Chapter 17: Another Effing Day in the 41st Millenium

I'm pretty sure everyone asks the question "Why the fuck didn't I stay in bed today?" at least once in their life. I'm fairly certain the number of times I've asked it is in the low thousands, not counting the times I asked it for a second time in a day. And third. And fourth. And fifth through twentieth.

I mean, today started nice enough today. Woke up in the same bed as my wife. Even though her face is really damn lined, there's nothing topping that smile of hers. We considered having a pre-breakfast quickie. We're both getting old and our sex drives don't quite work the way they used to, but we know how to work around it.

"But no," I muttered under my breath. "Double patrol duty, because the limp dick Lord General thinks that apparently this is how you respond to a fucking Chaos Lord being around the corner. Not like they would have to come in via fucking SPACE or anything. No, she could just sneak her fucking battle-barge in underground, because she found a hidden Web Way portal that even the Eldar didn't use."

I sighed and looked up. I was leading my platoon through one of the blasted wastelands that seemed to make up half of this Emperor-forsaken planet. Though, to be frank, considering how vicious the battle against the Chaos Lord's forces had been, I wouldn't be surprised if it was. It might as well be the planet's name. Wasteland. It had a proper name, but every time I heard it, all I heard was Wasteland.

I don't do it on purpose, it's was just what this damn planet feels like. Every time I step outside one of the cities, it's all I see. The crunch of barren and cracked soil under my boot, the stale taste of dry air, and nothing but rocky crags as fair as the eye can see. And twenty men were patrolling it by foot. This section of it at least, the majority of the 23rd EDR were patrolling the rest of it. "Never know when one of the cracks might be hiding an enemy battalion," I hissed.

"Uh, sarge?" a nervous voice said. I glanced over my shoulder. A girl, and I call her a girl because she doesn't look a day older than sixteen, was nervously walking alongside me. She was holding her lasgun as if was alien and she wasn't quite sure what to do with it. A local no doubt, either conscripted or volunteered as a result of the recent rise in Chaos activity all over the galaxy. "Uh, can I ask you something? What happened to the guy I replaced?"

"Oh boy, that one?" I slung my hellgun over my shoulder and let it dangle there as I reach into one of my pouches. I pulled out both the latest edition of my book and the rough drafts that I planned on working into the latter editions. "Ok let me see," I said, flicking through the pages of Avoiding Stupid Deaths in the 41st Millenium, looking for the incident that had given this girl a job. "That was last week...give me a second." I flicked all the way to the end, number 300, before closing the book.

"Must be in my notes." I uncrumbled the half rolled up notes and scanned them. "Ok here we go. He tried to take a piss on a damaged Servitor on a bet. Caused the Servitor to short circuit and got himself electrocuted." I gave her a wry look. "Don't sweat it too much, you're not exactly filling big shoes. Just don't piss where you're not supposed to and we'll be fine."

"Oh," the girl said, looking a little more relaxed. There was some hope for her if she wasn't running back to the city after hearing about death while urinating. "I thought he was murdered by that butcher that we're looking for." She swallowed. "He hasn't killed any Guardsmen has he?"

"Only one that was drunk and wandering off into the middle of nowhere. He probably would've died of exposure anyway, so it was aiming for the low fruit." Sliding my book and notes back into my pouch, I gripped my hellgun and continued marching, scanning the area. There had indeed been a couple of corpses that had turned up, looking like a butcher's knife had been taken to them, with the marks of Chaos carved into them. Clumsy marks of Chaos and sloppy knife marks, but marks nonetheless. High Command wanted any potential cultists dealt with. I get that part, I just don't get sending thousands of men into bumfuck nowhere to track down one mediocre cultists. Only the scouting platoon were qualified to act as trackers, the rest of them were just wasting time.

"Do you think he was one of...her's sir? You know, the-"

"I know very well who you mean trooper," I said through grit teeth. "And no. She wouldn't lowball it like that. Three bodies that couldn't even get the mark of Khorne right? She'd be embarrassed to begin her comeback like that. No. You know what this is? An idiot is panicking and is trying to build up a resume of heretical acts. That way, when the queen bitch shows up, he can pretend he was always on her side and not end up with his head on a pike. You get a handful of people like that whenever we get word that a big Chaos invasion is coming."

