purplefood wrote:Not to antagonise anyone but damn... that messes with established fluff so much...
Also i thought it was prose only? No background stuff?

WarOne wrote:

purplefood wrote:Not to antagonise anyone but damn... that messes with established fluff so much...
Also i thought it was prose only? No background stuff?

It is write anything.

For instance, you could write about the specs on a CRASSUS ARMORED ASSAULT PRIUS.

lowmanjason wrote:OK look, you can write background stuff if you want, but there needs to be some short story to go with it. its not a background comp its a fluff comp. If there is no story and just background it will not be counted when its time to vote. Short stories!!!

WARORK93 wrote:Awesome...I'm pretty sure this is within the word limit...

Ghosts of Tanith: Homefront
Part I: A Curse in the Nals

"Scouting's not as hard as people think. All it requires is that you put your ear to the ground and listen."

-Scout Jaren Mktayl

~I~

The shoggies croaked...

In the twilight by the forest pool they played their song for all to hear. The crickets in the grass joined them to form the symphony of the woods. There were, however, no people around to enjoy the music, just the shadows.

Just the ghosts...

The ghostly apparitions slithered between the towering nalwood trunks like serpents on the hunt, only stopping periodically to pause, look, and listen. In silence the mirages darted in and out of visible sight, hooded in cloaks like the spirits of the forest incarnate. There were five in all to be counted, but they were never all visible at the same time, the ghosts played an intricate game of leap frog as they crept through the forest, making no sound.

The shoggies croaked, hidden by the cowl of his camo cloak's hood, Scout Corporal Jaren Mktayl smiled to himself. The sound was familiar and in these times familiar was good...

Familiar meant that there was still a job to do...

Familiar meant that there was still a home to save...

Mktayl was not an impressive sight to most from a distance. Like most of the Tanith he was a shorter than average, compact brute of a man with thick arms and a snarl of a face. What truly set him apart was the deep red of his hair, exclusive majorly to him and his kinsmen. He was considered one of the most feral looking of the men, even by the pale and sometimes barbaric Tanith standards, the full right side of his face, neck, right arm, and torso were covered in intricate, blue tribal tattoos, labeling him as one of the planet's fierce minorities. His shaggy hair was braided and deadlocked in a few places with matching braids in his facial hair. His facial features and cold blue eyes held the stoicism of sheer granite and the capacity for soft humor. Some of the others joked and said he looked more like a pirate than a Tanith scout, though they usually never did so in his presence, those that did soon regretted it. Though he could not say he appreciated the gossip about him, truly, he didn't care what they thought about him, they didn't understand, it had always been that way. He had seen others like him in the regiment, hard in body and stare from the rough work in the mountains, they were just another group among many that had been called up to defend their home, they were the Highlanders...

However brutish his appearance, he was true at heart, thought on his feet, had naturally quick reflexes, a wary eye, and more than enough know-how of stealth to be a scout, that's why Mkoll had chosen him to be one.

Absent mindedly, Mktayl and two others made their way forward and took cover behind the next set of trees, Mktayl looked ahead, listened, and signaled subtly for the next group of two to move up. The forest around them was full of the sights, smells and sounds of any Nal forest in twilight.

The fresh dew, dripping from the thick green leaves, the dark blue sky tinged with pink on the horizon as Tanith's sun rose to shine light on the evergreens below, but most distinctive of all, the shoggies croaked, making their distinctive burping call through the forest and masking all that rode through the woodland in a surrealism that made the scene almost seem like a fairy tale haunted wood rather than a marshy woodland of a forest planet.

The thick mist that shrouded these parts of the wood made visibility negligible and gave each ghostly figure that continued to creep through the forest that morning an even more ghoulish appearance.

Jaren again peeked out from behind another tree to make sure the way was clear and was about to signal the other scouts to move up and continue the leap frogging that they had been doing for the better part of two hours, when he sensed more than saw an irregularity in the ground ahead. Even though the mist was cutting detectability down to almost nothing, these forests were where Mktayl had grown up and if there were any in the Tanith scouts that would know something was up around here, it would be him, and the chief of scouts knew this.

That's why when Mktayl signaled a halt, Sergeant Mkoll gave the affirmative signal immediately and the scouts bled into the surrounding glades,

almost as if they had never been there in the first place...

Scout "Mach" Bonin was the man immediately behind Mktayl and watched him disappear into the mist ahead. Bonin could not help but be a little unnerved at this, they had combed the forest for a couple hours and had not had to stop for anything until now.

What could have made Mktayl stop the procession like this?

Bonin kept his apprehensions to himself and for several minutes just crouched there behind the tree not moving, not wavering the aim of his lasrifle away from the direction Mktayl had gone. Feth take this fog! He couldnt see anything and he desperately wanted to know where Mktayl had gotten to.

Why was he so jumpy? Bonin pondered as he waited. He tried to console himself with the notion that it was just the jitters from being constantly on the lookout for the enemy but internally he knew that wasn't why he was nervous. It was more than that. It was what the Tanith First had been finding as they chased the last remnants of the enemy through the northern forests.

It was-

a sound...

The slightest sound of a twig breaking to his right was enough to make Bonin almost jump out of his skin. He had been traveling in utter silence for so long now that noise of any sort seemed alien to him. He quickly switched his aim to the direction of the sound.

What was it?

A cricket hopping along the forest path?

A timber wolf stalking its prey in the distance?

A squad of archenemy troops looking for any opposition?

Bonin had no time to find the answer to this, suddenly, the hairs on the back of his neck stood erect, he knew that feeling, someone was behind him only a few feet away...

Bonin spun suddenly pointing his weapon in the hooded face of his friend Mktayl, who, just as suddenly as Bonin had pointed it, had the barrel in his left hand pointing it away from himself and his right hand curled into a single finger over his lips for silence.

Bonin's eyes widened visibly as he pondered the speed at which Mktayl's hands worked, he'd seen the same sort of thing from the red haired scout in the barracks room over a card trick but had figured it was just a gimmick then. Bonin quickly revised that opinion..

"Its just me." signed Mktayl, the Tanith scouts constantly used an elaborate system of gestures to talk to each other while on the prowl. It was standard stealth practice as far as they were concerned.

"Feth! You nearly gave me a cardiac!" Bonin angrily signed back, his face overcoming the earlier surprise and replacing it with annoyance.

Mktayl smiled broadly and chuckled silently as he signed. "Get the chief over here, I've found something."

Bonin nodded silently and stood up from his crouch, he signaled with both hands for the other three to move up with them. quickly the mirages moved up to meet the two scouts and without words greeted them both. It seemed like if language had been invented these five men wouldn't have known it, for they spoke only with elaborate hand gestures.

"What have you got?" signed one, his face hidden behind his hooded cloak like the rest.

"More of the same, I'm afraid, Chief." Signed Mktayl. "More bodies, another ritual, more of these..." Mktayl held up a rusty brown object about a foot long and with a wide head at one end and a thick blunt point at the other. Mktayl passed the spike around to the other scouts who held it as if it were poisonous somehow, when the last of the group had seen it, he tossed it behind him onto the ground like garbage.

