Chapter 1: Fading Away from the Light

Arrakis, 10191 AD

The sun above was a hot, oppressive thing, reflecting off the vast sands of the world below it and amplifying the heat of the dry air.

Here on the curtain wall of utterly solid stone, it was only a little cooler comparatively. For Daniel Theisman, it was cold comfort as he jumped back, keeping as good a grip as he could on his blades as he regarded the… creature before him.

It used to be a man, once. He wasn't entirely sure what corner of Reality it pulled its power from, but it had twisted the once pale, bald man over time into a twitching, writhing mass of limbs and bony blades. Daniel had seen it… infect, for lack of a better word, other people, into pale imitations of itself that Daniel had dispatched during his time here.

His place here on the Shield Wall, thus, was intentional. As was keeping this beast there atop an explosive device that would turn the massive stone barrier into so much radioactive dust.

The beast howled and charged at him again, Daniel blocking and batting aside the whirlwind of strikes that pressed down on him, letting more than a few glance off his rippling body shield as he looked for an opening in the beast's defenses. Almost… almost… there!

A well-timed chop from his sword as his hooked dagger slapped aside a strike sent a limb flying, the beast lurching back as it screamed in pain, clutching a stump that now wept with deep crimson ichor. In the brief respite given to Daniel, a respite in which he felt those wounds that the beast had been smart enough to give him burning, he glanced over at the stone outcrop that would be this world's salvation, and perhaps both his and his opponent's untimely destruction. 'Come on, Paul… just a little more time…'

He looked back at the beast, and charged, pressing the attack as his blades became a blur that no man could match, slash and chop cutting deep, sending pieces of blade, hands, arms, flying away in founts of blood. It fought back savagely, the blades slow in his eyes but still blindingly fast to anyone else who might have a spare pair of binoculars pointed at them.

Then, the beast roared, a kind of roar that slammed not only into body but mind, the mental howl stunning Daniel and locking him in place as he fought to overcome the pain and move again. He watched as a blade slipped through the velocity-reliant shield, pressing on the device on his hip and cracking, then shattering it.

Daniel felt a spike of fear as his shields died, a fear that he channeled into willpower that finally let him move, swiping away the blade that now pierced his hip as he stabbed at the creature's throat, shutting it up as he pressed the attack.

Time seemed to stretch on, Daniel feeling the mounting pressure of the nuclear weapon under his feet as he ignored the equally mounting wounds on his own body, continuing his grim work. Finally, however, his opponent seemed to relent, an ululating call that Daniel braced himself for but didn't feel grip him rippling through the air. It turned aside, and the call intensified as the space before it rippled, then tore, a hole that showed a swirling, prismatic field of colors that seemingly stretched into forever.

"Oh, no you don't." Daniel managed in a ragged whisper as he sheathed his blades and called upon powers of his own, tapping into the might of his soul and weaving it into chain-like bonds of starlight that wrapped around the bulk of the beast, rooting it in place as it struggled to move towards its only escape.

Daniel stepped forward once, then again, strengthening the bonds as the beast weakened them with its wails. Finally, he took the 'chains' into his hands, feeding power from his body directly into the bonds.

Then, from the corner of his eye, he saw a limb slip past the bindings, looking over at it with wide eyes as it swept toward him. The air left his lungs as it lifted him off his feet, the beast bodily tossing him into the swirling portal as he fell… away.

There was no longer an easily found up or down, Daniel simply tumbling end over end away from the world he'd stood on as the beast, his bonds broken along with Daniel's concentration, began to follow him in.

Then, there was a blinding wall of light, a growling roar that consumed the beast, and the portal into whatever path the beast had opened was gone. Presumably, hopefully, along with the beast.

It still left Daniel spinning, spinning as he fell across Reality, desperately trying to right himself as he went… well, wherever the hell this thing was trying to go.

He didn't know how much time had passed, flying towards a destination he could not discern from within the path he now took. He simply focused on healing himself as best he could, patching up… how many wounds were there?

Finally, a destination seemed to be reached, Daniel going from a bright, swirling rainbow of colors to a place that, thankfully, had a down, even as he fell and tumbled across the hard ground, and was far darker in comparison to his journey.

After a moment of quiet groaning in pain, Daniel got up slowly, carefully, looking around to gauge his new surroundings as he ran his fingers through a head of long blond hair before scratching at a well-kept beard. He was in an alleyway, a deep one by the looks of it. The clean, sharp smell of desert air was replaced by a musty, urban odor that made Daniel gag for a moment.

