carrying rocket launchers began to show up as several salvos were launched up as we raced across the balcony. The rockets were even more inaccurate than the gunfire, one hitting the ceiling several feet away from us, one hitting a section of wall we had already passed, and even one hitting another Ork and splattering him across the wall. Unfortunately, one hit the underside of the balcony just as I was running across it, blowing a hole through the wooden flooring, dropping me several feet to the atrium floor.
"Commissar!" Watz shouted as he stopped to peer through the hole. I was lucky enough that a well-placed couch broke my fall but now I was stuck on the ground floor with a mob of Orks between me and the others.
"Get moving! I'll find another way!" I shouted since there was neither the time nor the means for me to join up with the others at the moment. They had to keep ahead of the Orks if they wanted to make it to the lander. A few of the Ork stragglers took notice of me but the bulk remained in pursuit of the others as apparently a space marine's helmet was a highly coveted trophy for an Ork (and Garrick was happy to entertain any who wished to take it from him). One of the Orks that saw me, however, was frakking huge and carried a hammer that was bigger than me. Some hardline commissars would consider my actions cowardice but my only chance for survival was to keep moving, so I bolted for the nearest door and prayed that it didn't lead to a dead-end.
I found myself in a long hallway and judging by the lack of décor it was more likely used by the service staff than guests. A few carts lined the halls and a few of the doors were already open to reveal panty storerooms – I had to be somewhere near the kitchen, which meant a delivery door to the outside. While there were likely more Orks and traitors outside it was the only chance I had to get my bearings and figure out a way to regroup with the others. Inside I would only succeed in running aimlessly through the halls until I ran headlong into an Ork. The kitchen was easy enough to find; I merely had to search for a large set of swinging or automatic doors so food carts could pass through without issue. The kitchen was as large as one would expect for a mansion: numerous ovens of various makes and purposes lined the walls, food and grains were stacked on shelves, and meals in various stages of preparation sat unfinished on counters. If I hadn't been running for my life I would have sampled some of the items as even the unfinished meals looked better than the usual meals prepared by the mess staff (not that it's the cook's fault, he does the best he can with the crap the Munitorium provides). As it was, I only had time to realize that I could use the kitchen to my advantage. The number of ovens available meant the kitchen had a large supply of oil or fuel, in this case a gaseous form of promethium. I opened all the gas valves I could find, pumping litres of volatile vapours into the kitchen. I still needed an ignition source that I wouldn't require me to be standing within range of the resultant explosion. One of the radiovens was able to fulfill that role suitably. I tossed a spare laspistol power cell into the oven, cranked the power to maximum, and set the timer for a few minutes.
Every soldier knows that a power cell can be charged on the field by hooking it into any electrical source or exposing the cell to an open fire. A soldier also knows that you never put a power cell into a radioven despite the fact that it simulates the effects of a fire using low-powered radiation. Something about the radiation reacted with the inner workings of a power cell causing a relatively small but ultimately destructive explosion of both the power cell and the radioven. About thirty seconds after starting the oven, the power cell detonated with the force of a small hand grenade, sparking off the gas-filled room and promptly turning the kitchen into a raging inferno.
Of course, by the time it went off I had already fled through the kitchen's delivery bay door and was now outside in the palace's inner courtyard. I heard the blast, though, and even felt a hot blast of air from the kitchen's direction. It wouldn't hold the Orks off forever but it bought me some time. The inner courtyard was a network of hedges, flowers, towering trees, and overly-elaborate gazebos, which would have been very appealing had the world not been coming down around my ears. Each of the four structures had access to the inner courtyard so all I needed to do was head for the eastern building, which was easy to identify as I could see the edges of a landing pad from where I stood.
"Cain," I voxed as I figured it would be prudent to let the others know I was still alive. "I've reached the inner courtyard. I think I can link up with you guys at the landing pad. How's the situation on your end?"
"Green and ugly," he replied accompanied by the whine of a chainsaw on maximum-shred. "We're making progress but we're sandwiched between Orks and traitors."
"Well…Emperor watch over you all and I'll see you at the landing pad." I had to keep moving. I could already hear Orks trying to bash their way through some of the other doors leading to the courtyard. Little more than a heavy duty lock was keeping the area from being flooded with greenskins. As I started across the courtyard, I heard the unsettling roar of high-powered jet propulsion systems. Before I even cranked my head skywards to see what it was, a Tau battlesuit landed in the courtyard ahead of me, shattering the rockrete walkway beneath its feet and kicking up a cloud of dust. It was alone and it bore the white markings denoting it as none other than that of Shas'O Lar'shi, who I bet had just heard of what transpired at the palace.
"Frak," I muttered softly as I skidded to a halt only a few meters from the machination.
"You…" his voice boomed when the battlesuit looked down upon me. "I was told you were dead."
"I get that a lot," I replied.
"Where is Cain?" he demanded angrily. "I thought he was a man of honour but instead he proposes a truce only to stab us in the back!"