The girl swallowed. "I thought the Imperium's people would have stronger faith in the Emperor than that. To toss him aside so quickly, did they ever truly believe in him?"

I had to fight back a sigh. This girl was too damn young. She shouldn't be out here, waiting inevitably to be a bit of cannon fodder when this planet was finally attacked. Her biggest concern should be figuring out what gender she was attracted to. And yet here she was, due to the wisdom of the High Lords of Terra. Too young to drink, too young to vote in local elections, but old enough to die for them. "Probably not. There's quintillions of us and we're too spread out, too disconnected. It's only natural that shit like this happens."

The girl swallowed. She was going to be dead by this time next year, barring a miracle. The 23rd EDR had a depressingly high fatality rate as it was. Maybe she would be lucky, maybe she would be one of the few who lived long enough to become veterans. "Look," I said, trying to reach back to when I had been a father of someone that age. "Don't think about that. We've held out for this long. We've pushed her back before and we'll do it again. Just think back to basic training and recite a hymn that comforts you. Rinse and repeat until your hands are steady."

She nodded. "As it says in the Imperial Uplifting Primer-"

"Oh for Emperor's sake," I swore before I stop myself. "Ok, new plan." Out came my book. "Read this. Forget everything in the Primer that isn't directly related to weapon maintenance and replace it with this." She looked very confused, but did as she was told. Shouldering her rifle and idly flicking the page open.

"Wait, that's what happened to your nose?" she asked, sounding half shocked, half bewildered. I gave a stiff nod. She gave a nervous laugh before continuing to read.

Well, she'll be able to get through it, this patrol was going to last another five hours. Halfway done. "It's been an hour," I said to my platoon's vox-operator, not looking at him. "Check in with the scout platoon, see if they've got any updates."

"Uh, sir, they reported in a few minutes ago. They think they have a potential suspect and are heading this way," a rather distracted voice said. This was why I didn't turn to look at him. I already knew that I wasn't going to like what I was seeing. He wasn't paying attention to his duties and letting me know what the scouting platoon was doing. That could mean a few things, none of them good.

"What is he doing?" I asked through grit teeth.

"Uh," the girl said, turning around. "He's showing off to his girlfriend by twirling his and her laspistols around his index fingers."

"You know!" I shout, my temper flaring up, "you get paid absolute garbage and yet I still feel like it's too much for someone who's microscopic, stupidity ridden mind managed to think 'yeah, this is a fucking productive use of my time!" There was a loud crack, much like a fairly large stick being snapped. Right after, there was a heavy thud as something slumped to the ground. There was a long pause as I came to a stop, the line of troopers doing the same. "He's dead isn't he."

"Both of them are," the girl said meekly. "He kept pointing them at her and making kissing noises. I think it was a flirting thing. Um. Both shots went through the heads."

"Ok!" I said, throwing my arms up over my head. "Draw straws, the four who draw the shortest stick with the bodies until pick up comes and gets them." Collectively groaning, the platoon gathered in a small circle, one trooper pulling out her litho-sticks to use as straws. "Not you," he said, looking at the girl who had moved to join the rest of the platoon, but came to a sudden halt. "Can you operate a vox?" She nodded cautiously. "Congrats. You're my new vox operator. Call in in our position to the scout platoon and tell them to meet us here."

Spluttering out a quick thanks, she ran off in the direction of the now dead man. I stick a finger into a chest pocket and produce a litho-stick of my own, poking it into my mouth before going for my lighter. After my litho-stick was lit and the straws had been drawn, the platoon was moving on at 75% strength with the girl lugging a vox on her back. Only a few minutes had passed before the sound of engines reached my ears.

Motorcycles came into view. A dozen of them manned by Guardsmen in rather ragtag armor, driving towards them in a spearhead formation. Before, there had been nothing but dry wind and stupid comments to break up the empty silence of the wasteland. After that, the sound of roaring engines were welcome. They were familiar, and most importantly, something I could react to.

