Trooper Marcus Visum of the Meridian 83rd Infantry Regiment was awoken by a piercing siren. Shaking his head in an attempt to clear the grogginess, he groaned as his nineteen fellow Guardsmen of Beta Squad shambled out of their bunks. A cool, female voice crackled out over the old comms system. "Ork invasion at Angel Forge. Ork invasion at Angel Forge." A pause to let the dreaded words sink in, then, "The Emperor Protects." The crackling ceased.
The lads had often joked and dreamed about that golden voice, or "Crackly Carlie", as she was known. The fantasy was ruined by the interference that sometimes left her voice unintelligible, but the bleak attempt at humour masked the fact that for some of them, that was the last female voice they would ever hear as she gave them a general idea of what they would be facing, before the Sergeant would enter and give a less titillating account.
As Marcus sleepily pulled on his flak jacket and picked up his lasgun, the Sergeant pushed open the door as hard as he could, the sound of the metal handle smacking into the grey rockcrete wall giving a dramatic flair as Sergeant Ductor stepped through. With cold brown eyes that had seen every atrocity, a hard, unforgiving face and a stab wound in his cheek, he commanded fear and respect. As his men lined up in a drill line, lasguns shouldered, he scratched at his stubble, irritated that his night's sleep was interrupted by bloody greenskins.
"We've got a tough fight ahead of us. Masses of Orks have come out from Emperor-knows-where to loot Angel Forge. Our instructions are simple: enter the Forge and secure it, purging any greenskins on sight. Lieutenant Septis will lead us and a few other squads out, so move it!"
Sergeant Ductor led his troops out down a bleak rockcrete corridor into the cold dawn air. They filed into a two-deep line along with the other four squads and waited for the Lieutenant to give orders.
"Gentlemen, the Orks are attacking at Angel Forge!" he proclaimed vigorously. "We shall push forward into the heart of the Munitorium and secure it against any further attacks from greenskins. We will be supported by this Chimera, manned by Alpha Squad and myself. Our path will be but a single corridor to the inner ring, and there we will be joined by another Guard force heading in the same direction. Praise the Emperor!"
"Praise the Emperor!" his troops yelled pleasingly back at him. He smiled indulgently. Perhaps putting down this incursion would merit a promotion.
Marcus, on the other hand, wasn't so pleased. He'd been told that Orks were attacking Angel Forge three times now, and the plan seemed to boil down to "shoot the nasty greenskins while me and my favourite squad cower in a Chimera".
However, as he and the rest of his unit smartly turned and marched the short distance to the Forge, Chimera rumbling behind, he felt an odd sense of satisfaction. It had been a while since the Guard last had a call that wasn't a minor riot, and now he had a chance to apply all those hours of laborious drills.
They neared the path up to Angel Gate, and Marcus involuntarily swallowed. No Orks were visible, but the deepness and frequency of the yelling meant the entire area was crawling with the wretched things, and not just the little ones either.
Lieutenant Septis' voice rang out from the Chimera, wrecking any chance at stealth they had. Hopefully the Orks were deaf as well as stupid. "We're being joined by a group of security forces and PDF troops as reinforcements. Er, we're accepting their aid."
A mass of what looked to be disorganised rabble filed through calmly, messing up the neat line formation into more of a blob. They had no standardised uniform, instead wearing mismatched armour and clothes. One lad Marcus saw was more boy than man, with horrible tattoos all over his face. Were they that incompetent that the best they had to guard their planet was degenerates like these? Idiots.
Irritated, the Guardsmen began to march down the long passage. Looked to be a couple of kilometres long with rows of tall buildings on either side. Enough rubble in the road to provide ample cover, but not enough to block the way. They began to move forward cautiously, lasguns at the ready, comforted by the low purr of the Chimera behind them. With any luck, they'd moved in before the Orks could loot or build any big weapons or vehicles.