"Oh don't play the innocent card," I scoffed. "We know you were dealing with the Eldar - destroying supply ships with one hand and offering the other to the governor as a supposed friend. Well guess what, your plan has fallen apart. Your forces are cut-off and surrounded with Orks on one side and us on the other. Your allies are hopelessly overwhelmed and we're about to drive an armoured column straight through this city. And the best part of all is that you were set up by none other than your little Eldar friend."
At first he said nothing, the battlesuit maintaining its lifeless gaze. I like to think that the Tau commander was trembling with rage at that moment, realizing that he had been played for a fool by the one he thought had been helping him all along. Perhaps the campaign taught the Tau the folly of listening to an Eldar. "I will deal with that Eldar after I have dealt with your commissar," he finally replied and then, most surprisingly, turned and started walking away. The blue-skinned bastard was snubbing me! Granted, I wasn't in a hurry to die for the Emperor but there were few things as insulting as standing the crosshairs of an enemy and having them decide that you weren't even worth the ammunition.
My temper flared, overriding any sense of self-preservation. "Don't you ignore me, you blue-skinned son of a bitch!" I yelled as I fired my laspistol several times into the battlesuit's exposed backside. Unfortunately, even a hotshot laspistol didn't have enough power to punch through a battlesuit's armour. All I succeeded in accomplishing was pissing him off as the O'Lar'shi swiftly turned about and firing a blast from its plasma gun. It might have been a warning shot as it flew wide but was close enough for me to feel the heat from the explosion. However, at the time my mind didn't register the possibility of a warning shot, instead interpreting it as a full-blown attack. Fueled by a mix of panic and anger, I dashed for cover while snapping off several more shots with the hope of hitting a joint or a structural weak point of some sort. I made some impressive-looking pot-marks on the armour but little else. Several more shots whisked past me before I finally found shelter amongst some hedges – it wouldn't protect me but it kept me hidden to an extent (at least I think it did, I had no idea what sort of sensors a battlesuit had equipped).
I cursed myself for my stupidity, picking a fight with a battlesuit when I lacked any sort of anti-tank weaponry. The only reason I had survived so far was that the battlesuit seemed to be armed to combat large, slow-moving heavy infantry rather than a quick and tiny commissar running for her life. However, after lying on the grass for a few moments, what I thought was a rock under my side turned out to be the krak grenade I had tucked away so long ago and had never bothered to get rid of. It was as long of a shot as one could get without being considered a blind throw but as energy bolts roared over my head, I realized it could very well be my only shot. If I simply tossed the grenade, the battlesuit would be able to get out of the way so my best chance was to distract Tau commander. Of course, I couldn't simply stand up and shout 'hey look over there.' I didn't have time to strategize as thudding footsteps alerted me to his approach so I sprinted off again and prayed for the Emperor's protection. A plasma bolt vaporized the spot where I had just been taking cover and I veered to the left in time to avoid a second, quickly released energy bolt. It whisked past me, fraying my nerves with the heat, and blasted a hole through a groundskeeper's shed. There must have been some fuel stored within it because something inside the shed detonated, sending pieces of tin and wood flying across the gardens. The blast threw me off balance and a piece of wood struck me in the knee, sending me tumbling to the ground in a heap. When I regained my senses, the first thing I noticed was my krak grenade lying on the grass several feet ahead of me…and the second thing was the battlesuit towering overtop of me.
"Insolent gue'la, war and anarchy are all your kind is good for," O'Lar'shi taunted, secure in his supremacy. "The Tau Empire offers you peace, harmony, and prosperity and you only spit it back in our face! The Age of Man is over…and the Age of the Greater Good will soon be at hand. Your kind can either join us in glory or be trampled underfoot."
Why some people insist on lecturing the enemies on their folly before killing them has always been a mystery to me. It always struck me as unnecessarily dramatic – the sort of antics done in holo-vids and old novels where long pauses to deliver speeches have no consequences. In reality, while the Tau commander prattled on I took the opportunity to look for an opening of some sort. There was no chance I could make a run for it not to mention my pride wouldn't allow it so my options were limited. He would notice if I tried to crawl over to the krak grenade and even at point-blank range it was unlikely my laspistol would be able to make anything more than a dent in the frontal armour. However, my eye caught a glimpse of an opportunity: the Orks. At the moment, the Orks were still trying to bash their way through various doors and gates leading into the inner courtyard and while most of the doors would hold for a while, a few were close to their breaking points. It was a long-distance shot for a laspistol but, and as crazy as it sounds, I could almost tell just by looking exactly where my shots would land. I snapped off three shots, all of which found their mark on the hinges and bolts of a heavy metal door. When the Orks on the other side rammed it once again, the door was knocked clean from its frame and about twenty-or-so greenskins rushed into the inner courtyard.
"What was that supposed to accomplish?" O'Lar'shi remarked. He must have thought I had tried to distract him since the battlesuit kept its focus on me, which was fine by me since it meant he wasn't paying attention to the mob of Orks that were racing over to meet him. Only when the bullets started pinging off his armour did he realize there was company and by that point it was too late for him to dodge the incoming ork rocket. It impacted against the suit's backside, smashing apart its jet pack. O'Lar'shi immediately turned about-face and began unleashing all his firepower against the oncoming Orks, giving me ample opportunity to slip away. Against my better judgment, however, I didn't flee the scene entirely, instead lingering a short distance away if only to see whether O'Lar'shi survived the encounter (or more accurately, to ensure that he didn't).