The formation swerved as they neared, the lead most bike stopping directly in front of him. The rider was wearing a thick pair of goggles, wires extending out of either side and into solid projectile pistols in leather underarm holsters. The rider slid the goggles off and let them rest around her neck, revealing a hard face. A tattoo of a skull with a bullet in its eye was on her forehead. "Got you a little present." She idly gestured to the back of her bike.

A bloodied corpse was tied to the back, several noticeable bullet holes in its head, to the point where it hardly resembled a head anymore. "Our serial killer I take it. I don't suppose there was any chance that you interrogated him before you reduced him to red mush?"

"Oh don't worry about that, the Mrs. peeled back the layers of his brain like they were a rotten onion," my daughter-in-law said idly. "Just like we all thought, panicking guy acting on his own. Nothing in his brain suggested otherwise. And then he tried to go for his knife and gut her." Her grip tightened on the handles to her bike. "I decided to show him why that was a very bad idea."

I couldn't help but fight back the urge to grin. Leaning forward, I gave her a firm pat on the back, which earned me a small smile from her. "That's an attitude that I like to see. You sure that there weren't any others?"

"Command wants us to interrogate his family. We found him in a holdout in the depths of a canyon about ten kilometers east. His family was with him, but it looked like he had taken them hostage. Still, we had orders to scan them for taint, as well maintaining radio silence about them." She gave the corpse a nudge. "Kind of why I brought his body out here instead of just voxing it in."

No sooner had she spoken, than a loud shout cracked across the barren plains. "BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD!" Instantly, everyone tensed. Both my platoon and the scouts readied their weapons, aiming in the direction of the cry. A single second later, I had relaxed. A lone person was charging towards us from the direction of the city. He was holding an axe in each hand, had blood splattered all over his face (which seemed to be his if the gashes he had were anything to go by) and he overall looked rather intimidating. An effect that was ruined by the fact that he was two kilometers away.

"Sir, do we open fire?" my new vox-operator asked.

"Too far out to hit with a lasgun unless you're an expert marksman," I replied, lowering my hellgun. "Leave that to her." Without further orders, my daughter-in-law promptly slapped her goggles back on, flicked a switch that caused electronic runes to burst to life in the inner lens, and drew one of her pistols.

"Adjusting for wind," she said, more to herself than to me. "Compensating for dropoff. He's running in a nice straight line. That oughta do it." With a pull of the trigger, the bang of her gunshot echoed. I watched, a feeling of satisfaction warming the pit of my stomach, as the head of the cultist exploded like a rotten tomato. "Done and done," she said, ejecting her magazine and sliding a fresh bullet in before reloading. "I'll grab that on my way out. I'll head in the direction he came from and see if he has any buddies we need to smoke out."

I nodded. I glanced at my vox-operator, about to tell her to relay what had just happened, only to see that she didn't need any prompting. "Yes sir, just the one. No sir, he's been dealt with. I'm positive, it was a dead center headshot. The scouting platoon is about to investigate it? What?" The girl swallowed and bit her lip, giving me a nervous look. "I understand." She lowered the speaker. "Scouting platoon is to return to their normal duties. We're to investigate the source of the cultist."

Both my daughter-in-law and I both stared at her. "Seriously," she said, giving her bike a rev as she did. "We've got the motorcycles, my wife has everything under control back there, and they want you guys to take the long trip? I got word about the bodies you left back there too and they said that they don't want us getting them either." I'm not surprised to hear that. The Lord General here is really prickly about people going off their assigned duties. I hope he dies first when we're finally attacked.

I lean closer and whisper in her ear. "Speaking of which, you know how I feel about motorcycles."

She gave an idle wave. "We're using them for recon, not showing off. Cheap sons of bitches didn't want to spring for a couple of Chimeras." I certainly knew how that felt. I had a feeling that the troopers that were watching the body of boyfriend idiot and girlfriend idiot were going to be waiting for a ride for awhile. "Still, we'll pick up the body, no way for you to carry it without holding two more men up. And you kinda look like whatever happened back there gave you another entry." She knew me well.