'Well,' he mused as his bright blue eyes narrowed, the man adjusting his senses until the shadowed alley seemed almost as if it were in daylight, 'wherever I am, it's at least a somewhat modern Echo.'

He looked down at what he wore, a tight-fitting, somewhat uncomfortable black-gray stillsuit. It had been a vital tool for his survival on that desert planet that he'd now left behind. Here, however, it might make him an object of curiosity. Or a target.

As he began to cautiously make his way down the alleyway, searching for anything that might define where, exactly, he was, he stumbled upon someone lying in the street. He was human, male from the look of it, and it looked like he had been strangled.

"I'm sorry, my friend," Daniel said, looking around to ensure that he was alone. "You look about my size, and wherever you've gone, you probably don't need these anymore."

He stripped as quickly as he could, stowing away the stillsuit and weapons in a space that no one could access but him and pulling on the pants, boots, and long-sleeved shirt of the man. As he dressed, it was clear that this man was the subject of a mugging, having nothing beyond his clothes. No identity, no personal effects, nothing but the clothes that Daniel now wore.

'This still doesn't tell me where I am.' Daniel thought with a grimace. 'I could be in… Chicago, for all I can tell.'

He looked up, the wall of the alley stretching up, and up and up and up, into the sky. 'If it's Chicago, though,' Daniel thought as he walked away from the now nude man, 'then it's not the one I'm most familiar with.'

As he walked carefully, and cautiously, he began to hear someone speaking. At least, he was pretty sure it was someone speaking. It didn't sound like any language that he knew yet. 'Alright, that rules out Earth, or anywhere else I've been.' Daniel thought as he came to the entrance of the alley.

Finally, he emerged onto a street, largely empty save for a vehicle, what looked like a 6-wheeled personal transport truck, at one end. Several people in what looked like riot armor jostled two men and two women into the truck, one man standing beside the entrance in the back with a staff and long white and gold robes offering what Daniel guessed would have been some sort of benediction.

Daniel's focus settled on the symbol at the top of the holy man's staff. It was a brass bird of prey, its angular wings spread wide as two heads faced to the left and the right. It took a moment, but the sight of the symbol, the Imperial Aquila, crystalized where he was into terrifying clarity. 'Aw, hell.' Daniel thought.

"Vos. ID?"

The voice behind Daniel made him spin to face the man in armor like those now behind him, the helmet that he wore covering all but a somewhat scowling mouth. It was a surprise, but for Daniel, it was also an opportunity.

Daniel's soul reached out, a framework of power brushing against the soul of the man in front of him, who, incidentally, was Arbite Marshal Elam Kasilen of the Hive City of Zenith. More importantly for Daniel, however, he found a rather surprisingly comprehensive understanding of both Low and some High Gothic.

Daniel's silence as he absorbed the information made Arbite Kasilen sigh quietly. "Alright, let me try again. Do you have your ID with you?"

Daniel shook his head at what was, by all accounts, a ridiculously empowered police officer. "No, I don't."

The scowl deepened. "You know what, right now that doesn't matter. Come with me."

Kasilen grabbed Daniel's arm and began to walk him roughly over to the truck. "Can I ask where I'm going?"

"I can throw you into sentencing for lack of legal identification," Kasilen said, "or I can make the Militarum that little bit more happy and send you to the Regiment. So congratulations. You're in the Guard now."

'Wonderful.' Daniel thought as they came to a stop in front of the priest. 'The last place I wanted to voluntarily visit. What was that creature thinking?'

"This one will be our last here, I think," Kasilen said to the other Arbites, his head shifting as he glanced over at the priest. "Brother Ghelman, let's finish this quickly."

Brother Ghelman glanced over at the Arbite, who shook his head, then nodded, looking at Daniel. "What is your name, son?"

At this point, Daniel really didn't have much to gain from hiding anything. "Daniel Theisman."

Ghelman nodded. "Very well. Daniel Theisman, son of the God-Emperor of Mankind, by the power vested in me by the Adeptus Ministorum, I commend you to the service of humanity as a member of the Astra Militarum's 119th Regiment of Pallidus Primus. May you complete your duty in all due faith and valor, and may the God-Emperor see your soul swiftly to his side as you give your life for the Imperium of Man."

With that, Kasilen and another Arbite lifted Daniel into the truck, slamming the door shut. As Daniel took the last seat on the truck, it rumbled to life and rolled out.

