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This is the big one! I've written a fair bit of 40k stuff before, but never attempted anything longer than a series of one-shots in the setting. With National Novel Writing Month upon us, though, and a good bit of free time, I've decided to have a shot at a full length novel that will be bigger in concept, scope, scale and word count than any 40k stuff I`ve written before.

Unlike my other stuff, I won't be posting any notes on this by default, although do feel free to ask any questions and make any comments, I'll do my best to answer them in as spoiler-free a way as possible. From this novel you can expect lots of action, but also something of a deeper look at some of the ideas that make up 40k as a setting. I guess I'll just get straight to it, and you can see what you think.



True Faith

Prologue

Somewhere, Nowhere, Everywhere, something stirs in the light of a black sun. Aeons of motionless currents and eddies, the hopes and dreams of a thousand ages, the beating hearts and dying breaths of millions, have brought this moment to be, and amid the sea of starlight and ice, something new is born.

Its name is of no import. It has none; it needs none, for it simply is, and always will be, and always has been. Names will be given to it and cast aside as generations upon generations seek to justify their darkest fears and brightest dreams. It is alone, and it is one of untold billions, for it is legion, and it is all.

What form could such a being take? Any. In the newly-formed ashes of a mindscape, ideas fall into place, changing as fast as they occur, and the roiling mass soon takes shape, but not one any eye can see. It is what it needs to be; an eye if it must see, a hand if it must shape, a maw if it must consume.

No sooner has the body emerged than the mind is again at play; it has shaped itself, and must now shape its destiny. Cast wide, a net over a field of stars, it sees a million worlds, and learns a billion truths, and knows every possibility. A delectable feast. So many paths it could take, watch, alter, devour. Each soul is a pinprick of light, and the galaxies shine before it, tempting, inviting.

Among all the brightest lights, there is a shadow, a single spiral that is dimmer than the rest. So many minds, but so many shut, their fears controlled, their dreams dust, their lifetimes already laid out, not by gods, but by their puppets. There will be no feast there, not yet.

But already this new being knows that the struggle will make the meal all the sweeter; A world here is worth any other galaxy. It looks closer, excluding all else until it sees only its chosen prey. A darkness pulses out from a single point, blinding, cloying, choking, and at its centre, some immense power. The pain is a new sensation, and one others of this being's ilk would consider ecstacy, but to this one, it is only a barrier to the truth of Knowing. Closer still.

Closer still, and a vision. A carrion lord atop a golden throne, in whose name a million billion lives are won or lost. In the temple of a king, a man who would be a god in death, and around him, lackeys who ensure his every thought and deed are made truth and creed. Such power would be a wholesome treat indeed, but he is not for taking; other, greater eyes have turned to the Golden One, and would have him for their own.

But there is still much to be taken from this, for here, for the first time, an understanding that not all is as it seems. It is obvious this pitiful wreck is held to Godood by his skulking minions, but to one such as this, he is merely a child a play. Truth is knowledge, knowledge is power, but this, this is something else...

A man who makes play he is a God, and a universe in his eyes fool enough to believe it. But if he is made God, then what manner of beast plays the Devil? Once more, the net is cast wide, and knowledge is sought.

Space is a cold void, but colder still are the husks of metal men, buried deep beneath mountains and seas, their lights dimmed and their soul empty, harvested or bargained for some greater purpose. They worship, too, but not true Gods, and they trap in chains those they profess to revere. Their gods are a weapon, nothing more.

Bright against the darkness are the oldest of races, souls so rich they could make a feast for the ages, but so dark, so hidden. These creatures have seen their old gods born and die, and lived beyond them. Faith for them is no shield, merely rational reason, and altogether unsatisfying. They are defended by knowledge; no promise could sway them from that.

The simplest of races burn hotter but not as bright, green-skinned barbarians for whom truth is a self-creating cycle. Their belief shapes the world, its effects fuelling further faiths in twin entities of their own creation, opposed but conjoined. They are too simple to appreciate truth and knowledge, content to wallow in their own self-created reality.