After checking with them to see that our water was still topped off, they rode off. I, with a feeling of growing impatience, took my men off on a long ass detour. "Not like time is of the fucking essence or anything," I hissed as I ordered my men to double time it, to the answer of many groans. "Not like there could be more cultists doing Emperor knows what. Dumb as bricks most likely, but they could still kill someone we need alive. You'd think that'd call for transport but noooooooo." Time slowly ticked by as we passed the spot where the insides of the cultist's head were splattered all over the ground.

Two incidents in one day. That was never a good sign. Plenty of people would think that it was a sign that the invasion would be right around the corner. It wasn't, but there wasn't any way to convince the local populace of that. They saw some Chaos and they assumed it meant that Abbadon the Despoiler would be arriving in orbit the next day. Chaos terrified people, and I had to admit, with good reason. It could appear anywhere at anytime in the form of anyone. It wasn't all powerful, but it had a good way of making people think that it was.

And so began a long hike in the other direction. We hadn't received any orders that we were to continue our regular patrol but I seriously doubted that they would let us off like that. Everyone was already starting to complain about sore feet. Mine were starting to ache a bit as well, though decades of soldiering made the feeling little more than a minor annoyance to me. The girl beside me kept her mouth shut, but I could spot her wincing. She was trying to tough it out. I made a mental note to tell her that she really didn't need to bother. I would have to tell her when no one else was around, doing it now would just humiliate her for trying to do more than was expected.

There was another bark of orders from across the vox, which the operator quickly responded to. Her face turned pale. "Another solo cultist attack. Not too far from here. She was intercepted by another patrol. They triangulated both attacks and there's a chance they came from the same source. The second patrol is heading there now. It looks like it's a cave, one kilometer from here"

"All right, everyone, triple time!" The platoon broke from a brisk trot into a firm run. Enough to get them across the kilometer that they needed to cross at a good pace, but not so fast that they would be tired when they got there. Normally, I would push them a bit faster, but the more I look at the men I have, the more I realize how young they are. Half of them are barely older than my new vox-operator. Most of the others look like they're only in their twenties. Only three are any older. Two women and a man with graying hair and eyes that tell me just how much they've seen.

"I always get the fucking green idiots. Why's that again?" I hiss. "Oh yeah, that's right, because the colonel trusts me to keep them alive. Makes you wonder how bad the attrition rates are in the other platoons." I had to force myself to slow my pace. The last thing I want to do is get ahead of the others and force them to move faster to keep up. Two or three of them were loudly complaining. "Oh stuff it! I'm sure you think that if you ask the Chaos Gods nicely their servants will let you go at your own speed, but the ones of us who actually have brains know we need to go a bit fucking faster!"

Thankfully we were almost there. A cave opening had just come into view amongst a small outcrop of rocks. Around a dozen bodies were strewn about the entrance. Most of them were PDF soldiers that had profane marks of Chaos painted in blood on their armor. However, here and there were members of the 23rd EDR, their bodies riddled with a mixture of las burns and solid round holes. "Local PDF unit was corrupted," I muttered. There was a faint sound coming from inside the cave, the sound of snapping sticks. Then a sharper sound of autogun fire. "IN!"

Without another word, I bounded into the cave, hellgun at the ready. I crept forward at a firmly controlled pace, slow enough to check the corners, but only just enough. The sounds of both las and auto fire were getting louder as I pushed through, the thumps of my platoon's footfalls behind me.

The cave became darker and darker as I moved further in, with there being something unnatural about the darkness. It felt like the darkness was actively pressing down on me, trying to smother me. I've felt this before, and it was never in a friendly environment. And always with this enemy.

My mind drifted for half a second, and when I came back, bright red lights illuminated the automatic fire of las weapons. Fifty plus cultists were taking cover behind a fairly well entrenched holdout. Lines of crates and sandbags at their front, with a cave wall to their back. Another 23rd EDR platoon was already engaging the enemy taking makeshift cover behind rocks and stalagmites. Fire was viciously being traded, bodies already littering the ground.