Daniel took a deep breath as he tried, discretely, to contact the ship that had brought him to his last destination, waiting somewhat impatiently as his soul-bound communication made its way out to the rest of Reality. "Val? You there? Ayre?"

Nothing. He was alone, in the 41st Millenium, in a galaxy that knew only war. 'Well,' Daniel thought, 'looks like I'm going to have to start being really careful about my powers, now.' The last thing he needed was to be executed as an unsanctioned psyker. Or worse.

He looked around the somewhat dimly lit cab, seeing three other men and three women. They looked down at the floor, or at each other, or out the grilled slit windows above them. His focus fell on the woman next to him. She shuddered slightly, whispering a prayer under her breath. Daniel had seen this sort of thing time and time again, especially with conscription that was quite this… sudden.

"Hey," he said quietly, tapping on the shoulder of the woman. She jumped slightly, looking up at him with wide gray eyes that were underneath shoulder-length pale blonde hair. "What's your name?" he asked.

The woman blinked in apparent confusion. "What?"

"Your name," Daniel said calmly, smiling slightly. "I figure since we're about to go through this, I might as well ask. I'm Daniel."

The woman nodded slowly. "I'm Kat."

"Pleasure to meet you, Kat," Daniel said. "What year is it? I haven't been able to get a look at a calendar in… who knows how long, now."

Kat frowned. "It's… 888 dot M41. Where have you been?"

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you." Daniel looked around the cabin. "What had the Arbites gathering up people off the street for the Guard? Something bad, I reckon."

"There's an Ork presence, last I heard." one of the men said, his voice gruff and deep. "Out on the fringes of the cluster. The Regiments went out to crush them. I guess the Silver Scales took a bigger beating than they were expecting."

Daniel looked at the man, a stout, broad sort with dark hair and dark eyes. "Must have been a hell of a beating to require conscription like this," Daniel said.

"Either way," the man replied with a shrug of his shoulders, "there are worse things the Arbites could have decided to throw us in the back of a transport for."

"Can you all shut up?" another man said on Daniel's side of the vehicle, his breath heaving in the clear signs of a panic attack. "Don't you get it? We're going to die. We're all going to die Throne knows where."

"If we think like that, yeah." another woman, taller and with short, startlingly white hair, said as she smacked the man's head with a well-defined arm. "Damn it all. And here I was, aiming for sisterhood in the Order."

Daniel looked over at the woman. "Which Order would that have been?" he asked, guessing at what that might have meant.

"The Order of the Purified Flame." the woman said with a sigh. "The Order Militant here in the Billet. My older sister is a part of it, and I wanted to follow after her."

She looked at the floor, chuckling softly. "Would have been interesting, having another Sister Kartetz around. But I guess Ruth is still going to be able to see her little sister in the Guard. I guess that's something."

"And who would the brave Sister Kartetz have been waiting for?" Daniel asked.

The woman looked over at him. "Leona," she said simply.

Daniel nodded. "Well, at least we have a prospective Sister of Battle here with us." He said with a slight smile. "I don't know about the rest of you, but I think our chances are a little better than most."

"Speak for yourself." the second man grumbled.

Daniel said nothing more for the moment, sitting back in his seat and waiting out the ride in contemplative silence. It wasn't much. But if he was going to get anywhere around here, keeping these people alive as best he could was going to be as good a start as any.

. . .

Finally, they arrived at wherever their destination was, the door opened by a man in a steel gray dress uniform accented with stripes of royal purple on the sleeves and down the left side of the chest. Daniel led the charge, as it were, getting out and looking around at… a forest. A decently well-kept one, at that.

But, breaking up the view, was a squat stone gray building that led to what looked to be a vast complex, the trees around the space cleared out for quite a ways around.

As the last man exited, the uniformed man closed the door. "Come with me," he said firmly as the truck began to drive off, walking back towards the building.

Having little other choice, the group followed the man inside, coming to a staging area where dozens of other men and women, a walled-off desk at the far end of the room that the group approached.

Daniel, first in line, was first to encounter the somewhat gaunt, older woman behind the desk, who looked up at him with an unamused expression. "Identification papers," she said curtly.

"I don't have any papers," Daniel said, pausing for a moment before sighing softly. "You can thank my last Rogue Trader employer for that."

"How unfortunate." the woman said in monotone as she sighed quietly. "Name?"

"Daniel Theisman." Daniel settled in for a process that would be tedious for all involved.

"Date of birth?"

