A/N: Happy 2025. May this year be better than the last...or at least not worse. This is a busy chapter, with a lot thrown at you. I've added some notes at the end to help folks on time and place. Things are coming to a head. Sabbat Martyr.

Thank you all for reading and reviewing.

Chapter Thirty-Five: Aliquem Sanctorum Convertere

Trooper Lina Moles could not stop staring at the metal augment where her left foot used to be. The augment was so new, Doc decided to keep her back when the rest of the regiment began its honor guard mission. She wasn't even sure where they were going, only that it had something to do with the local saint.

They moved her back into temporary barracks where the other walking wounded of the Tanith First and Only were preparing to ship out. There were so many more heavily wounded still needing treatment that they had to keep beds open in the hospital. The evacuation was in full swing, with transports lifting off almost every hour. She was scheduled to leave that afternoon.

The Chaos Forces managed to light some unholy beacon, and now enemy reinforcements were coming in numbers the Imperium simply had no hope in defending against.

She wiggled her toes. The thick metal claw plate responded. She could feel it, in a limited way. Just enough feedback to be able to walk. The flesh around the augment was still raw and glistened with the salve Doc Dorden put on it.

"New augment, eh?"

Lina was so completely absorbed in her new reality that she never saw nor heard the stranger who now spoke. It was a woman, striking more than attractive, who sat on the edge of the empty cot beside her. The woman didn't wear a Guard uniform, but rather a tight bodice that might have been leather, with a loose skirt below. Despite the civilian garb, she wore a well-made and equipped weapons belt.

"Yes, ma'am," Lina said cautiously.

The woman lifted one boot. "Me too. Only it was my right foot I lost, not my left. An emergency bulkhead severed the leg right on the anklebone. Let me tell you, that hurt."

Lina couldn't help but wince. "Wow, sounds like it."

"My name's Kleo. Lord General Lugo asked me to talk to some of the injured. Just to make sure everyone is doing well."

"That's real nice of him, Miss Kleo." It was the safest answer Lina could think of. Lord General Lugo was a lying bastard, from what she'd heard from her fellow Ghosts.

Kleo leaned over and reached out to touch the axe rakes on her collar. "I've seen a few of those around. What does it mean?"

"Vervunhive," Lina said. "We had a really good mine there, and produced textiles for the militarum."

"Ah, yes. Vervunhive. I've been there, believe it or not. It was a terrible tragedy. Not just for the loss of life, but for the loss of the city itself. It was a beautiful hive."

Lina's pain meds must have lingered, because she found her eyes watering. It hurt to think about what happened to her home. "It was," she agreed. "The hive helped build the basilica, and the basilica made sure we had food, even if we had to miss time at the looms."

Kleo crossed her long legs and leaned forward, elbow on her knees. "You know, I was talking to an Ardelean chap who said the women fighting with the Tanith were some of the best shots he'd seen. When I asked Colonel Corbec, he said something about the loomgirls."

"Well, suppose so," Lina said. "Sarge told me it was because we had good hand-eye coordination, working the loom shuttles."

"Sarge? You mean Sergeant Kolea?"

Lina snorted. "Gol'd never say something like 'hand-eye coordination'. He don't talk much at all, not really. It was Sarge Jada. She saved us, see? She, Jessi and Calie helped pull the rest of us out of the manufactorums when the shelling first started."

Kleo had a really inviting smile. It reminded Lina a little of her mother, one of the many, many victims of the initial shilling back home at Vervunhive. "You sound like you admire her."

"She saved my life," Lina agreed. "Showed me how to shoot a lasgun. Showed me how to fight the Zoicans. How to cook over real fire, and how to boil water so we don't get the spurts. She looked so young, but even Gol let her make the plans 'cause she just knew. Best sarge in the regiment."

"Did you work in the same manufacturm as Jada?"

"Oh, no. I was in the other loom chamber. Never saw her before, not 'til she and the others came and saved us."

"Is she the one they called the 'angel of the outhabs'?"

Something about how the questions had seemed to linger on Jada made Lina suddenly cautious. "Yes, ma'am."