"Keep your wits about you!" I shout as my platoon filed into the open cavern, firing their lasguns as their sought cover. "They're not random bumblefucks! They're PDF, they've got equipment and training! Don't underestimate them just because-" before I could finish my sentence one of them attempted to throw a grenade. Attempted because as he threw it, it bounced off of a stalactite, fell back, hit the cultists on the head, and then rolled back into the thick of the enemy forces. The resulting explosion sent a dozen bodies flying, many in several pieces, over the barricade that had been formed.

There was a momentary lull in the fighting as everyone, Imperial and Chaos, gawked at what had just happened. I just gave a groan. "Another fucking entry," I grumbled as I took aim at the stunned cultists and managed to gun down three while they were still distracted. My much more powerful hellgun easily punched through their armor than a lasgun would, making quick work of them before they regain their senses. One was able to recover more quickly than the others and fired a snap shot at me. I didn't get back into cover quickly enough.

Feeling like a Ogyrn slammed me in the chest with a hammer, I went sprawling onto my back. Lights popped in front of my eyes as I felt a pair of thin arms wrap around my torso and pull me back. At the same time, a roar of rage filled the cavern. "SISTERS! FORWARD! FLAMES!" Before I could comprehend where I was in relationship to everything else, the cavern was bathed in a blinding orange light. From within the first platoon, a team of five had charged toward. The attention of the Chaos forces were mainly in my direction since I had been the one to bring them back into reality. It had drawn their focus away from the other side of the cave for a few precious seconds.

The team was at the barricade, massive tongues of flames arching out of their weapons. For a second I thought that they were going to throw themselves over the barricade, but thankfully they weren't that stupid. They instead slid up to the edge and continued to spray flames into the enclosed space. Half of the interior of which had caught fire, without even counting the cultists that were rolling on the ground in pain.

The ones that weren't on fire abandoned their positions. Screaming pledges to their dark gods, they charged out of position, away from those with the flamers, and at my platoon. The ones in the lead swung axes, felling a handful of soldiers. With a feeble grunt, I heaved up my hellgun, spraying wildly. I sawed off the leg of the lead most cultist when I had been aiming for his chest, and managed to nail the second one in the head.

A lasrifle poked out just above my head, and fired with the setting on burst. It hit one cultist in the chest, sending it sprawling to the ground. Still alive, it drew a pistol and aimed it, only for a second burst to slam into its shoulder. It hissed in pain and anger before a third burst to the head finally finished it off. The rest of the platoon were now concentrating their fire on the cultists, easy targets out in the open. Within seconds, they had been reduced to a pile of corpses.

"I think...I think that's the last of them sarge." My head was still reeling from the gutshot. Gingerly, I finger my chestplate, where the bolt hit me. No blood, and only armor in the hole. Thank the Emperor for carapace armor. No longer disoriented, I realized that I was on my back. At a rather awkward angle, thanks to the power pack connected to my hellgun. "Sarge? You ok?" My vox-operator is leaning over me, looking nervous.

"Not bad shooting," I groan, managing to get myself into a sitting position. "First taste of combat?" She nodded gingerly. "Well, you did all right. Next time just aim for the body though. Headshots when you can get them are one thing, but you were struggling to get it just then. Until you can get it down, just aim where they keep all their organs." She nodded, hastily checking the power cell on her lasgun. "Oh, and burst? Good choice. Though when they were out and charging at you, full auto would've worked, but sticking with burst is fine too. You can get complacent with full auto. Now then, I know a few people who would charge a bunker with flamers, but only one of them is on this planet. The rest aren't stupid and crazy enough to be here."

"Crazy and stupid am I?" An elderly Sister of Battle made her way over to me. Her hair was pale white and her face heavily lined. One might have thought that all Sisters dyed their hair white, but only those of Our Martyred Lady did. This one wore the red armor of the order of the Bloody Rose, that hair was her natural color. Reaching me, she holstered her flamer and offered a hand to me. "Be careful who you insult, I may not save you next time."

"Is that what saving me is supposed to look like? Because it leaves something to be desired. Felt more like I was a distraction." My voice is blunt, but I'm smiling as I take the sister's hand. She's as old as I am, in other words extremely fucking old, and I've known her for most of that extremely long life. "Wish they had told me my sister was going to be here, I would've forced the kids to move faster."