Daniel paused for a moment, thinking about the knowledge that he'd gained from the unknowing Arbite. "28th day of the Month of Highsun, 874.M41."

"Previous profession?"

It seemed a rather trifling thing for Daniel to lie about, seeing as it likely wouldn't change where he went, but it might give him an opportunity to be a little more free with what he said. "Stellar cartographer and surveyor."

The woman nodded. "Alright, you'll receive your identification alongside your new belongings. You and your current group," she said as she looked over Daniel's shoulder to the people that accompanied him, "Will be training group Alpha-Psi-48. Stand aside until you can be measured for your uniform and armor."

The process was as drawn out and boring as Daniel expected, but it was enlightening to find out who the rest of 'his' squad was. In addition to Kat, or Katherine Dhiv, and Leona, he was joined by Galen Resavon, the stout fellow, Iago Tasellon, the pessimist who seemed to look for any means of escape with frantic pale green eyes, Vherra Ferrunis, the final woman who had a red head of hair and gray-green eyes that darted about more in curiosity than anything, and Stavros Strackon, the man that had, thus far, remained quiet, studying his surroundings with intent hazel eyes under a mop of black hair.

All in all, a motley crew. But Daniel knew that the motley, more often than not, could surprise and even, with some help, excel.

After what felt like ages and not long enough, they stood in uniforms that were only somewhat ill-fitting, the same steel gray and purple their last officer was wearing, joined by about two dozen other recruits in front of what could only have been a training officer, a man who had obviously seen combat and walked with a whir that betrayed a prosthetic leg, scanning them with a critical eye of brown that was accompanied by a red lens covering its partner.

"I'm not going to lie to you." the man said, "I don't like what I see. I see the unprepared, the unwilling, the dregs of our world. But I've worked with worse men before. Men and women who, after going through the fires of war, have willingly given their lives for their comrades and for Mankind. I can't guarantee that any one of you will get to that point. But you must try if you don't want to end up back in the Manufactorums helping us that way."

Daniel glanced around him. Clearly, the idea of the Manufactorum was not a pleasant idea. "So," the man continued, his expression hard as stone, "I'm going to put you through the wringer, make you into a sword that will strike against the enemies of Mankind. So, welcome to the soldier's Manufactorum. You won't enjoy your stay here right up until you get to your first deployment. Then you will."

Daniel took a deep breath as he steeled himself for what was inevitably to come.

. . .

1 Week Later

The Terinix Pattern Lasgun, as Daniel had come to find out, was an outright marvel of technology, at least for so humble a battle rifle. In addition to being comparable to most other lasguns, it had the remarkable feature of both a power setting switch, allowing the weapon to climb from a near limitless well of stunning stings to a few remarkably powerful shots, and a pulse selector, allowing for 'automatic' fire, 'burst' fire, and single shots.

He sat on the floor surrounded by his training team, the lights of the room low and no vision-enhancing gear to help them as they, once again, stripped down, went through the motions of cleaning, and reassembled the weapon that would be their life and, hopefully, the death of their enemies.

It was somewhat slow going for some, and Daniel glanced around the room from time to time with a discrete enhancement of his sight, cheating somewhat as who Daniel now knew was Sergeant Lorrin strode around the room, his bionic eye whirring softly as it likely allowed him to pierce the darkness as well.

He looked down at the lasgun in his hands, slotting the outer plas-steel shell together, putting in the last locking bolt, and tapped the timer that sat next to his knee as he glanced down. 52.16. A decent time for a week after touching this rifle for the first time, and seemingly well ahead of a fair few still learning the ins and outs of the weapon.

He looked around at his team, considering what more he might learn about his comrades from how they handled their equipment.

Galen, Stavros, and Kat were still slow, but growing faster, clearly not used to taking something like their new rifles apart and putting them back together. Clearly, still learning, and getting quicker, but it would be obvious to whoever looked on that they were conscripts.

The others seemed more familiar with the process, and Daniel caught one leaning over to Galen or Kat to whisper helpful tips when the Sergeant had his focus elsewhere. Iago and Vherra, in particular, seemed to be the quickest to pick it up, matching and often exceeding his time now. But where Vherra seemed to just manage it as a matter of course, following instructions precisely, Iago took, discreetly in the light but blatantly here in the dark, some… liberties with how certain parts went together. It betrayed a deep, but unofficial familiarity with such weapons. Criminal? Or simply survivalist?

It didn't matter much at the moment as the lights went up, Sergeant Lorrin giving his summary inspection and dismissing them to the mess hall for lunch.