"I see. Well, enough about others. Let's talk about you. How are you feeling, Lina? About your foot?"

~~Revelation~~

~~Revelation~~

Taylor woke abruptly. The pain and fuzzy-headedness followed in a nauseating rush. Bile burned its way up her throat; she turned just in time to be sick. Almost immediately gentle hands pulled her hair away from her face and braced her head until the stinking, acidic vomit left.

"It's okay. It's okay." A cool cloth rubbed at the corners of her lip. Over the rancid smell of her sickness came the pervasive smell of antiseptic. It took physical will to blink her eyes open. One of the locals in cream-colored robes knelt beside her, not a concern on her calm face over the sickness. "Here, drink."

A straw found its way to her lips. Taylor swallowed convulsively, suddenly terribly thirsty. Almost immediately, the room-temperature electrolyte drink eased the burning in her throat. Her head still throbbed, but the throbbing eased back before a cloud of drug-induced fuzziness.

She fought to focus her eyes, and opposite the esholi girl kneeling beside her bed, she saw a familiar face. "Jessi?"

"Hey, you," Jessi Banda said. She sat gingerly, her stomach firmly bound. "Figured you wouldn't mind company. Dorden wasn't sure how long you'd be under."

"How long has it been?"

"Two weeks. Doc induced a coma to get the brain swelling down. Never seen you so…fragile."

Taylor forced a weak laugh. "This is nothing. One of the Emperor's monsters hit my tank during the Battle of Vada Wastes. When I woke up there wasn't any Merican Federation any more, just the Imperium."

Wait. What did I just say?

"I do not understand her words," the esholi said to Jessi.

Jessi faked a smile. "Sarge here likes history. She took a nasty head wound. Probably just talking about something she read."

"Ah, perhaps." The girl was cleaning up the vomit quickly, without complaint. She had the same shaved head and ponytail that Taylor saw on the other girl. Moments later, she left Taylor and Jessi alone.

The other girl's assuring smile faded. "What's Merican?"

"A lost dream," Taylor whispered. "Head's all fuzzy. So, Doc say what's wrong with me?"

"Three cracked vertebrae, four cracked ribs, broken left leg. Rattled your brain pretty bad. You ran across that forum with a broken leg, did you know?"

"I guess that explains why I was so slow."

Jessi's laugh turned into a pained snort. "Things are pretty gakked up. Those gak-head cultists did something. Blew the citadel up, lit some type of space magic beacon. They're evacuating right now. We're scheduled to ship out in a few days, with the rest of the wounded. The Lord General's blaming everything on Gaunt. Everything. Sent all the healthy Tanith off to collect some saint's body or something stupid like that, then we're probably gonna lose him for a new commander."

Why would they move the saint's body? Why… "Why are we evacuating? Did we lose the city?"

"No, we took it. 'Til that Pater Sin bastard leading the enemy lit the warp beacon. A whole chaos fleet is coming to burn Hagia into ash. There's something else, though."

"What?"

"Moles came by. Some lady visited her in the barracks. Made it seem like a psych visit, but she asked a lot of questions about you. Roesch and Ladgen too. She was good, distracted them with a lot of other questions, but somehow you always came up."

"If she talks to you about me, what will you say?"

Jessi shrugged. "The truth. You saved me, and taught me to fight. You're the best friend I've ever had. Nothing else matters."

~~Revelation~~

~~Revelation~~

The Tanith Chief Surgeon reminded Taylor of Emma's grandfather. A bull-headed, thick-necked man who spent thirty years at the naval shipyards in Maine to put his only son through law school. Hard-working, soft spoken and wise in a way only life and experience could provide.

Why am I thinking about Emma?

Tolin Dorden walked in with the esholi girl from before. He stopped just inside the isolation curtain and frowned in confusion as he leaned down and started pulling picter prints and vellum prayer strips from the edge of Taylor's cot. She never realized they were there.

"Sanian, what's this? Why are people putting these pictures of Sergeant Washton on her bed?"