"Didn't want to get here and find all the work done?" she said, turning idly to the dead cultists and applying another jet of flame to the unscorched ones. While it was a legit tactic to make sure the enemy were dead, my sister had a rather unnerving look in her eye as she watched the bodies burn. She was enjoying the sight a little too much. "I would've saved you a couple if you asked nicely." The worst part about this was that most people would think she was being sarcastic. I knew she was dead serious.

"More like I'm concerned about my sister being ok," I said, so that no one else could hear me, except maybe the vox-operator.

A small glance of tenderness crossed her face. "Aw, you're sweet," she said sincerely. "With you, fun shared is fun doubled. Minus the parts when you get shot." She gave a very toothy grin, one that looked so menacing that I heard a couple of nearby troopers take a step back in shock. "Then I just have to make it clear to all of the servants of the false gods what a terrible mistake they've made. I mean, I would've done that anyway." She lovingly stroked her flamer. "You know me, I love my work." Understatement of the fucking 42nd millennium. I'm still 99% convinced she became a sister purely to work with fire. "And I enjoy it either way. But there's a certain intensity when you're in danger. It's not just me enjoying it. I just get an overwhelming urge to just stamp them out!"

Without warning, she lifted up an armored boot and brought it crashing down on the neck of a burning cultist. There was a sickening, wet crack as she snapped the body's neck. Lifting her foot up, she admired her work with a satisfied look. "That's better. I just get this gnawing feeling whenever you're in danger, and I just have to work it out. But you know what that feels like."

"Can't say that I do." Ok, that was a lie, I knew that feeling very well and got it just as much as she did. I just didn't admit it. I would say that I'm more subtle about it, but I'm fairly certain that would end up being a lie.

She grinned. "Maybe, maybe not. The important thing is that we're both alive, and everyone who tried to mess with us is dead." She let out a loud, bark of a laugh. "Funny how that always happens. You'd think they'd learn." I'm fairly certain everyone in the cave, even the other Sisters of Battle, were at the very least mildly uncomfortable by this point. Me? I found the whole situation both hilarious and a bit comforting. This was familiar ground. I knew this.

"Well, I think it's around time for your favorite part of the job. We've got an upper platoon strength's worth of dead cultists here. Corpse disposal time." Her grin widened. "I've got a patrol to finish. I'll try to convince the upper command not to, since we're down more than a few people, but I'm not feeling lucky." Yeah, I was cussing out the Lord General as we left, my sister starting a merry bonfire and cackling as we went. Patrol orders still stood.

We were down to ten people now. A good chunk of the platoon was still babysitting corpses and we had taken some losses in the cave. I had thought that this would be the kind of loss I could handle. The tragic but unavoidable attrition of war. Then someone said something about how one of the people who had been killed had dropped his lasgun when the cultists had charged him, looking to draw his knife instead. Something about "honorable" combat. This is what happens when I try to be optimistic.

So we took the rest of the patrol back onto our first route. One dumbass had gotten part of her ear shot off by a solid round and was showing it off to her friend, telling her that she was going to keep it. I instantly got flashbacks to the other hundred odd sometimes something like this had happened. Someone gets shot, they start showing off their wound, and the next thing you know they're in the infirmary and Zamora is tearing her hair out because they should've gone to her straight away.

So I stopped the march, marched up to her, and told her to clean and bandage the thing. She refused, on the basis that it wouldn't be as cool if it was all cleaned up. I clarified that it was an order. She told me to go to hell. I promptly kicked her in the back of the leg when she turned around, jumped on her, put her in a hold, and order my vox-operator to clean and bandage her wound while she was down. When it was done and we both got back up, I was not happy.

"AND IF YOU EVER PULL ANYTHING AS FUCKING STUPID AS THAT AGAIN!" I roared, "I WILL TAKE A SIDE TRIP TO THE NEAREST TYRANIC FLEET, AND SHOVE YOU DOWN THE THROAT OF THE NEAREST FUCKING CARNIFEX! SHOW OFF THE FUCKING WOUNDS FROM THAT!" She was, thankfully, docile the rest of the trip.