"Anything else?" another figure asked silently.

"Not much, Ven, just the same as we've gotten in the past week, cultists, all dead, bodies arranged in some sort of pattern, an altar in the middle, more dead cultists, drained of blood."

All the hooded figures seemed to shudder involuntarily, they could sense the machinations of Chaos at work here.

"Alright, enough, Mktayl, lets go check it out, we'll mark it on the map for the rest of the regiment to take care of and move on to our objective." Mkoll signed.

Mktayl nodded and signaled for them to follow, after about two minutes of moving forward in the criss cross pattern they had been doing earlier, they reached the site. The five scouts spread out to comb the site for any more clues. It wasnt a pleasant sight. Bodies sprawled spread eagled in an eight pointed cartwheel design around a fixed point in the center where a small dirt mound resided with more bodies piled on it.

Around the dirt mound a wide and shallow moat had been dug to contain...

well...

to contain the blood of what looked to be human sacrifices.

The bodies on the mound had been drained of all blood and the red liquid filled the moat ankle deep. Each body surrounding the moat had a rusty spike driven into it with small grooves made into a funnel from each one to the moat making a large gorey puddle in the clearing of the forest. Each body was that of a cultist, the evil archenemy that had invaded Tanith more than a month ago. They had identified themselves as "The Kindred", or at least partly identified themselves as such, it was the only two words the Tanith could make any sense out of from the graffiti the cultists had scrawled on the walls of their besieged cities. Each cultist wore some sort of black robes with red scarves draped over their heads so that nothing but the eyes were visible, in this way and so many blasphemous others, they pledged their allegiance to the darkness. When uncovered, the cultists were not much more appeasing. Each freak had his (or her, it was hard to tell) foreheads inscribed with an eight pointed star, and their heads and bodies each had ritual scars in ghastly patterns that made even the hardiest men queasy when they looked at them.

"Don't touch anything, it could be toxic." Signed Mkoll.

Not like anyone wants to touch these fethers, Mktayl thought.

Their kind had descended on Tanith two weeks after its first founding, giving the planet's military commanders, including the offworlder Colonel-Commissar Ibram Gaunt, little time to plan a defense.

Ibram Gaunt...

Mktayl rolled the name around in his head, and found himself grimacing.

Most of the Tanith left in the one regiment that had been agglomerated together after the siege had been broken by Imperial reinforcements, had a deep, protruding distrust, if not an outright hatred for the off world commander. It seemed to the Tanith that the Imperium's arrival had brought with it the curse of the Chaos invasion, and for that most of the Tanith resented the newly christened Imperial Colonel-Commissar. Even more so because when given the news, actually considered abandoning the planet and running away with what forces he could.

The Tanith held their ground though, most simply refused to leave their world to the Chaos hordes, and eventually Gaunt was convinced to dig in, much to the satisfaction of the general soldiery.

But one had to admit, that man is a damn fine commander of men, Mktayl surmised.

It was true, Gaunt had led the Tanith from the front, during the siege of the planet, and had held the three regiments and multiple militia and volunteer units together by force of will and charisma to defend Tanith's main hives, cities, resources, and spaceports. Now that the enemy splinter fleet had been destroyed, the remnants of the Archenemy went to ground on Tanith, and it was up to the remainder of the Tanith and the Imperial forces to snuff them out. Already the Vendoland 712th airmobile regiment and the 7th Radimir Armored Panzers had landed to lend the lightly clad Tanith the heavy support that would be needed. Not only guard units had been mobilized to save the valuable Agri/Hive world of Tanith, but the Navy had also come with reinforcements; the 375th air corps with its Thunderbolts, Lightnings and Marauders had nullified many positions, that the Archenemy had managed to turn into hard points, from the airfields that had been Jerry rigged on Tanith's fields.

Now the mop up was nearly complete as the straggling forces of the enemy retreated north into the highlands.

Home. It was a word that gave Mktayl mixed feelings...

Mktayl again looked to the pale, bloodless bodies on the ground. As the Tanith moved North chasing the enemy in this final pursuit, this strange scene of ritual sacrifice had repeated itself in every clearing and town the Tanith had reclaimed since the siege had broken. No enemy contact, besides a few ambushes, no bodies besides the sacrificed ones, not even so much as a spent laspack. It was extremely unnerving for all the Ghosts, that's what they called themselves now; "Gaunt's Ghosts" for their obvious stealth and reconnaissance skills as light infantry specialists and because by "winning" the bitter fight for Tanith most of the planet's populace had been displaced and had lost their homes, their lives, their loved ones. Suffering, pain and death were all a part of an enemy incursion, and Tanith's main cities had nearly succumbed to the fierce siege of the planet. Millions were killed, millions more were left homeless, starving, cold, and destitute.

It would take years, decades even, but Tanith would live again, and she would be stronger for it, like a ghost from the grave she would live again. Mktayl smiled at the thought, happy that what could have been was not, as he finished his search.

Nothing more to find here, the damn enemy didn't leave any pocket full.

"Why are you smiling?" Signed the last of the ghostly group to Mktayl when he finally looked up.

"Just thinking about the beating those fethers are in for when we corner em." Mktayl signed back, Hwlan smirked halfway and lightly shook his head in mock disapproval.

"Get over here, the chief wants to go over the game plan." He urged Mktayl who nodded his affirmative and hustled over to the grouped scouts who were waiting.

"Anybody find anything abnormal?" Was what Mkoll signed to them initially.

The other scouts blinked at him, Mktayl thought he was joking for a second to relieve the tension. Just a second, and then he remembered Mkoll was speaking, he meant it.

"Well besides the whole fething ritual sacrifice here, I didn't find anything." Mktayl signed, all the other scouts signed their agreement and this seemed to satisfy Mkoll.

He pulled out a thin, off-white parchment from his cloak and marked a symbol on it, the map to take to Gaunt and report the position for cleansing once the circuit was complete. Mkoll put it away and signed rapidly,

"Okay lets get to our main objective, the crossroads town into the foothills of the mountains is just a few kilometers away. We do a quick sweep, get out, quick, clean, and silent, get back to the regiment and tell them what we've found. Any questions?" There were none.

"Lets go, Tri-spread, Ven and Tayl have point this time, move out!"

The scouts nodded and silently slithered off into the forest line, soon the ritual site was motionless yet again as if the Ghosts had not been there at all. The next hour went on as silently as expected for the five scouts, with no enemy encountered and the trees and cover thinning out to open into farmland as the procession encountered the bare foothills. The scouts were forced to use the ditches along the ever widening roads to continue their sweep. Although it was predictable, the ditches were the only cover around the flat, plowed fields, even though the scouts hadn't yet encountered enemy resistance, it didn't mean that they wouldn't. The group came upon the first few farmhouses without incident.

Just like the others...Mktayl thought as he crossed a farmhouse's front yard. Nobody home and everything as it should be, like they just disappeared...