Sanian was four or five years older than the last esholi Taylor saw, and held herself with a quiet composure similar to the ayatanis. "With respect, Chief Surgeon, those are not pictures of Sergeant Washton. Those are prints of the Holy Beati. Many of the esholi noted the resemblance and so pray for the sergeant's recovery."

Dorden looked from the photos to Taylor. "That's…that's remarkable." He put the photos and prayer strips down on the foot of the cot and walked over to flash a penlight in Taylor's eyes. "Good pupillary response. How's your head feeling?"

"Like a cracked egg."

"Accurate analogy. I've put a note in your official file recommending against trying to take out tanks bare-handed in the future."

"I'll try to remember that, sir."

He took her hand. "Push down."

She did as asked. He walked around and repeated with her other hand, then her feet. "Okay, sergeant. We're going to try and get you upright. The bones fused well; it was that stubborn, cracked head of yours that kept you under. Let's start combatting the atrophy, shall we? Sanian?"

Taylor realized now why the esholi was there, acting as a chaperon for Taylor as much for the doctor, given the Tanith man's relatively new female patients. Her legs shook tiredly as Sanian helped her stand on one side, while Dorden took her other hand to help as well.

On her own feet, she felt terribly weak, but nothing really hurt except her head. "No PT, then?"

Dorden shook his head. "Not for six weeks, at least. Rahab, yes. No PT. Dizzy? Nauseous?"

"A little, but nothing too bad," Taylor said. "Mainly just a headache."

"Alright, let's get you back into bed." Once Taylor was situated again, Dorden walked to the foot of her cot and made notes on the data slate there.

Taylor fought back a wave of nausea. "Trooper Banda said that the colonel was leading a mission away?"

Dorden's heavy brows furrowed a moment. "Yes. But that's not something you should worry about. You'll be on a transport tomorrow night. Until then, I want you up and walking as often as you can handle. Pain meds are for whenever you need them, but no more than six a day. I'd send you to the barracks, but with head trauma like yours I want you under observation. Understood?"

"Yes, sir."

He nodded, then paused. "You saved a lot of lives, Sergeant. At great cost to yourself."

"Thank you, sir."

He nodded and left the room. Sanian lingered only long enough to reattach the pictures of Saint Sabbat to her cot. The esholi smiled up at Taylor. "It is a miracle of the Beati that you are here, so let her bless your recovery as well."

With that, Taylor was left alone again. She found herself wondering when the lady Jessi told her about came. And if she would come with stormtroopers or Sororitas, or with secret society assassins.

Either way, her head hurt too much to think about it for long.

~~Revelation~~

~~Revelation~~

Standing on the second floor balcony of the medical school, Taylor could see the Warp fire that slowly consumed the top of the Citadel of Doctrinopolis. It cast an eerie, disturbing pall over the whole of the city, and that first night awake, she stepped outside in her hospital robes and stared at the massive tongues of mist-blue and frost-green energy with a boiling sense of rage. That willingness of the cultists to shatter the realms between the real and unreal to win their battles never got any easier to swallow.

"Bragg told me about what happened," Jessi said, standing beside her as the two looked out across the city. Like Taylor, Jessi was up and walking, but just barely. She'd taken a lasbolt in the stomach while trying to pull Taylor from the tank. She lived only because of her tac vest.

"They sent the Brevenians in," Jessi continued. "Then next thing we know…that. Brevians all dead. Colonel Corbec was captured, you know. Captured and tortured before Gol and the others rescued him. Said he saw Pater Sin personally. The bastard planned it."

The two women stood for a long time on the balcony before Jessi cleared her throat. "Lina's friend paid me a visit this afternoon. Told me I was going to get a commendation, and how much I must have respected my sergeant to risk myself like that. She was definitely asking about you."

Taylor wasn't surprised. "There are a few groups out there that try to find me every time. None of them really have my…best interest at heart."

"What'll you do?"

"Wait, for now. I can barely walk the hall before I get dizzy. I just have to keep my head down and ears open."

"Will she…I mean, what do you think she'll do?"