Daniel looked down at the platter in his hands, a roll made of he knew not what (and he didn't want to find out now), a slab of packaged meat, and what seemed to pass for rice on this world. By all accounts, a feast for those at the front.

The squad, as instructed, sat together and ate. To build cohesion and all that. Daniel glanced over at Iago, who ate with his head down and the ghost of a scowl seemingly always haunting his expression. "So, Iago," he ventured.

He paused for a moment as Iago glanced at him, an arched brow all Daniel needed to continue. "I saw you had some interesting techniques in rifle field care. Care to teach us sometime?"

The question made Iago pause, his brow creasing but the rest of his expression still in place. "The Sergeant'd batter me and you around the ears if he found out we were cutting corners to save time. You saw what he did to Surinti for just keeping the magazine power coupler put together, and that's the least of what I've done."

"Maybe so." Daniel replied. "But a few seconds could mean life or death out there. Throne knows I've seen enough to make that ring true."

It was quiet for a moment before Iago shrugged noncommittally. "I guess."

"So," Vherra said quietly after another moment's silence, "what have you seen while working with a Rogue Trader?"

"Yeah," Leona said, leaning on the table with a curious glint in her eyes. "You've probably got some pretty wild stories to tell, bouncing around the galaxy like that. Where were you before you ended up here?"

All eyes on his team turned to him, and Daniel smiled slightly. At least this way, his stories could sound somewhat plausible. "Alright, so," Daniel said, a slight smile on his face, "the last planet I went to was out in Segmentum Pacificus. A wild desert planet that had these massive sandworms. I mean big. Some of them could probably swallow a small Titan whole."

"Come on," Galen said with an arched brow. "Surely, you're exaggerating."

"I swear, I saw one swallow a mining vehicle dozens of meters long without even a care in the world. Made me glad to be in the air then." Daniel grinned slightly. "They're monstrously large beasts, I can assure you."

"So why bother with a place like that at all, then?" Iago said, his frown still remaining.

"Supposedly," Daniel replied, mockingly glancing around himself conspiratorially, "there was some sort of 'spice' that was supposed to help give psykers a safe little boost. All it did was make any of the psykers we had on board hallucinate, though, so…" he shrugged.

Iago grunted and turned his attention back to his meal, but it looked like he had the attention of the others. This was going to be… interesting.

. . .

2 Weeks Later

The Terinix Pattern Lasgun, as Daniel had come to find out, was a ruggedly durable weapon, capable of being dragged through dirt, mud, stones, even submerged in water, and still be made to fire at the setting that was tuned by the Guardsman holding the rifle to fire at the enemies of Mankind. Very few things could intentionally make the lasgun fire in a way that the user did not intend.

As Daniel slid into cover behind a tree, nearly slamming into it, he desperately, desperately hoped that the training team they now faced had remembered to set their lasguns to the lowest setting during this latest live-fire exercise. He'd seen far too many corpses carried off that way thus far.

They were dueling over an objective that was at the center of the clearing, a fist-sized glass orb crafted especially for the soldiers who now meant to claim it. How such a prize was claimed was, rather surprisingly, up to the discretion of the teams involved in the training exercise. Training group Beta-Rho-22, their opponents, had decided that their strategy of choice was to camp in front of the objective and eliminate them first.

His other teammates got behind cover as well, Vherra and Galen having bright red bandanas tied around a thigh and a shoulder respectively that denoted wounds that they had to hobble themselves with.

"What the hell are they thinking?" Iago asked over the hail of needle-like red las shots. "They could have taken the objective and ended this ages ago!"

"Maybe if you hadn't gotten into a fistfight with one of them the day before," Leona retorted through gritted teeth, "then maybe we wouldn't be in this situation!"

"Focus and spot them!" Daniel said, dragging the focus of the two back to the fight as he restrained a sigh at the two of them and their continued antics. "Vherra, Stavros, bracket them when you find the furthest apart. Iago, Leona, Kat, lay down suppressing fire on them after bracketing. Galen, you'll be pushing up with me."

"Pushing up?" Galen said somewhat incredulously as Vhera and Stavros shifted from tree to tree in the brief breaks between barrages. "In this sort of storm, we'll have to crawl."

Daniel smiled. "Damn me, Galen, ideas like yours make it seem like I should be the one following you sometimes."

Galen stared at him silently before shaking his head as Vherra and Stavros began to open fire, Vherra's measured bursts a far cry from Stavros' withering barrage. "Emperor's teeth… you're going to be the death of us," he said.