The scouts continued past the farmhouses into the heart of the town, the town of Hangasroc according to the briefing, but Mktayl had already known that, where the buildings became thick together and roads became even wider. The scouts continued to search houses and buildings, finding nothing of interest.

No bodies, nothing ransacked, nothing destroyed...yet.

The scout team crested a hill in the town road, and Mkvenner saw it first...

"Oh feth" he whispered, the other scouts immediately looked up to see what Mkvenner had seen...

All of the buildings in the center of town had been flattened by explosives, the pattern of the buildings flattened made an eight pointed star that poked inwards to the city square.

Bodies, both Tanith and archenemy lay sprawled, spread eagled in the streets nailed to the ground with little grooves going from the bodies to the town square where a moat had been built to catch the slowly trickling blood flow. In the center of the large moat in the town square sat a large mound with at least a hundred bodies piled onto it, their vital fluid making a pool hundreds of gallons deep in the moat. Flies surrounded the bodies, buzzing two and fro from one cold corpse to the other

The entire center of the town had been turned into a ritual site for the ruinous powers, like the ones they had found in the forests and other towns, except much bigger. The Scouts stood in stunned silence and stupification for what seemed like a few seconds but was actually several minutes.

The rotten smell of so many decaying bodies was almost unbearable, the enemy had obviously been through here at least a few days before.

Finally Mkoll spoke up. "Alright start poking around, try to find anything that will give us a clue as to what the feth went on here."

Mkoll motioned for the scouts to split up and each went a separate way. Mktayl went towards the center of town and began to go through the door of a ruined building when someone behind him called his name, it was Mkvenner.

"Be careful, mate." he said

Mktayl arched his eyebrow as if to wonder how he could have ever cautioned of such.

"What? You think I'm gonna go settin fire to everything like Brostin?"

Mkvenner shrugged "Just be careful."

Mktayl made a dismissive gesture with his hand "Quit worrying about me and go find something for us to kill."

Mkvenner left without another word, Mktayl watched him leave. He hadn't figured out Mkvenner yet. The man seemed most times like he intended to keep his distance from everyone in the unit. In certain instances, like that one just now, Mktayl saw something in his eyes that nobody else but the scouts he knew saw in him...

Care...

Emotion...

Mktayl knew Mkvenner better than anyone in the unit with the exception being Mkoll and maybe Bonin. And that wasnt saying much honestly. He'd heard the rumors about him, he'd heard that word tossed around reverently plenty of times off duty by whispering Ghosts...

Nalsheen

He knew why Mkvenner kept so distant, it was in the man's nature, Mktayl knew the rumors were true, though most Ghosts thought of it as just another regimental myth. Mkvenner hadn't told him, Mkoll hadn't told him either. He knew because he'd seen the way Mkvenner moved, talked, acted, Mktayl had seen it before only once, in another time and another place...

Mktayl turned and entered the building and Mkvenner went into another. Mktayl found himself in a cozy living room with a fireplace, the wood was cold, it hadn't been used in at least a few days. over the fire place was a mantle piece and on that were framed pictures of what looked to be a happy family. A farmer, a homely but attractive woman, and two beaming children, a boy and a girl both not even in their teens. Mktayl picked up the picture, sat down on a table and looked at it. It was things like these that reminded him that his home, his planet, though saved from horrible death, would never again be the same. It was things like these that filled him with a sense of loss. He remembered his own family...

His father, so proud and strong, his mother, so loving and compassionate, his brother, so fierce and determined, his sister, so delicate and headstrong...

his nephew...

He smiled, and tears ran down his cheeks from the memories of a happier time and a happier place...

Mktayl put the picture back on its dusty place, just as he was doing so, he heard the slight sound of a door opening slowly...

Someone was in the house with him, not only that...

but it was someone who wanted to be quiet, Mktayl had barely heard him.

Mktayl activated his mic twice, sending two short jolts of static to the team, he had made contact with something. Mktayl moved into the shadow of a wall crevice in a blind turn of the hallway between the back door and the living room. He slid his lasrifle into the sling on his shoulder and unsheathed his Tanith silver knife, thirty centimeters of Tanith pride through the heart or throat usually put an opponent down no matter what. Whoever or whatever it was, it was getting closer, nearing Mktayl's bolt hole. Mktayl could hear the man's footsteps even though they were muted severely.

Suddenly, he could see a long shadow coming across the path, slowly ever so slowly, the shadow pushed on, looking for him...

Almost, almost...Mktayl said to himself...wait for it.

Mktayl saw the end of a lasgun poke around the corner, held out in front of whoever was behind it.

In a blur Mktayl jumped out of cover and used the back of his left hand to push the gun muzzle up and way from him as it fired and filled the ceiling with holes, with his right leg, foot and hip, he masterfully pushed the surprised figure over and fell on top of him, straddling his opponent as he had done so many times before, both in combat and in practice. The lasgun fell out of his target's hands as he lay sprawled on the ground, dazed. In his right hand Mktayl held his straight silver, a poised coil ready to come down into his enemy's heart.

"For Feth's sake!" The figure cried.

That was strange, the enemy didn't usually use Tanith slang...

"Wait, dont! Get off you dolt, its me Doyl!"

"Doyl?" Mktayl said confused.

The figure pulled his cowled hood back to reveal a fair and pale Tanith face, "Yes, Feth it! Now get your big highland arse off me!"

Mktayl sheathed his knife and got up, he helped Doy to his feet as Mkoll and Bonin ran through the front door.

"Whats going on here? Report." Mkoll asked as if it hadn't been obvious.

"I was checking out this house sir." Mktayl started "I heard someone come through the back and I gave the contact signal over the mic, I wasn't able to make visual contact without being seen so I hid. I ambushed Doyl here who I thought was a hostile."

Mkoll nodded slightly, he turned to Doyl

"Where's the rest of your team?" He asked.

"Spread out on the other side of town, I was looking to meet up with you when Tayl here jumped me."

Mkoll nodded to Doyl

"You should have signaled us Doyl, that's how black crosses happen, stupid feths not doing their job right, you know better." The scout sergeant advised coldly and efficiently, when Mkoll was giving advice that was the only way it was given. "Tayl, good work." Mkoll finished flatly, to anyone else it would have sounded as if Mkoll was playing favorites but in fact he was just being frank, Doyl had erred and as a result Mktayl had thought him an enemy, the scouts knew this so they said nothing and followed their leader out of the house.

"We're making our way to the center of town to see exactly what happened" Bonin stated matter of factly.

"Looks like just another debrained slaughter if you ask me." Doyl stated bluntly.

Mkoll fixed him with a withering stare, the kind that could turn a man to stone. There was a strained pause.

"Regardless" Mkoll started "We will do our duty and make sure it is safe for the regiment to move up and take care of this." At this last phrase Mkoll gestured to the center of town that had been turned into an unholy ritual site.

"Hwlan and Ven are already searching the heart of this...monstrosity over, lets go join them and then we can get out of here."