"Depends on who she's with. What's important is that you not get caught up in it. I'm serious, Jessi. Some of these groups have authority to do whatever they want. Kill whomever they want. I'd really hate getting you killed by association, not after all the trouble I took to save you."

"Hah! I took a shot dragging your skinny butt away from that tank."

Taylor's head hurt too much to laugh, but she couldn't help but grin. "True. Very true. Go back to your cot. It's getting late and I need to lay down."

Jessi nodded and moved off the balcony. She was careful not to touch Taylor–she knew now that Taylor was a blank, but managed to keep the aura by her skin. Dorden and the Esholi undoubtedly knew as well.

She glanced back once more at the warp flame consuming the citadel before moving slowly back to her own bed.

She still felt weak from two weeks in a bed, but she had many memories of being injured far worse than this. She glared one more time at the abomination burning over the city before she turned to walk back into the medical wing when she heard the familiar, guttural voice of Colonel Colm Corbec, the second officer of the regiment, arguing in a nearby office with the Chief Surgeon.

"Corbec, please!" She'd never heard old Dorden sound so desperate.

What surprised her was when she heard Trooper Brin Milo, the youngest of the Tanith-born troopers, ask, "What sort of message?"

She thought Milo had gone with Gaunt.

Corbec responded to them both. "All he says is the same thing, over and over. He's in his machine shop, back in Pryze County, working the lathe there. I come in and he looks up and he says, 'Sabbat martyr.' Just like that."

For a moment, Taylor couldn't breathe. She leaned against the wall and tried to control the sudden rush of blood that brought the dizziness with it. The words rang in her mind. She remembered one of the brief snippets of dream she had between deaths. This one was different, though, because she could see herself in the garden she could never enter.

"Soon, Taylor. Find me. Sabbat Martyr."

Knowing she was about to intrude, Taylor forced herself to take several deep breaths. In the room, Dorden was trying to rationalize whatever had possessed Colonel Corbec. She pushed into the room, and found the three men standing, facing each other. Trooper Milo was still in his field gear and carried the stink of several days without a shower.

Corbec himself had his shoulder thoroughly wrapped for injuries he'd received while she was out. She'd heard about it from Jessi after the fact–how the colonel was captured by Pater Sin himself, but managed to escape right as the Imperial forces accelerated their attack with heavy armor. Gol Kolea personally disobeyed orders to bring the colonel back.

Dorden looked exhausted and angry in equal shares. All three turned and stared in confusion at Taylor. Brin Milo blushed furiously and ducked his head. As far as the rest of the Tanith were concerned, she was the youngest member of the regiment only after Brin himself, whom Gaunt saved as a boy when Tanith was destroyed.

"Sergeant, what are you doing here?"

"'Sabbat martyr." She said the words slowly. Clearly. "In my dreams. I heard it too."

"See here…" Dorden looked far more rattled than merely disbelief.

"You've heard it as well, doc," she said to the surgeon. It started as a guess.

The fact that he choked on his denial was proof she was right. Instead, he just shook his head. "So its just a coincidence that you look so much like the saint the locals are worshipping you, eh?"

"What's that?" Corbec looked confused.

"There's a picture of the Saint in their gospels," Dorden explained. "That girl Sanian explained it to me. It was a portrait taken by Saint Kodrius himself of the Beati when she was still young. Swear to the Throne it looks just like Washton here."

"Maybe it's a sign," Taylor said. "I've read of stranger things. That's why I know what this is. The Saint is calling us to action. So, colonel, what were you planning?"

"Sargeant, you are recovering from a serious injury," Dorden declared.

Taylor laughed dryly and pointed at the plethora of bandages and wraps covering most of Corbec's torso.

The Tanith colonel snorted at the irony. "Aye, she's not wrong there. So be it, sergeant. We're going after Gaunt. He's on a mission to recover the body of the saint herself for evacuation, and so we're going after him. I know Captain Daur is coming. Maybe others. We just need transport and a driver…"

"I can drive a transport, sir," Taylor said.

"How?"

"I dated a Vervun primary driver. He showed me."