Nothing else happened, except one prick tried to sneak a little bit of hooch on the patrol. I've been drinking too long to miss him. I grabbed his flask, banged him on the head with it, dumped (most of) it and pocketed the flask. The guy almost complained back, but I was clearly angry enough at this point that he was smart enough to keep his mouth shut.

Now, you remember what I said before about wondering why I got out of bed? I had asked that around four or five times this day. The first being the double patrol, the second for the galaxy's shittiest suicide pact, the third for the honorbound training dummy, the fourth for the moron that thought a one eared lady would be a good freakshow attraction and the fifth and final for Mr. glug glug. I thought this day couldn't possibly get any worse. I said it out loud, "this day can't get any worse," as I finally stumbled into my room, my wife not back yet, and collapsed on the bed. I need to learn to keep my fucking mouth shut.

"Salutations." I snapped bolt up right from where I had been lying face down, my hellgun at the ready. I thought I had a cultists or a potential fragging on my hand. I was not so lucky. Sitting cross legged on a stool was an Eldar, a Harlequin to be precise. "I am a humble servant of the Laughing God. A Shadowseeker of the Masque of the Hidden Path."

He might as well have said "Hello, my name is In the Face, first name Shoot," because that's all I heard. "Why are you here?" I ask, my finger hovering over my hellgun's trigger. I don't fire, however. I have no love for Eldar, and even the Harlequins are allies of convenience at best. But one word that I clearly heard him say was "Shadowseeker." I have fought a Shadowseeker once in my life, and it was not something I wanted to repeat. A dozen holograms backflipping through the room while a vortex of shadows caused all but a handful of shots to go wide? I didn't need a repeat of that.

"To give you a warning," he replied. "That which has happened before will happen again. The black tide will wash over us all." Around this point two vicious battles were going on inside my head. The logic side of me was urging caution and restraint. Trying to remind myself that this was an ancient warrior, thousands of years old, that could most likely make my head explode with a thought. The rest of me was screaming "THE FUCKING CUNT IS SPEAKING IN RIDDLES!? THROUGH HIS FACE! PUT A LAS ROUND THROUGH HIS FUCKING CUNT FACE!"

And then something happened that utterly through me off. He started laughing. "I jest, I jest," he said. "I do come with a warning, but one much more helpful. Reaching into his gaudy, flowing and brightly colored robes, he produced an Imperial data-slate. "I have spent the last few months scouting enemy territory. I have collected as much information as I could reasonably aquire, and compiled it all there."

One hand still on my hellgun, something the Shadowseeker was cheerfully ignoring, I took the slate. Out of the corner of my eye, I started flicking through the slate. I did a double take. Baneblades, Leman Russes, Valkyries, Marauder bombers and destroyers, masses upon masses of Chimeras and Titans. Oh Emperor protect me the Titans. All reporting to the Chaos Lord. I started at the report before looking back up at the Harlequin. "I'm ready for the part of the comedy act where you reveal this was all a joke and then show me the report that doesn't say how utterly fucked we all are now."

The Harlequin let out another laugh, although it was a much sadder laugh. His mask, I realized, was lying on his lap, baring his face. He had a very depressing smile on his face. "Forgive me, but I do not jest when it comes to the servants of She Who Thirsts. Your enemy and my enemy lurk out there, not far from this planet, and she has amassed a mighty army. Not just in war machines, but in numbers as well. Read on."

My hellgun dropped to the floor as I continued to read on, scrolling past the highly detailed numbers on the enemy vehicles, complete with precise numbers, distribution and quality. Eventually I reached the point that talked about infantrymen. A horrible gnawing feeling spread through my bones. I had been feeling it a lot lately, but this was the worst burst of it I had felt in a long time. "She's arming...everyone she has?"

"Farmers, miners, factory workers, she's arming them all," the Harlequin said. "When there aren't enough rifles to go around, she gives them spears. Makeshift craft has been constructed to ship them all, and Navigators are being bred to man them. She has developed a rather inhumane method of accelerated reproduction that I'd rather not go into detail about. The Navigators that she has go from children to fully grown in a matter of months. Though they go from men and women to corpses just as fast."