Despite the stories I heard about the Tau being horrid close-quarter combatants, the Tau commander did an impressive job keeping the Orks at bay even when the greenskins got in close. Though lacking any sort of close-range weapon, the battlesuit had enough speed and mass to knock the Orks back when needed, giving him the time needed to fire off quick shots at close-range that even reduced the larger Orks into bloody stains across the grass. But with most battles against Orks, the mob was greater than the sum of its individual parts and while the battlesuit could quick dispatch individual Orks with ease, the numbers were slowly overtaking him. I couldn't help but smirk and imagine the sense of growing panic as the battlesuit started backing up, firing wildly at the advancing Orks, the few remaining thrusters on his jet pack sparking periodically in attempt to gain some altitude. There was no escape for him, however, but even when facing incredible odds he fought with savagery and tenacity. Most of the larger Orks were killed in the initial charge, leaving the weaker runts to try and whittle down the rest of his armour. The last big Ork was able to smash one of the battlesuit's guns with his hammer, though he was immediately blown with a point-blank rocket hit. The explosions detonated with enough force that even from my vantage points several meters away I was nearly hit by flying Orks chunks. Bullets continued rattling against the battlesuit's armour but to no effect other than to be answered with a blast from his plasma gun.
Against all odds, when the gunfire died down (relatively speaking) the Orks lay dead at the battlesuit's feet. Its armour was marred with deep gouges, cracked from repeated hammer strikes, and blasted by gunfire and explosions. The battlesuit merely stood there, most likely because the pilot was preoccupied assessing the suit's damage. I scanned the field of dead Orks for a weapon I could use and by the Emperor's will I spotted one of the Ork's crude rocket launchers. It was way too heavy for me to carry on my own so I lifted up the business end and propped the weapon up against one of the dead Orks. In hindsight, I should have just left well enough alone and left – the Tau commander was in no condition to pursue me and would've likely died whenever another batch of Orks arrived plus I had no assurance that the Ork weapon would still fire (and frankly, no Ork weapon looks like it should be able to fire in the first place). But I still had a score to settle with Shas'O Lar'shi. He owed me blood and I intended to collect.
O'Lar'shi must have heard me lugging the rocket launcher into position as the battlesuit suddenly turned towards me, plasma gun taking aim at me. I panicked and squeezed the trigger even before making sure the weapon was properly aimed, not that it mattered as the rocket streaked through the air straight into the battlesuit's chest and sending slabs of scorched armour in all directions. The battlesuit could take no more, it struggled to keep balance for a few seconds but gravity overpowered the machine and it fell back, crashing into what was left of the gazebo. I had hoped for a second explosion or for the battlesuit to burst into flames but I couldn't complain with the result. Still, I had no assurances that the pilot was dead so I had no choice but to investigate further. As I drew closer, the suit began to move once again, though not the limbs but what remained of the chest plates. A jagged, broken section of the frontal armour swung outwards, which answered my question as to whether the pilot lived or not. Once the suit opened up, I saw the weary figure of the Tau commander emerge from the wreckage. He had a pistol in hand but I had put the Tau in my crosshairs the moment I saw him so the second he raised his weapon I fired, hitting him in the shoulder and sending him toppling back inside the battlesuit.
When I took another step towards the wreckage, my foot tapped into something round and heavy, drawing my eyes towards my feet and the krak grenade that lay next to it. I picked up the grenade and continued on my way, stepping onto the wreckage to take a closer inspection. O'Lar'shi was still inside, slumped awkward inside the cockpit with a hole through his shoulder. When he saw me, he tried to grab his fallen pistol with his good hand, only to be shot through his other shoulder. He was crippled at my mercy. I could have given him a quick death but where was the satisfaction in that? Vengeance was something that needed to be savoured when it could for it came very rarely for most people. In the faceless masses of modern warfare, any one person you held a grudge against could be vaporized in an instant by a stray artillery round, a sniper's shot, or simply killed by in an offensive against another regiment. The individual soldier rarely got the chance to stare a hated enemy square in the eyes just as victory became assured, hence why most soldiers took their hatred out on whatever enemy they could find. Personal wars were rare when you're but a single soldier in an ocean of war but they are the most memorable moments. And I can truthfully state that I will never forget the way O'Lar'shi stared at me, not with fear or panic or hate…but stern resolution. He saw his death and he accepted it.
"You can never prevail against the Greater Good," he said defiantly.
"Right now," I said as I pulled the grenade's pin, "I'm content with prevailing over you."
I dropped the grenade into his lap and then ran like hell. As I watched the battlesuit detonate in a shower of metal and plastic fragments, I couldn't help but reflect on what I had just accomplished. How many people in the Imperium outside the Astartes could say they were solely responsible for the death of a Tau general? I lamented that there was nobody with me to share in that moment…because I knew nobody would believe me if I told them.