The lie didn't sound convincing, but she didn't need to convince them. They were looking for a reason to believe. And she gave them one. For her own part, she needed a reason not to be there when the hunters finally came.

Corbec grinned. "Then we'll get word to Captain Daur. We met this morning–he feels the call too."

An hour later, fully kitted in her Tanith uniform with Captain Daur, Taylor made her way gingerly to the munitorum motor pool.

"With respect, sergeant, I was Vervun primary," Captain Daur said. "There's no way you learned to drive any vehicles with the Primary as a loomgirl."

Ban Daur was a Vervunhiver, the only one to transition into the Ghosts as a commissioned officer based on his similar rank in the Vervun Primary. He was a good-looking man, with well-groomed blond hair and tanned, shaven face. He stood out from the black-headed, pale skinned Tanith.

He had what Taylor considered a more sophisticated, educated outlook than most of the Tanith. He was hive born, yes, but he was upper hive born. Not truly wealthy, but better off than most. And though he was as moved by his visions as Corbec, he wasn't looking for an easy answer.

He was wondering how a teenaged loomgirl had the training to drive a massive, multi-ton armored transport carrier.

"I wasn't always a loomgirl," she said. "And I'm older than I look." Both statements had the benefit of being entirely true.

Daur didn't look entirely convinced, but one of the many unspoken rules the regiment carried was not to dig into anyone's past. Many of the new recruits were former gangers at Vervunhive. Taylor never asked about their ganger tattoos, because it didn't matter. Vervunhive was dead; only Gaunt's Ghosts remained.

The munitorum clerk, when they reached her, looked askance at the requisition order. She appeared young, tired and overworked. She was alone in her little office at the edge of the motorpool yard. "I'm not familiar with a Major Anita Mann," she said to them.

"Field promotion," Daur said smoothly. He'd leaned forward and pitched his voice a little lower than normal. "We learned about a temple just north of the city that holds a relic of Saint Falturnus. We fetch it tonight, should be back before morning roll call. We need it armed, fueled and provisioned because of reports of enemy activity, otherwise we'd just take an autocar."

Taylor never worked with Daur. He had his own platoon, but also did a lot of liaison work for Colonel Gaunt. Like her, he'd suffered wounds in the city, but it was interesting to watch how the clerk responded to him.

The bastard's seducing her.

Worse, it was working. Even in the poor light of the clerk's office, Taylor could see how the woman's cheeks darkened with her blush. "What happens if I call this in for confirmation?"

"Major Mann gets shouted at for not getting this taken care of yesterday," Captain Daur said smoothly. "The Lord General's been in a foul mood since the Citadel."

"And why is a Tanith officer bringing it? She's Ardelean."

"She's also a friend," Daur said. "And I'd do anything for my friends."

It was like watching a sculptor at work. He used facial expressions, body-language and perfectly pitched vocal tones to mold the clerk like so much putty. With a dramatic sigh, the clerk stamped the order and put it in a chute to the yard proper.

Then, instead of going back to work, she stared soulfully into the captain's eyes. "You don't look like the other Tanith."

Caught between disgust, amusement and, though she hated to admit it, some admiration, Taylor drifted out of the clerk's office and waited by the gate of the motorpool. It took half an hour, but eventually she heard the clanking of the tracked vehicle moving over crushed flagstones.

The thirty-eight ton, seven-meter long, four-meter-high monster rolled out right next to her. The rear ramp opened and the munitorum corporal walked out. "Fueled, stocked and armed. Don't know why, though. Sarge says get it back to us by morning to ship out."

"Thanks," Taylor called.

The man stalled a moment, then looked back at her. "Hey, anyone ever tell you you look just like…"

"Yeah."

"Hm." He turned and walked back to his position.

Taylor waited thirty more minutes before Captain Daur walked out of the clerk's office. His uniform was perfectly made up, except for the last three misaligned buttons. Taylor watched as he walked into the back ramp, moved through the heavily armored cabin, and took the gunner's seat next to her.

"So, get any good information on the state of the munitorum, Captain Loverboy?"

