Chapter 10

181: Hitting emotionally distressed people doesn't help: For some reason there seems to be this conception that if you smack someone who is freaking out, it'll calm them down. Pain does not calm people down. Pain stresses people out even more, and more often than not causes them to lash out. Because when someone hits you, the rational and instinctive response is to hit back. Hard. So when someone just saw their husband get vaporized in front of them and is crying in the corner, you do not walk up to them and slap them. They will bury their bayonet in your groin. Just to make sure, I tried slapping the guy as he waddled around, screaming as the whole gun was swinging from his dingus. Yup, he did not calm down after that. Oh I didn't expect him to, I just wanted to hit him.

182: Black Ships are not luxury cruises: I seriously hope that this idea started because of a cruel prank. If not, I think people are getting stupider as time goes by. But yes, there are honestly people who fake being unregistered psykers in order to get sentenced to a Black Ship. Had a friend set something on fire while he was making funny noises. I think the Lord Captain knew that he wasn't really a psyker when the idiot was dragged off in chains, but wanted to throw him to the Inquisition when they got to Earth. It was kind of funny really. The idiot's smirk started to fade away when he was halfway in the ship and heard the screams of pain.

183: You cannot tough it out: Whenever people get shot there are three responses. Dying, receiving medical treatment as soon as possible, or ignoring it. Granted some people don't treat their injuries because they can't, or don't have supplies. If that's the only reason why you wouldn't treat a wound, just read up on emergency medical techniques and you're golden. But some people like to show off how "manly" they are. One Catachan woman took an axe to the forearm and was walking around showing it off. Said it didn't even hurt. Yeah, three days latter it had turned green and she had to get her arm amputated. And she died anyway. I swear, Catachan women have more insecure masculinity than most male guardsmen, and there's no shortage of it in the guard.

184: Gas masks are to be worn only when needed: Death Korps feel free to ignore me on this, you don't care if you live or die anyway. Actually that's a lie, you do care. Anyway, gas masks. People like to wear them when they're not needed, because they think it makes them look intimidating. Here's a quick list why that's a bad idea. Tunnel vision, hard to breathe, wastes filters, puts the gas mask at risk of being damaged, really this should be enough. The last one is particularly important. A certain SOMEONE tripped and cracked his mask three hours before the chemical shelling began. I had already had a very bad day wading through trenches that were overflowing with the corpses of both cultists and guardsmen, firing my hellgun all the while. And this was during that chaos incursion by that Lord I mentioned, things were really starting to go to shit. I didn't need to stab someone so he couldn't rip my own mask off.

185: No gun tricks: My future daughter-in-law shows off with these things sometimes. When we're in the barracks and she's trying to impress my daughter. So unless you're trying to impress someone (OFF OF THE BATTLEFIELD!) do not attempt any of the following. Spinning your guns, reloading a revolver with every shot, juggling your guns, ricocheting shots, look use your imagination, I'm not coming up with more stupid. The last time I told someone about the more stupid things that I saw with gun tricks, he tried to shoot his lasgun with his tongue. And it overloaded.

186: Aim for vital areas: If you shoot something, you're trying to kill it. You are not preserving the head for a trophy, you are not making it suffer, you are not demonstrating your power. You are killing it. So when we manage to get the drop on a Genestealer and you're shooting it with a krak missile, you are turning it into bloody chunks. Not just taking off a single limb. Mainly because it turns out a Genestealer isn't slowed down at all when it has a missing leg and it'll still disembowel you in half a second. And she was talking about how good the Genestealer head would look on her mantle. I got a single talon, biggest bit that was left after the rest of the squad decided they were more interested in killing it than fucking around. Not that impressive, but it's part of a Genestealer and it makes a good necklace. And my small intestine wasn't ripped out.

187: No lazing around in orbital combat: Some people seem to think that if they're guardsmen, they can just sit around when it comes to ship to ship combat. These people seem to forget that boarding is a thing. And a Chaos cruiser thought it would be fun to have a one night stand with the ship we were on. Half of the guardsmen were ASLEEP! Even though we had been in active combat for the past hour! I had little guilt in shutting the airlocks behind me and spacing them.

188: No gloating: Keep your mouth shut and kill the other guy. If you really need to say something witty, do it after all non allies are dead, and preferably when we're on the Valkyrie out of town. I don't care how smug that Ork is, just shoot him in the head and get on with it. Don't boast how you managed to disarm him and that you'll always remember killing him. He might find out that your head makes for a very good football.