Mktayl and Doyl nodded and together the four scouts made their way to the center of Hangasroc where the two scouts were indeed searching the bodies for anything that might give the Tanith forces an edge. They were joined by Caober, Leyr, Baen, and Mkeller, the team Doyl led in the counter sweep of the same area. Each scout greeted each other quietly and got to work looking through the mutilated bodies to find anything of value.

Mktayl hated desecrating these people any further than they already had. But he had a job to do, and he would do it, by the Emperor, until death claimed him. He passed Hwlan who was busy trying to move a couple bodies away to be examined.

"Find anything?" Mktayl inquired quietly.

Hwlan simply shook his head and didn't take his eyes off his work. Mktayl turned and continued his work. Mktayl went through the pockets of an archenemy soldier and had finished searching the clothing pockets when he found something sticking out of the cultist's webbing pouch, he reached for it.

It was a piece of paper, scribbled on it were patterns of lines and more eight pointed circles...

Numbers with foreign gibberish written out to the sides were displayed on the side of the patterns like a key of some sort...

Mktayl knew he had a map that the enemy must have missed and was about to call out to Mkoll when he heard the small popping crack from a distance...

Behind him he heard and saw Hwlan yelp and hit the ground and begin cursing, clutching his shoulder which bled profusely from a slug wound.

Mktayl dived to one side taking cover behind a trough in front of one of the buildings just in time for the second slug aimed for him to pass harmlessly through his camo cape. Mkoll waved to him from behind some cover at the other end of the street.

"Did you see where that came from?" he signaled.

Mktayl said that he hadn't and Mkoll began talking to Mkvenner beside him. Mktayl could see that all the other scouts had likewise taken cover. Hwlan rocked back and forth holding his shoulder and spewing curses left and right.

"Hold on Hwlan, just hold on, you hear? I'm gonna be right there." Mktayl said placatively, almost pleadingly, another shot rang out and kicked up dirt not a foot from where Hwlan was.

Mkoll signaled Mktayl again "Me and Ven see him, he's using the windows on the top floor of the building at the end of this street, when I give the signal run across the street toward Hwlan but keep going until you get to the other side so Ven can get a bead on him."

Mktayl hesitated, he really didn't like that plan, it meant that he could possibly not come back form this.

He had to put his trust in his sergeant and Mkvenner.

"Okay, tell Ven not to miss."

Mkoll nodded and smiled grimly "Can do." he signed, "Standby..."

Mktayl readied himself for the sprint of his life, he got into a sprinting crouch and waited for Mkoll's signal. Agonizing moments passed as he watched Mkvenner line up on the upper floor of the building on the end of the street, about a two hundred meter shot. If Mkvenner made this shot, Larkin would be damn proud, if he didn't, well...

Mktayl tried not to think about that.

Mkoll signaled him "Go!"

Mktayl blasted off into the street like an Olympic champion starting a one hundred meter sprint, in reality it was more like thirty meters but to Mktayl it might as well have been a kilometer away. He passed Hwlan who was now lying in a small pool of his own blood from his ruined shoulder, it was trickling slowly into the moat at the center of it all and Mktayl shuddered involuntarily. His cloak flew behind him and his hood fell away to reveal his face, he looked into the top floor window to see a shadow pointing the end of a long autorifle straight at him. It seemed to him to be trained right between his eyes. His sprint took him, finally, to the other side, time seemed to slow as he dove and slid feet first into cover as the wall corner of the building above him shattered into dust as the heavy slug bullet passed just where his head had been a millisecond ago.

At the same moment Mkvenner fired one bright blue lance into darkness of the window he thought the shot came from.

All was silent and the air itself seemed to hold its breath as the scouts waited.

Well only one way to find out...Thought Mktayl.

He stepped out into the street toward Hwlan who had fallen unconscious, when he wasnt killed the others stood up as well and made their way to Hwlan. Mktayl began to dress the wound and put a tourniquet on to stop the bleeding as someone stood behind him.

"Remember what you said about being careful Ven?"

Mkvenner's face contorted into a dull question. "Vaguely" he said seeming bored.

"Well that wasnt." Mktayl said mockingly harsh.

"Oh wasn't it?" Mkvenner came back.

"Yeah, just like you, daring, dangerous, risky, and in the end totally worth it."

Mkvenner smiled and chuckled grimly at the remark and shook Mktayl's proffered hand.

"He who dares, wins." Mkvenner said simply.

"Nice shooting, that one will make Larkin unhappy." Mktayl complemented, Mkvenner smiled again ever so slightly.

"Nice run, didn't know if you had made it at the end there, saw the burst out of the corner of my eye."

Mktayl nodded slightly, "Yeah, that's gotta be the second best run in the regiment." Mktayl said simply.

"Second best?" Mkvenner asked, interested.

"Yeah, right behind that time Bragg ran to the latrines when he learned the shoggy soup at the mess hall wasn't made from real shoggies."

Mkvenner laughed at this, which was impressive on Mktayl's part, Mkvenner never laughed at anything.

Mkoll came over from where the rest were reviving Hwlan and pointed to the two.

"You two come with me, we're checking the house and then we're getting back to the regiment."

Mkoll turned to go, Mkvenner and Mktayl followed silently. No affirmation was needed. When Mkoll gave you a command you did it, no questions.

The three scouts made their way down the street into the house where the sniper had been moments before. Mktayl put his ear to the door and gave the downhand motion for no sound. Mkoll put up three fingers and let each one drop in turn, at the last finger drop, Mktayl hammered in the door with his boot and it swung open. He advanced in scoping his lasrifle to his shoulder ready to fire, checking corners, and crevices. A few seconds after entry Mkoll gave the all clear and the team moved up the stairs into the upper third floor of the building.

There they found a lone archenemy cultist with a long barreled autorifle slumped into a corner with an ugly black chest wound. Mkoll checked him and they were all astonished to find the man still alive, he was mouthing something silently, a sly and blood soaked smile gracing his face, he looked up into Mktayl's eyes and said in a sandpaper dry voice...

"So sure of your victory, you have seen nothing. The blood tide comes...the door will open and the destroyer of worlds comes with it...this world will be drowned in blood and death."

The cultist slumped limp, a shadow of a chuckle coming from his gurgling throat, and died there in the corner of the room, the light fading from his eyes before he could be questioned or moved. Mktayl shuddered inwardly as the impact of the man's words sank in.

it all made sense now...

the ritual sites...

the blood sacrifices...

the destroyed towns...

the alien chaotic patterns of the enemy...

they were trying to summon something...

Unholy.

He sat down and looked at the floor.

"What do you think he meant by that?" he asked, his voice shaking a little.

"Nothing good, I'll tell you that much." Mkoll stated.

The events that unfolded as the siege of Tanith came to a close (especially after Imperial reinforcements arrived) is still somewhat of a mystery. Most information on the subject has been quarantined by the Inquisition, but it is obvious from astropathic records of the space around the planet during the siege that the warp boiled and possibly broke the surface of reality around Tanith, whether there were any aftereffects of this remains to be seen..