"Drive, sergeant."

Smirking, Taylor drove the APC into the street, glancing at the various display plates above her head to check the side and rear views. She was half-way back to the hospital when the captain said, "How did you learn to drive this machine, sergeant?"

"I'll tell you if you tell me if the clerk's drapes matched the upholstery."

Daur had the good manners to choke on his spit and fall into a coughing fit that left him gasping and pained from his injuries. "I'm beginning to think Dorden didn't put your head back together right, sergeant."

"Maybe. We're driving a fraudulently obtained Chimera on an unauthorized mission to go AWOL. Any one of those things could get us shot. A lot of people would call that crazy."

"Oddly enough, I don't feel worried about that."

"Me neither, Captain. That's why I know we're doing the right thing."

They drove back to the hospital and saw a group of kitted out Ghosts waiting for them. "I didn't know Nessa was hurt," Taylor said as she spotted a fellow loom girl. "What happened?"

"Took a cultist bayonet to the stomach," Daur told her. "Your girl Banda was hurt dragging you away from that tank you blew up so a medic could stabilize you. Bragg got hit in the shoulder, but he was so big doc didn't have to amputate. Nor sure on Trooper Derin, but he's a good head in a fight, wounded or not."

Corbec had collected a diverse group, Tanith and Vervunhiver's alike. Unsurprisingly, she saw Milo Brin there, but with him was the Esholi girl, Sanian. They waited together as Taylor drew the chimera up next to them. Daur was moving gingerly from his seat into the rear cabin when she opened the ramp.

The first up was Trooper Derin, a Tanith she'd not dealt with much. The man blinked up at her in surprise when he reached the ramp. "Washton? When did you get rated to push steel?"

"Probably about the same time you got approval to go AWOL with the colonel," she called back. She glanced over his shoulder and signed to Nessa, who lost her hearing during the Vervunhive shelling. "Are you good to mount the autocannon up top?"

Nessa signed affirmative and gingerly climbed up to the seat in the upper section of the armored vehicle. It was the most comfortable seat in the APC short of the driver's, and Nessa needed the cushioning. She was also one of the best shots.

The tattered group climbed into the cramped transport cabin and stored their gear. When they were secured Taylor made her way back to the driver's seat. "Okay, everyone hang on. It's been a long time since I've driven one of these."

"That's a story I'm still waiting for," Colonel Corbec called up.

"As soon as Captain Daur tells you how we got it, I'll tell you how I can drive it!"

She started to close the ramp when she heard a hand slap on it. Everyone within the cabin grabbed their weapons, but when the ramp lowered back down, Chief Surgeon Dorden climbed in with his full medicae kit.

He looked right at Corbec, tears in his rheumy eyes. "Sabbat Martyr," the man said. "My boy told me to."

~~Revelation~~

~~Revelation~~

Commissar Hychas winced. "That is correct, Inquisitor. The names just came across my desk. Ordinary enlisted, it's not unusual to miss a muster. A simple reprimand is sufficient. But for a colonel such as Corbec to miss–that's notable. I was about to dispatch a punishment detail to detain Colonel Corbec."

"I don't care about Corbec, Commissar. I care about Sargeant Jada Washton. She was not in the Scholam Medicae Hagias, and she did not appear at muster. Several others were missing, and I see those names on your list. They are together, Commissar, and I want to know where."

"I shall see to it at once, Inquisitor." The woman had a fierce glare, Hychas thought.

"In the name of the Emperor, you shall, Commissar."

Notes:

The events of this chapter can be found in Dan Abbnett's The Saint Omnibus of the Gaunt's Ghosts series. In short, the Chaos Lord who invaded set a Warp sorcery trap for the Imperials that created a beacon which has called Reinforcements. The commanding general, being your typical WWI inspired dickweed, blamed the whole fiasco on Colonel Gaunt and sent him on a punishment detail to recover the body of Saint Sabbat for transport. Meanwhile, Corbec and several others have visions of loved ones telling them Sabbat Martyr.

Sabbat herself led her crusade around 500.M35. That's six thousand years ago.