189: No pranking the Astropath: This isn't as bad as messing with the Navigator, but it's still something you should never do. They're the ones who send out that cry for backup, but even if everything is peachy you should let them do their job. One bitch decided to mess with ours by taking a swipe at him with a sword while he was making a transmission not high command. Turns out that when he panics, an Astropath can change "Everything fine," to "the General is a heretic," without meaning to. That wasn't a fun six months.

190: Keep your weapons from overheating: Sometimes you get lucky and you have access to a stockpile of munitions, meaning you can afford you have an itchy trigger finger. Still, some people get the wrong idea. They think just because you have enough ammo to keep a heavy bolter firing indefinitely, they need to have it firing every second. This is a stupid idea. The Tyranid swarm was actually being routed, the Hive Tyrant had been killed by strategic orbital bombardment. This trio of morons kept spraying their bolter from the upper city walls, even as it started to glow and smoke. I managed to realize what they were doing and made a jump to a lower battlement just in time. I broke my arm in a compound fracture, but I got off with a scratch compared to them.

191: Don't put refineries in military bases: I don't know how many base designers are going to read this book, but on the off chance that one picks it up, this is for you. Refineries, hell, anything dedicated to a planet's infrastructure and not directly killing people, has no place in a military base. Refineries are particularly bad because they have a tendency to explode when hit by heavy weapons. We were a good couple of kilometers away from the base and it still nearly burst my ear drums. My sister was pissed. She had gone to the trouble of not using her flamer inside the base and had been cutting up heretics with her chainsword to prevent something like that from happening. All for naught as it turned out.

192: No pets: Question, can it kill something? Can it help you kill something? Can it find supplies. Does it aid us in anyway? If you cannot say yes to any of these things, get rid of it. I met a sanctioned psyker who had a raven that could help him focus the energies of the Warp. Those are the kinds of pets that are ok to have. Anything else is just a waste of time and food. It doesn't help that some people are really stupid about their pets. Some asshole's cat kept clawing my face when I tried to sleep, and then ran out into the middle of an Ork charge because it was stupid. Its owner wasn't much better, he went running after it. It confused the poor Orks, they thought they were supposed to cuddle the owner. After he exploded, I finally understood why the Orks don't have any non Squig pets.

193: Hold it in: For fuck's sake, it's like I'm talking to five year olds. Except I raised a five year old, and she had more common sense than most people in this Emperor forsaken army. If I see one more person die in a way that can be described with "While taking a dump" then I think I might just make a few more entries in this book. People. Remember what mommy and daddy told you. Wait until you can find a toilet. Barring that, wait until the Eldar remember that they're massive cowards to cry every time they lose one of their precious gems and run off. Covering it up by claiming everything went according to plan.

194: You cannot push your soldiers indefinitely: We are not Space Marines. We do not live purely for the sake of fighting. Can we fight for prolonged periods of time? Yes, particularly when our lives are at stake. But eventually something gives. You can't expect a person to fight year after year in a war that seemingly has no end. You need to rotate soldiers in and out so that they can recuperate. Even if it just means stationing them on a peaceful planet. Hell, I spent two decades on one a planet like that. It's where the whole "raising a kid" thing happened. Otherwise, you end up like General Stupid Blonde Bitch. Forcing the same soldiers to fight a losing battle against the Orks for ten years? Belly fully of bayonets.

195: Mounted weapons are mounted for a reason: You know why we tend to fix heavier weapons down? Because it turns out those things are pretty fucking heavy. My wife can lug around a heavy bolter because she's 60% chrome. So unless you're like her, or built like fucking Gunnery Sergeant "Stonetooth" Harker (And you're fucking not) you can't do it. So do not try and lug that lascannon around, because odds are you'll drop it and snap your neck with it. AND HE DID!

196: Do not ride giant animals: Leave the local wildlife alone people, the birds, the worms, and the hulking monstrosities that could eat us in a single bite. Some people on Death Worlds do this as rites of imitation or some crap, but that's a pride thing and I've made me points clear on that. Anyway, they're called DEATH worlds for a reason, so no. You cannot run out into the middle of a desert and hook a giant worm. It will eat you!