"Not if I can help it," Daniel replied. "Get ready."

Galen visibly steeled himself as the suppressing team opened fire, Daniel joining in as he laid down some fire into the tree line. '23, 22, 21, 20, 19…' he mentally counted, down from 30 before he needed to 'reload' back up to the standard amount of shots this pattern of lasgun was said to have.

Finally, as he paused his fire, ejecting his thermal magazine and reseating it, he looked over at Galen. "Go!"

Daniel and Galen threw themselves to the ground, their carapace armor cushioning the blow to an extent as they crawled towards the objective as quickly as they could, pausing here and there to add to the barrage on their side.

Slowly but surely the pair crept closer, the las-blasts scorching overhead and slowly getting closer and closer. Almost there…

Daniel paused as he glanced up and saw one of his opponents sighting in Galen, who had gotten somewhat ahead of him. In a flash, Daniel got on his elbows as he sighted in the foe and laid down covering fire, a part of him feeling a sting of satisfaction as he caught the soldier across the way in the cheek. His victory, however, was short-lived as he felt several shots slam into his head and shoulders in reply.

Finally though, cresting the lip of the wide, shallow hole, Galen's hand flashed out and grabbed the glass sphere, standing and holding it aloft.

"Cease fire, cease fire!" Sergeant Lorrin shouted, every training soldier emerging from their cover as the sergeant and his aide walked from what Daniel was sure was their observation bunker.

Daniel glanced around, managing to catch a view of the servo skull cameras hovering away to their docks, then returned his focus back to Sergeant Lorrin as he began to speak. "You've both shown a remarkable amount of tactical thought and forward thinking. You'll be a boon to whatever squads you join."

He paused for a moment, sweeping his gaze across the gathered Guardsmen. "You'll be joining those squads soon. You're shipping out at the end of the week."

The proclamation sent murmurs rippling through the assembled group, all of them looking at each other with wide eyes. Daniel was, as far as he could tell, the first to look back at Sergeant Lorrin. "Sir, there's surely more that we'll need to learn. We haven't even gotten to large-scale maneuvers."

"You're not wrong," Lorrin said with a barely repressed sigh. "But the Orks don't care if you're 3 weeks into training or almost done. The regiment needs you now. They need all of the trainees in this camp. You'll be reinforcing squads that have already taken casualties. They'll be able to train you in the field, and you'll receive primers in transit."

Lorrin paused, and a face that Daniel could have sworn, along with most everyone else under his mentorship, had been carved in stern, almost annoyed stone, finally cracked slightly, softened just so. "I wish I didn't need to throw you boys and girls into this yet. Whatever you do… by the Emperor, be careful. Do your duty. But be careful."

"Yes, sir." was the respectful, calm reply. Daniel had heard so many mockingly say it behind his back, wondered in lowered voices over chow time why he hadn't simply given his life valiantly for the Emperor instead of hobbling around shouting at recruits for their sloppy form. Now, though, he served as an example. And Daniel knew that there were far worse fates than Lorrin's to be found.

"Now," Lorrin continued, "I can tell you that you'll be deploying on the Mass Conveyor Faith's Child alongside reinforcement elements of the Terinix 350th Armored, and the now mobilized regiments of the Jinocti 98th Infantry and the Adinim 13th Artillery. The whole damn Billet is about to come crashing down on those greenskin's heads. The Guards on Salome will be appreciating your force of arms, I'm sure. Dismissed."

The training teams began to make their way to the barracks, a contemplative silence falling on them as they walked. "Well…" Galen said quietly. "Off of the anvil and into the fire, I suppose."

"And we're expected to save the day with, what, three weeks of training?" Kat said, a troubled look in her eyes. "I… don't exactly like our chances, I'm not going to lie."

"Have faith, Kat," Leona said firmly. "As long as we have faith in the God-Emperor, then he will ensure that we will see victory, and live to celebrate it with gratitude."

"Indeed," Daniel replied. "I've fought Ork boarders before. Mean, tough bastards, the lot of them. I have at least some idea of how they work. I'll give you all some pointers while we're waiting."

Entirely true? Well, frankly, no. But Orks, Daniel was sure, might be the least of their problems in the near future if he remembered correctly. And if they could counter Orks, then they had at least a decent shot of making it out alive against many other threats.

'Step 1.' he mused as they got to their barracks. 'Stay alive long enough to make some sort of long-term plan.'

Easier said than done. Especially here.