(Not a whole lot of action I know but its a set up for the rest of my fanfic (Each segment of which is A LOT longer than this one) so it ends up explaining the plot and setting a lot more than anything else...)

Avatar 720 wrote:This is showing up as 5,734 words (excluding the bracketed part at the end and the small sentence at the start, but including the title) to me; anyone else want to check?

WARORK93 wrote:Awesome...I'm pretty sure this is within the word limit...

Ghosts of Tanith: Homefront
Part I: A Curse in the Nals

"Scouting's not as hard as people think. All it requires is that you put your ear to the ground and listen."

-Scout Jaren Mktayl

~I~

The shoggies croaked...

In the twilight by the forest pool they played their song for all to hear. The crickets in the grass joined them to form the symphony of the woods. There were, however, no people around to enjoy the music, just the shadows.

Just the ghosts...

The ghostly apparitions slithered between the towering nalwood trunks like serpents on the hunt, only stopping periodically to pause, look, and listen. In silence the mirages darted in and out of visible sight, hooded in cloaks like the spirits of the forest incarnate. There were five in all to be counted, but they were never all visible at the same time, the ghosts played an intricate game of leap frog as they crept through the forest, making no sound.

The shoggies croaked, hidden by the cowl of his camo cloak's hood, Scout Corporal Jaren Mktayl smiled to himself. The sound was familiar and in these times familiar was good...

Familiar meant that there was still a job to do...

Familiar meant that there was still a home to save...

Mktayl was not an impressive sight to most from a distance. Like most of the Tanith he was a shorter than average, compact brute of a man with thick arms and a snarl of a face. What truly set him apart was the deep red of his hair, exclusive majorly to him and his kinsmen. He was considered one of the most feral looking of the men, even by the pale and sometimes barbaric Tanith standards, the full right side of his face, neck, right arm, and torso were covered in intricate, blue tribal tattoos, labeling him as one of the planet's fierce minorities. His shaggy hair was braided and deadlocked in a few places with matching braids in his facial hair. His facial features and cold blue eyes held the stoicism of sheer granite and the capacity for soft humor. Some of the others joked and said he looked more like a pirate than a Tanith scout, though they usually never did so in his presence, those that did soon regretted it. Though he could not say he appreciated the gossip about him, truly, he didn't care what they thought about him, they didn't understand, it had always been that way. He had seen others like him in the regiment, hard in body and stare from the rough work in the mountains, they were just another group among many that had been called up to defend their home, they were the Highlanders...

However brutish his appearance, he was true at heart, thought on his feet, had naturally quick reflexes, a wary eye, and more than enough know-how of stealth to be a scout, that's why Mkoll had chosen him to be one.

Absent mindedly, Mktayl and two others made their way forward and took cover behind the next set of trees, Mktayl looked ahead, listened, and signaled subtly for the next group of two to move up. The forest around them was full of the sights, smells and sounds of any Nal forest in twilight.

The fresh dew, dripping from the thick green leaves, the dark blue sky tinged with pink on the horizon as Tanith's sun rose to shine light on the evergreens below, but most distinctive of all, the shoggies croaked, making their distinctive burping call through the forest and masking all that rode through the woodland in a surrealism that made the scene almost seem like a fairy tale haunted wood rather than a marshy woodland of a forest planet.

The thick mist that shrouded these parts of the wood made visibility negligible and gave each ghostly figure that continued to creep through the forest that morning an even more ghoulish appearance.

Jaren again peeked out from behind another tree to make sure the way was clear and was about to signal the other scouts to move up and continue the leap frogging that they had been doing for the better part of two hours, when he sensed more than saw an irregularity in the ground ahead. Even though the mist was cutting detectability down to almost nothing, these forests were where Mktayl had grown up and if there were any in the Tanith scouts that would know something was up around here, it would be him, and the chief of scouts knew this.

That's why when Mktayl signaled a halt, Sergeant Mkoll gave the affirmative signal immediately and the scouts bled into the surrounding glades,

almost as if they had never been there in the first place...

Scout "Mach" Bonin was the man immediately behind Mktayl and watched him disappear into the mist ahead. Bonin could not help but be a little unnerved at this, they had combed the forest for a couple hours and had not had to stop for anything until now.

What could have made Mktayl stop the procession like this?

Bonin kept his apprehensions to himself and for several minutes just crouched there behind the tree not moving, not wavering the aim of his lasrifle away from the direction Mktayl had gone. Feth take this fog! He couldnt see anything and he desperately wanted to know where Mktayl had gotten to.

Why was he so jumpy? Bonin pondered as he waited. He tried to console himself with the notion that it was just the jitters from being constantly on the lookout for the enemy but internally he knew that wasn't why he was nervous. It was more than that. It was what the Tanith First had been finding as they chased the last remnants of the enemy through the northern forests.

It was-

a sound...

The slightest sound of a twig breaking to his right was enough to make Bonin almost jump out of his skin. He had been traveling in utter silence for so long now that noise of any sort seemed alien to him. He quickly switched his aim to the direction of the sound.

What was it?

A cricket hopping along the forest path?

A timber wolf stalking its prey in the distance?

A squad of archenemy troops looking for any opposition?

Bonin had no time to find the answer to this, suddenly, the hairs on the back of his neck stood erect, he knew that feeling, someone was behind him only a few feet away...

Bonin spun suddenly pointing his weapon in the hooded face of his friend Mktayl, who, just as suddenly as Bonin had pointed it, had the barrel in his left hand pointing it away from himself and his right hand curled into a single finger over his lips for silence.

Bonin's eyes widened visibly as he pondered the speed at which Mktayl's hands worked, he'd seen the same sort of thing from the red haired scout in the barracks room over a card trick but had figured it was just a gimmick then. Bonin quickly revised that opinion..

"Its just me." signed Mktayl, the Tanith scouts constantly used an elaborate system of gestures to talk to each other while on the prowl. It was standard stealth practice as far as they were concerned.

"Feth! You nearly gave me a cardiac!" Bonin angrily signed back, his face overcoming the earlier surprise and replacing it with annoyance.

Mktayl smiled broadly and chuckled silently as he signed. "Get the chief over here, I've found something."

Bonin nodded silently and stood up from his crouch, he signaled with both hands for the other three to move up with them. quickly the mirages moved up to meet the two scouts and without words greeted them both. It seemed like if language had been invented these five men wouldn't have known it, for they spoke only with elaborate hand gestures.

"What have you got?" signed one, his face hidden behind his hooded cloak like the rest.

"More of the same, I'm afraid, Chief." Signed Mktayl. "More bodies, another ritual, more of these..." Mktayl held up a rusty brown object about a foot long and with a wide head at one end and a thick blunt point at the other. Mktayl passed the spike around to the other scouts who held it as if it were poisonous somehow, when the last of the group had seen it, he tossed it behind him onto the ground like garbage.

"Anything else?" another figure asked silently.

"Not much, Ven, just the same as we've gotten in the past week, cultists, all dead, bodies arranged in some sort of pattern, an altar in the middle, more dead cultists, drained of blood."