The first greenskins to spot them were small ones, the... what was it? Gretchin? The small ones more occupied with prying metal sheets away from the buildings than the Guardsmen. Most of them didn't see the lasbolts coming, so being reduced to smoking corpses came as an unpleasant surprise. Marcus grinned.
They were maybe halfway there when the first proper Ork spotted them. He emerged over the crest of a small pile of rubble, turning his head to yell. "Oi, boyz! We got some 'umies for stompin'!"
As a dozen lasbolts blew his head off, a resounding cry of "WAAAAAAAAGH!" echoed all around. An order resonated from the Chimera. "Run for it!" They obliged.
The green tide came from either side. Massive hulking monstrosities roaring and cursing at them as they sprinted down to engage in melee. The Chimera's multilaser and heavy bolter made short work of most of them, vaporising limbs and punching holes in the Orks. As Marcus ran, he fumbled with his lasgun, turning the power up from medium to high. At least then he could wound the beasts.
One of the greenskins, raging and almost frothing at the mouth, had spotted Marcus and picked him out specifically, rampaging towards him with a massive, crude axe held over its head ready to split him in half. With practised movements, Marcus slowed his pace, lifting the lasgun to his shoulder aiming at the head. A single shot burst through the jaw of the xeno, dropping it stone dead. Marcus picked up the pace again. A command rang out over the incoherent alien yelling. "Throw grenades at them! Blow the bastards up!" He recognised Sergeant Ductor's voice and moved instinctively to obey, grabbing a frag nade from his belt, pulling the pin and pitching it towards a group of Orks who were herded together by the rubble. The ensuing explosion and roars of pain told him he'd made his mark.
He managed to sweep across to get closer to the Sergeant. "Continue, trooper!" he yelled. "We need to secure the objective ASAP, at all costs!"
"Yes, sir!" Marcus shouted back, taking the time to shoot at an Ork that was gaining on them from behind. Ductor turned, identified the threat and cut its head off with a swift stroke from his power sword. Marcus glanced at the Chimera, which looked fairly intact save for a few gouge marks on the side skirts. The multilaser was valiantly blazing away at the enemy and the bolter rattled, but the tide was growing. More and more Orks emerged and came into the fray. One particularly large Ork picked up a man and crushed him in its grip, bellowing out profanity occasionally interspersed with orders as his hands dripped red. Marcus decided he was too far out of range to hit it, so turned to face Angel Gate, running full pelt towards it.
A few yards now... he was through. Positioning himself behind a stable-looking wall with perfectly positioned firing holes, he took potshots at Orks until the majority of the survivors had come through, similarly digging in and providing covering fire for anybody else who had yet to pass the gate.
The Chimera met an unlucky end as the large Ork shoulder-barged it into a pile of rubble and ripped the turret off. A few small Orks crawled inside and Marcus knew the Lieutenant and Alpha Squad were lost. Now all surviving Guardsmen and the rabble accompanying them had passed the gate. Now that they were in cover they could shoot away with impunity at the Orks.
Unseen to all, a single PDF trooper slipped into an opening in the wall, heading up to the gate controls.
The gate closed. The Guardsmen were dumbfounded. "What idiot shut the gate!?" yelled Ductor. "I'll have his head!"
One of the security men had gotten behind Marcus. He never saw the shot that blew the back of his head out, and all at once the Planetary Defence and security forces turned upon the Guardsmen. Ductor fell, a lasbolt piercing his flak jacket. The more canny Guardsmen banded together, ducking under the masses of fire being poured into their positions by the far more numerous traitors.
Black Dreadclaws began to rain from the sky. The Guardsmen began to pray to the Emperor.
A/N: Over 400 views? Blimey. Suggestions/criticisms/corrections are welcomed, as always. Thanks to the people who review this drivel, and the people who've followed it.
I wanted to try a different perspective for this chapter. I hope it made a nice change, but changes in perspective will be rare from here on. Next chapter will introduce the Blood Ravens before Eliphas runs off to troll Araghast some more. Thanks for reading!