197: Nova Cannons are unreliable: I get the appeal of Nova Cannons, nuclear ordinance at light speed? A nice bit of fuck you to whoever we're aiming at. If we can pull it off. As it turns out, these things are hard to aim, so there's a good chance your Emperor patented fuck you shot will miss the Tau warship and zoom off into space. And that's if we don't get unlucky and just have the warhead explode on the ship. Yeah, funny thing about these kinds of weapons, they're very precise and even minor damage can fuck with them pretty badly. Particularly the Jovian Pattern. If we're under siege by the twat headed Tau, I'm under enough stress without our flagship spontaneously combusting. Even if I'm surrounded by officers I'll take a drink. And I won't get in trouble because they'll want a sip when I'm done.

198: Stealth is not for cowards: Hey dumbass. Do you consider Corvus Corax to be a coward? No, you wouldn't, be cause he's a Primarch. And for some reason what's good enough for a Primarch isn't good enough for some people. They don't want to inch along in the dirt where no one can see us. Nooooooo, they want to stand up, fire their weapon into the air, and let out a scream of rage. Right before they get shot in the face by a Necron flayer. And get a bunch of other people shot in the face by Necron flayers too.

199: The point of war is not to simply kill the enemy: Don't get me wrong, the end goal of the Imperium's mission across the galaxy is the death of all cultists and xeno. The problem is that it isn't as simple as landing on a planet and killing everything you see. We need to focus on tactical and strategic objectives and get to the killing later. But some commanders (Like MOTHERFUCKING KUBRIK CHENKOV) don't have a single intelligent thought in their head. It's just "kill kill kill," and not killing is regarded as a personal disgrace. These are the type of people who, and I swear to the Emperor this happened one time, try to launch an invasion of the Eye of Terror. I think they got a light-year in before being torn apart at the molecular level.

200: Don't overestimate your Titans: Titans are weapons that turn the tides of war. One being fielded can turn an entire army into corpses, and cause a planet to change hands. But they inspire overconfidence, and someone stupid enough can waste something that powerful. I've got very clear memories of something just like that happening. Thankfully it's a happy memory.

Remember that Chaos Lord I mentioned? When her offensive lost its momentum, smaller warlords splintered off from her forces. They were never as much of a threat as her, but they were still a thorn in our side. Lessened by the fact that they were kind of stupid. Fifty years after that almost Black Crusade, only one was left. An ambitious woman who had tried to usurp the Lord. Her rebellion was…short lived.

This wannabe warlord was sent packing from the Lord's planet with half of her men dead. Frustratingly enough, the Lord left her warships intact. I think because the Lord was damn smart, and knew that her former servant would have to flee into Imperial territory. And she did. Fortress worlds had been established along the border, and the one I was stationed at was put to the test.

We held the line for three months. The navy was oddly competent and managed to turn most of the Chaos navy to ash. Sadly they did it after the ground forces had landed and managed to overrun one of the major cities. We kept them contained most of the time. Whittling them down, playing defense and letting them throw themselves at us futilely. Then they got desperate.

The loaded up their last Titan with everything they had and pushed forward, all of their forces right behind it. The warlord hadn't been able to break our lines before, she was too cautious to risk enough men, but she was desperate now. Our front lines broke after she drowned us in her men's corpses, the Titan spearheading the assault. She pushed onward, not bothering to cover the Titan from behind. That was where everything went wrong for her.

My family and friends had been in a bunker, a complex one you could only find on a fortress world, build just in case the city had to be surrounded. The entrance was blocked by the Titan's initial rampage, and it took half an hour to clean it. When we got out, the Titan had its back to us, as did the entire Chaos army.

Most of the people in the bunker were wounded, so we had no idea what to do. Until we spotted a Shadowsword. It was shot up all to hell, half of the guns were offline, but the main cannon still worked. A Volcano Cannon. It took a few minutes to turn the thing around (Still don't know how to drive tanks), but when we brought it to bear, we managed to get a shot off. Cleaved through the leg. It fell right on top of the Chaos forces.

We should not have been able to do this. We spent five minutes turning around a flaming tank. A single frag grenade and we all would've been dead. But that warlord was focused on running dick first into our second line. No wonder she was crushed by the Lord so easily. Pretty freaking pathetic. She accomplished nothing but turning that Titan into her tomb. Well there was one other thing. My daughter and her sweetheart ended up getting married on the ruins of that thing. They thought it was romantic. Not what I had in mind but hey, whatever floats their boat.