All the hooded figures seemed to shudder involuntarily, they could sense the machinations of Chaos at work here.

"Alright, enough, Mktayl, lets go check it out, we'll mark it on the map for the rest of the regiment to take care of and move on to our objective." Mkoll signed.

Mktayl nodded and signaled for them to follow, after about two minutes of moving forward in the criss cross pattern they had been doing earlier, they reached the site. The five scouts spread out to comb the site for any more clues. It wasnt a pleasant sight. Bodies sprawled spread eagled in an eight pointed cartwheel design around a fixed point in the center where a small dirt mound resided with more bodies piled on it.

Around the dirt mound a wide and shallow moat had been dug to contain...

well...

to contain the blood of what looked to be human sacrifices.

The bodies on the mound had been drained of all blood and the red liquid filled the moat ankle deep. Each body surrounding the moat had a rusty spike driven into it with small grooves made into a funnel from each one to the moat making a large gorey puddle in the clearing of the forest. Each body was that of a cultist, the evil archenemy that had invaded Tanith more than a month ago. They had identified themselves as "The Kindred", or at least partly identified themselves as such, it was the only two words the Tanith could make any sense out of from the graffiti the cultists had scrawled on the walls of their besieged cities. Each cultist wore some sort of black robes with red scarves draped over their heads so that nothing but the eyes were visible, in this way and so many blasphemous others, they pledged their allegiance to the darkness. When uncovered, the cultists were not much more appeasing. Each freak had his (or her, it was hard to tell) foreheads inscribed with an eight pointed star, and their heads and bodies each had ritual scars in ghastly patterns that made even the hardiest men queasy when they looked at them.

"Don't touch anything, it could be toxic." Signed Mkoll.

Not like anyone wants to touch these fethers, Mktayl thought.

Their kind had descended on Tanith two weeks after its first founding, giving the planet's military commanders, including the offworlder Colonel-Commissar Ibram Gaunt, little time to plan a defense.

Ibram Gaunt...

Mktayl rolled the name around in his head, and found himself grimacing.

Most of the Tanith left in the one regiment that had been agglomerated together after the siege had been broken by Imperial reinforcements, had a deep, protruding distrust, if not an outright hatred for the off world commander. It seemed to the Tanith that the Imperium's arrival had brought with it the curse of the Chaos invasion, and for that most of the Tanith resented the newly christened Imperial Colonel-Commissar. Even more so because when given the news, actually considered abandoning the planet and running away with what forces he could.

The Tanith held their ground though, most simply refused to leave their world to the Chaos hordes, and eventually Gaunt was convinced to dig in, much to the satisfaction of the general soldiery.

But one had to admit, that man is a damn fine commander of men, Mktayl surmised.

It was true, Gaunt had led the Tanith from the front, during the siege of the planet, and had held the three regiments and multiple militia and volunteer units together by force of will and charisma to defend Tanith's main hives, cities, resources, and spaceports. Now that the enemy splinter fleet had been destroyed, the remnants of the Archenemy went to ground on Tanith, and it was up to the remainder of the Tanith and the Imperial forces to snuff them out. Already the Vendoland 712th airmobile regiment and the 7th Radimir Armored Panzers had landed to lend the lightly clad Tanith the heavy support that would be needed. Not only guard units had been mobilized to save the valuable Agri/Hive world of Tanith, but the Navy had also come with reinforcements; the 375th air corps with its Thunderbolts, Lightnings and Marauders had nullified many positions, that the Archenemy had managed to turn into hard points, from the airfields that had been Jerry rigged on Tanith's fields.

Now the mop up was nearly complete as the straggling forces of the enemy retreated north into the highlands.

Home. It was a word that gave Mktayl mixed feelings...

Mktayl again looked to the pale, bloodless bodies on the ground. As the Tanith moved North chasing the enemy in this final pursuit, this strange scene of ritual sacrifice had repeated itself in every clearing and town the Tanith had reclaimed since the siege had broken. No enemy contact, besides a few ambushes, no bodies besides the sacrificed ones, not even so much as a spent laspack. It was extremely unnerving for all the Ghosts, that's what they called themselves now; "Gaunt's Ghosts" for their obvious stealth and reconnaissance skills as light infantry specialists and because by "winning" the bitter fight for Tanith most of the planet's populace had been displaced and had lost their homes, their lives, their loved ones. Suffering, pain and death were all a part of an enemy incursion, and Tanith's main cities had nearly succumbed to the fierce siege of the planet. Millions were killed, millions more were left homeless, starving, cold, and destitute.

It would take years, decades even, but Tanith would live again, and she would be stronger for it, like a ghost from the grave she would live again. Mktayl smiled at the thought, happy that what could have been was not, as he finished his search.

Nothing more to find here, the damn enemy didn't leave any pocket full.

"Why are you smiling?" Signed the last of the ghostly group to Mktayl when he finally looked up.

"Just thinking about the beating those fethers are in for when we corner em." Mktayl signed back, Hwlan smirked halfway and lightly shook his head in mock disapproval.

"Get over here, the chief wants to go over the game plan." He urged Mktayl who nodded his affirmative and hustled over to the grouped scouts who were waiting.

"Anybody find anything abnormal?" Was what Mkoll signed to them initially.

The other scouts blinked at him, Mktayl thought he was joking for a second to relieve the tension. Just a second, and then he remembered Mkoll was speaking, he meant it.

"Well besides the whole fething ritual sacrifice here, I didn't find anything." Mktayl signed, all the other scouts signed their agreement and this seemed to satisfy Mkoll.

He pulled out a thin, off-white parchment from his cloak and marked a symbol on it, the map to take to Gaunt and report the position for cleansing once the circuit was complete. Mkoll put it away and signed rapidly,

"Okay lets get to our main objective, the crossroads town into the foothills of the mountains is just a few kilometers away. We do a quick sweep, get out, quick, clean, and silent, get back to the regiment and tell them what we've found. Any questions?" There were none.

"Lets go, Tri-spread, Ven and Tayl have point this time, move out!"

The scouts nodded and silently slithered off into the forest line, soon the ritual site was motionless yet again as if the Ghosts had not been there at all. The next hour went on as silently as expected for the five scouts, with no enemy encountered and the trees and cover thinning out to open into farmland as the procession encountered the bare foothills. The scouts were forced to use the ditches along the ever widening roads to continue their sweep. Although it was predictable, the ditches were the only cover around the flat, plowed fields, even though the scouts hadn't yet encountered enemy resistance, it didn't mean that they wouldn't. The group came upon the first few farmhouses without incident.

Just like the others...Mktayl thought as he crossed a farmhouse's front yard. Nobody home and everything as it should be, like they just disappeared...

The scouts continued past the farmhouses into the heart of the town, the town of Hangasroc according to the briefing, but Mktayl had already known that, where the buildings became thick together and roads became even wider. The scouts continued to search houses and buildings, finding nothing of interest.

No bodies, nothing ransacked, nothing destroyed...yet.