The gnawing is getting worse. "Chaos has a tendency to be self destructive, but I've never seen anything like this before," I say to no one in particular.

The Harlequin nodded. "I agree. Abbadon, while his constant attacks never achieved the level of success they sought, has never the less proven to be skilled at endurance. Ten thousand years he has lasted, and he seems to have settled for a slow crawl of minor victories. Our new mutual foe seems to lack the preservation that has kept Abbadon alive all these years. She intends to either take this planet or sacrifice every last pawn she has trying."

I can think of a hundred-thousand ways this can end, and maybe three of them are ideal. And even those end with a few billion Imperial soldiers and citizens dead and with a cracked planet. I stopped looking at the slate and at the Harlequin. The questions all came tumbling out. "Why are you showing me this? And by that I mean why me in particular, why are you showing the Imperium at all, and what do you plan to get out of it?"

"All fair questions," the Harlequin said. "Billions on this planet alone. So why did I pick you, when there are such hatreds between our species. Well, it's a simple answer. I found this." Into his robes he went again, pulling something else out this time. A copy of Avoiding Stupid Deaths in the 41st Millenium. "An interesting read."

"You're fucking kidding me," I said, before I could stop myself.

"I see you don't have much of an author's persona. An interesting approach to take," he said, flipping through the pages. "I see you hardly have a high opinion of my kind, but seem to be willing to work with us. More importantly, you have fought this servant of She Who Thirsts before. You know how dangerous she is. So I decided you would take information about her seriously." Can't deny that logic. Even if it did make me want to punch him in the face. I can work with Eldar if it helps me survive, now they're making housecalls? I don't like this one bit.

"As for why I am contacting the Imperium, you should know well that our kinds make alliances when times are dire. And, as much as it saddens me to say it, the fight against She Who Thirsts and her kind goes poorly. My master has scattered us all across the Imperium, doing what we can where we can. Many of my kind even work directly with the one you call Roboute Guilliman. My place is here. Stopping a warband from growing into one that may ravage hundreds if not thousands of planets."

"She did seem like the type who wouldn't be satisfied with only 47 planets. Though I suppose it's 49 now. Guess she wants this planet to make it a nice even fifty," I said bitterly.

"She does have a flair for the dramatics," said the Harlequin. I had to fight back the urge to tell him to go fuck himself after he said that unironically. "As for what I want out of it? Simply put, her and her minions dead." That, I can get behind. Good fucking luck making it happen though. He seemed to realize what I was thinking. "I have few warriors that I can call upon, but I can permit the Imperium limited use of the Webway in the coming battle. Surgical strikes on enemy territory should be possible."

I stood up, shouldering my hellgun and flicking through the slate. "I'll have to get this to my commander. It's probably for the best if you stay out of sight until I get her to get someone higher up on the horn. We need to have someone actually approve you being here, if you don't want to be riddled with las rounds." And we wouldn't want that highly relieving event to transpire, would we?

He nodded. "I can stay out of sight. I have a talent for it. I wish you luck." He said that with utter sincerity and kindness. God I hate this prick.

"Don't. Fucking. Move." I said, getting up, pointing as I went, before slipping out of my room. Well this was a fine fucking mess I was in. I'd have to flag down the colonel, make sure no one I cared about went anywhere near that thing just in case he was insincere, and somehow forge an alliance with the Harlequins. No pressure.

Moving towards the bottom of the slate's long report, I saw something that filled me with nothing less than pure horror. "Constant talk among servants of She Who Thirsts. Referring to front line commander who took one of two Imperium planets. High regard from overall commander. Powerful individual. Many hints that he is the overall commander's son. Must confirm with Imperium intelligence to be certain." Son. She had a son. Taking the flask I had confiscated early, I drained it.

Plenty of material for the book, on the bright side. So much that I'll have to carry some of it over to the next chapter. For the final time that night, I asked myself a question. "Why did I bother getting out of bed today?"