The scout team crested a hill in the town road, and Mkvenner saw it first...

"Oh feth" he whispered, the other scouts immediately looked up to see what Mkvenner had seen...

All of the buildings in the center of town had been flattened by explosives, the pattern of the buildings flattened made an eight pointed star that poked inwards to the city square.

Bodies, both Tanith and archenemy lay sprawled, spread eagled in the streets nailed to the ground with little grooves going from the bodies to the town square where a moat had been built to catch the slowly trickling blood flow. In the center of the large moat in the town square sat a large mound with at least a hundred bodies piled onto it, their vital fluid making a pool hundreds of gallons deep in the moat. Flies surrounded the bodies, buzzing two and fro from one cold corpse to the other

The entire center of the town had been turned into a ritual site for the ruinous powers, like the ones they had found in the forests and other towns, except much bigger. The Scouts stood in stunned silence and stupification for what seemed like a few seconds but was actually several minutes.

The rotten smell of so many decaying bodies was almost unbearable, the enemy had obviously been through here at least a few days before.

Finally Mkoll spoke up. "Alright start poking around, try to find anything that will give us a clue as to what the feth went on here."

Mkoll motioned for the scouts to split up and each went a separate way. Mktayl went towards the center of town and began to go through the door of a ruined building when someone behind him called his name, it was Mkvenner.

"Be careful, mate." he said

Mktayl arched his eyebrow as if to wonder how he could have ever cautioned of such.

"What? You think I'm gonna go settin fire to everything like Brostin?"

Mkvenner shrugged "Just be careful."

Mktayl made a dismissive gesture with his hand "Quit worrying about me and go find something for us to kill."

Mkvenner left without another word, Mktayl watched him leave. He hadn't figured out Mkvenner yet. The man seemed most times like he intended to keep his distance from everyone in the unit. In certain instances, like that one just now, Mktayl saw something in his eyes that nobody else but the scouts he knew saw in him...

Care...

Emotion...

Mktayl knew Mkvenner better than anyone in the unit with the exception being Mkoll and maybe Bonin. And that wasnt saying much honestly. He'd heard the rumors about him, he'd heard that word tossed around reverently plenty of times off duty by whispering Ghosts...

Nalsheen

He knew why Mkvenner kept so distant, it was in the man's nature, Mktayl knew the rumors were true, though most Ghosts thought of it as just another regimental myth. Mkvenner hadn't told him, Mkoll hadn't told him either. He knew because he'd seen the way Mkvenner moved, talked, acted, Mktayl had seen it before only once, in another time and another place...

Mktayl turned and entered the building and Mkvenner went into another. Mktayl found himself in a cozy living room with a fireplace, the wood was cold, it hadn't been used in at least a few days. over the fire place was a mantle piece and on that were framed pictures of what looked to be a happy family. A farmer, a homely but attractive woman, and two beaming children, a boy and a girl both not even in their teens. Mktayl picked up the picture, sat down on a table and looked at it. It was things like these that reminded him that his home, his planet, though saved from horrible death, would never again be the same. It was things like these that filled him with a sense of loss. He remembered his own family...

His father, so proud and strong, his mother, so loving and compassionate, his brother, so fierce and determined, his sister, so delicate and headstrong...

his nephew...

He smiled, and tears ran down his cheeks from the memories of a happier time and a happier place...

Mktayl put the picture back on its dusty place, just as he was doing so, he heard the slight sound of a door opening slowly...

Someone was in the house with him, not only that...

but it was someone who wanted to be quiet, Mktayl had barely heard him.

Mktayl activated his mic twice, sending two short jolts of static to the team, he had made contact with something. Mktayl moved into the shadow of a wall crevice in a blind turn of the hallway between the back door and the living room. He slid his lasrifle into the sling on his shoulder and unsheathed his Tanith silver knife, thirty centimeters of Tanith pride through the heart or throat usually put an opponent down no matter what. Whoever or whatever it was, it was getting closer, nearing Mktayl's bolt hole. Mktayl could hear the man's footsteps even though they were muted severely.

Suddenly, he could see a long shadow coming across the path, slowly ever so slowly, the shadow pushed on, looking for him...

Almost, almost...Mktayl said to himself...wait for it.

Mktayl saw the end of a lasgun poke around the corner, held out in front of whoever was behind it.

In a blur Mktayl jumped out of cover and used the back of his left hand to push the gun muzzle up and way from him as it fired and filled the ceiling with holes, with his right leg, foot and hip, he masterfully pushed the surprised figure over and fell on top of him, straddling his opponent as he had done so many times before, both in combat and in practice. The lasgun fell out of his target's hands as he lay sprawled on the ground, dazed. In his right hand Mktayl held his straight silver, a poised coil ready to come down into his enemy's heart.

"For Feth's sake!" The figure cried.

That was strange, the enemy didn't usually use Tanith slang...

"Wait, dont! Get off you dolt, its me Doyl!"

"Doyl?" Mktayl said confused.

The figure pulled his cowled hood back to reveal a fair and pale Tanith face, "Yes, Feth it! Now get your big highland arse off me!"

Mktayl sheathed his knife and got up, he helped Doy to his feet as Mkoll and Bonin ran through the front door.

"Whats going on here? Report." Mkoll asked as if it hadn't been obvious.

"I was checking out this house sir." Mktayl started "I heard someone come through the back and I gave the contact signal over the mic, I wasn't able to make visual contact without being seen so I hid. I ambushed Doyl here who I thought was a hostile."

Mkoll nodded slightly, he turned to Doyl

"Where's the rest of your team?" He asked.

"Spread out on the other side of town, I was looking to meet up with you when Tayl here jumped me."

Mkoll nodded to Doyl

"You should have signaled us Doyl, that's how black crosses happen, stupid feths not doing their job right, you know better." The scout sergeant advised coldly and efficiently, when Mkoll was giving advice that was the only way it was given. "Tayl, good work." Mkoll finished flatly, to anyone else it would have sounded as if Mkoll was playing favorites but in fact he was just being frank, Doyl had erred and as a result Mktayl had thought him an enemy, the scouts knew this so they said nothing and followed their leader out of the house.

"We're making our way to the center of town to see exactly what happened" Bonin stated matter of factly.

"Looks like just another debrained slaughter if you ask me." Doyl stated bluntly.

Mkoll fixed him with a withering stare, the kind that could turn a man to stone. There was a strained pause.

"Regardless" Mkoll started "We will do our duty and make sure it is safe for the regiment to move up and take care of this." At this last phrase Mkoll gestured to the center of town that had been turned into an unholy ritual site.

"Hwlan and Ven are already searching the heart of this...monstrosity over, lets go join them and then we can get out of here."

Mktayl and Doyl nodded and together the four scouts made their way to the center of Hangasroc where the two scouts were indeed searching the bodies for anything that might give the Tanith forces an edge. They were joined by Caober, Leyr, Baen, and Mkeller, the team Doyl led in the counter sweep of the same area. Each scout greeted each other quietly and got to work looking through the mutilated bodies to find anything of value.

Mktayl hated desecrating these people any further than they already had. But he had a job to do, and he would do it, by the Emperor, until death claimed him. He passed Hwlan who was busy trying to move a couple bodies away to be examined.

"Find anything?" Mktayl inquired quietly.

Hwlan simply shook his head and didn't take his eyes off his work. Mktayl turned and continued his work. Mktayl went through the pockets of an archenemy soldier and had finished searching the clothing pockets when he found something sticking out of the cultist's webbing pouch, he reached for it.

It was a piece of paper, scribbled on it were patterns of lines and more eight pointed circles...

Numbers with foreign gibberish written out to the sides were displayed on the side of the patterns like a key of some sort...

Mktayl knew he had a map that the enemy must have missed and was about to call out to Mkoll when he heard the small popping crack from a distance...

Behind him he heard and saw Hwlan yelp and hit the ground and begin cursing, clutching his shoulder which bled profusely from a slug wound.

Mktayl dived to one side taking cover behind a trough in front of one of the buildings just in time for the second slug aimed for him to pass harmlessly through his camo cape. Mkoll waved to him from behind some cover at the other end of the street.

"Did you see where that came from?" he signaled.

Mktayl said that he hadn't and Mkoll began talking to Mkvenner beside him. Mktayl could see that all the other scouts had likewise taken cover. Hwlan rocked back and forth holding his shoulder and spewing curses left and right.

"Hold on Hwlan, just hold on, you hear? I'm gonna be right there." Mktayl said placatively, almost pleadingly, another shot rang out and kicked up dirt not a foot from where Hwlan was.

Mkoll signaled Mktayl again "Me and Ven see him, he's using the windows on the top floor of the building at the end of this street, when I give the signal run across the street toward Hwlan but keep going until you get to the other side so Ven can get a bead on him."

Mktayl hesitated, he really didn't like that plan, it meant that he could possibly not come back form this.

He had to put his trust in his sergeant and Mkvenner.

"Okay, tell Ven not to miss."

Mkoll nodded and smiled grimly "Can do." he signed, "Standby..."

Mktayl readied himself for the sprint of his life, he got into a sprinting crouch and waited for Mkoll's signal. Agonizing moments passed as he watched Mkvenner line up on the upper floor of the building on the end of the street, about a two hundred meter shot. If Mkvenner made this shot, Larkin would be damn proud, if he didn't, well...

Mktayl tried not to think about that.

Mkoll signaled him "Go!"

Mktayl blasted off into the street like an Olympic champion starting a one hundred meter sprint, in reality it was more like thirty meters but to Mktayl it might as well have been a kilometer away. He passed Hwlan who was now lying in a small pool of his own blood from his ruined shoulder, it was trickling slowly into the moat at the center of it all and Mktayl shuddered involuntarily. His cloak flew behind him and his hood fell away to reveal his face, he looked into the top floor window to see a shadow pointing the end of a long autorifle straight at him. It seemed to him to be trained right between his eyes. His sprint took him, finally, to the other side, time seemed to slow as he dove and slid feet first into cover as the wall corner of the building above him shattered into dust as the heavy slug bullet passed just where his head had been a millisecond ago.

At the same moment Mkvenner fired one bright blue lance into darkness of the window he thought the shot came from.

All was silent and the air itself seemed to hold its breath as the scouts waited.

Well only one way to find out...Thought Mktayl.

He stepped out into the street toward Hwlan who had fallen unconscious, when he wasnt killed the others stood up as well and made their way to Hwlan. Mktayl began to dress the wound and put a tourniquet on to stop the bleeding as someone stood behind him.

"Remember what you said about being careful Ven?"

Mkvenner's face contorted into a dull question. "Vaguely" he said seeming bored.

"Well that wasnt." Mktayl said mockingly harsh.

"Oh wasn't it?" Mkvenner came back.

"Yeah, just like you, daring, dangerous, risky, and in the end totally worth it."

Mkvenner smiled and chuckled grimly at the remark and shook Mktayl's proffered hand.

"He who dares, wins." Mkvenner said simply.

"Nice shooting, that one will make Larkin unhappy." Mktayl complemented, Mkvenner smiled again ever so slightly.

"Nice run, didn't know if you had made it at the end there, saw the burst out of the corner of my eye."

Mktayl nodded slightly, "Yeah, that's gotta be the second best run in the regiment." Mktayl said simply.

"Second best?" Mkvenner asked, interested.

"Yeah, right behind that time Bragg ran to the latrines when he learned the shoggy soup at the mess hall wasn't made from real shoggies."

Mkvenner laughed at this, which was impressive on Mktayl's part, Mkvenner never laughed at anything.

Mkoll came over from where the rest were reviving Hwlan and pointed to the two.

"You two come with me, we're checking the house and then we're getting back to the regiment."

Mkoll turned to go, Mkvenner and Mktayl followed silently. No affirmation was needed. When Mkoll gave you a command you did it, no questions.

The three scouts made their way down the street into the house where the sniper had been moments before. Mktayl put his ear to the door and gave the downhand motion for no sound. Mkoll put up three fingers and let each one drop in turn, at the last finger drop, Mktayl hammered in the door with his boot and it swung open. He advanced in scoping his lasrifle to his shoulder ready to fire, checking corners, and crevices. A few seconds after entry Mkoll gave the all clear and the team moved up the stairs into the upper third floor of the building.

There they found a lone archenemy cultist with a long barreled autorifle slumped into a corner with an ugly black chest wound. Mkoll checked him and they were all astonished to find the man still alive, he was mouthing something silently, a sly and blood soaked smile gracing his face, he looked up into Mktayl's eyes and said in a sandpaper dry voice...

"So sure of your victory, you have seen nothing. The blood tide comes...the door will open and the destroyer of worlds comes with it...this world will be drowned in blood and death."

The cultist slumped limp, a shadow of a chuckle coming from his gurgling throat, and died there in the corner of the room, the light fading from his eyes before he could be questioned or moved. Mktayl shuddered inwardly as the impact of the man's words sank in.

it all made sense now...

the ritual sites...

the blood sacrifices...

the destroyed towns...

the alien chaotic patterns of the enemy...

they were trying to summon something...

Unholy.

He sat down and looked at the floor.

"What do you think he meant by that?" he asked, his voice shaking a little.

"Nothing good, I'll tell you that much." Mkoll stated.

The events that unfolded as the siege of Tanith came to a close (especially after Imperial reinforcements arrived) is still somewhat of a mystery. Most information on the subject has been quarantined by the Inquisition, but it is obvious from astropathic records of the space around the planet during the siege that the warp boiled and possibly broke the surface of reality around Tanith, whether there were any aftereffects of this remains to be seen..

(Not a whole lot of action I know but its a set up for the rest of my fanfic (Each segment of which is A LOT longer than this one) so it ends up explaining the plot and setting a lot more than anything else...)

Asherian Command wrote:Can I post a Chapter Background written from a Narration point of view or no?
Because I have Angel Prince Gavreel story. But I don't know if that will work :(