Other races flit by, but none of them can be the devil in this tale. The swarm the conquers all it touches cannot instil any fear beyond that of its own desire, and while its weight is large, it is hollow, merely a shadow in this warped space. The upstarts who look to the stars have no faith to corrupt, and therefore cannot be turned. The graveyards of a thousand extinct species purged in the names of the Golden One by his legions are testament to the power of faith in Him, and no force yet could shake that faith.

He is an objuration, a perversion. His Truth is lies, His faithful are deceived. The truth of knowledge is corrupted, and the corruption must be removed. Let other, greater ones covet his throne, this being merely seeks to cast him out into the wild howling night, and show truth to those who have so long been lied to. They deserve that much, and the thought of how much sweeter their souls will be once they are free from His oppression sends shivers through the immaterial body.

In the malestrom of the Warp, the Otherworld, the shadow of the Golden One is a giant, in amber clad upon a pale horse, and his name is Death. Faith is his shield, and terror his sword, and even the mightiest in this plane dare not face him. And yet, he must be destroyed.

One last time, the newborn entity, now epochs old, looks out among the stars, and this time, it knows what it seeks. Every mind, every living soul will undergo its intense scrutiny, and it will search until it has found what it must to destroy the Golden One.

A chink in the armour...



1: War Unending

"Luc?" The vox crackled to life, and the words were somehow too loud, and audible even over the overt din of battle. "Luc, are you in position?" Luc reached for the transmitter, and took shelter behind a hulking wreck of a battle tank before replying, barely making cover before the next wave of shots hammered home, shredding the gdirt where he had just stood.

"Aye, Captain. Second Squad is in position and holding, but not for much longer. Heavy fire from the heights, and we're taking casualties." As if to illustrate his point, a fusillade of rocket fire smashed into the ground to his left, and he pushed himself tighter against the metal hull at his back. He daren't count how many men the salvo claimed, but where half his squad had been sheltering a moment before, there now lay a pile of wet red meat and charred remains. Luc barely had time to gag before a thick black smoke obscured the charnel pit from view.

"You have your orders. Hold that ground, whatever the cost."

"Sir, I'm not sure we ca-"

"You have your orders. Command out."

"Well, feth." Luc muttered, and gripped his pistol a little tighter. The weapon was of little use, but at least the worn leather grip was comfortable, and there to remind him that both he and the weapon had pulled through worst. He risked a glance from behind the wreck, and his heart sunk.

What had once been a fortified position was now nothing more than a wasteland; in just a few hours, the horrifying firepower of the Xenos and their foul technology had laid waste to the defences, and now the pitted, open ground offered no cover and nowhere to hide. His eyes flicked up to the ridges along both sides of the ravine, and the high walls at its far end, and was reminded all too readily of the cell he had traded for this battlefield and the freedom it offered. He almost began to regret the decision. Almost...

Sparks of blue fire shimmered along the heights on all sides in a way that, in more peaceful times, might be considered beautiful, but when each was answered by a screaming voice, or the silencing of one, it was hard to appreciate. What Luc could appreciate, however, was just how bad this position was. Pinned down in the open, surrounded on three sides by an enemy that far outmatched his ragged band of men, and with no relief in sight, he was as good as dead. His eyes fell almost automatically to the pistol in his right hand; one pull of the trigger, and at least it would be over quickly.

But no. He had not come this far to give in, and the very least he could do was survive, like he always did. He hunkered even lower, pressed almost flat against the dirt now, and again scanned the area, hoping beyond hope he had missed something, anything, that might offer some safety.

From the smoke, two figures plunged without warning, one supporting the other, and in an instant they dashed to the tank where Luc hid. As soon as they reached cover, the carrier dropped his comrade to the ground, and Luc raced to ready a dressing, training kicking in before his brain could consider acting. Hands fumbled and yells became distant and seconds later the bandage was wrapped tight around wounded trooper's the shattered leg, already stained red and growing warm. Luc frowned, but he had done all he could. The immediate danger over, he looked up at the newcomer, scowling as he recognised.

"Lieutenant Tarn. Still in once piece, I see." Luc did nothing to hide the venom behind his words, and his nodded greeting was terse. He pointedly ignored the officer's extended hand.

"Corporal Bodewick. I trust you're not having second thoughts about joining up, are you? Got to be better than that cell they had you languishing in, at any rate." Tarn's hooked nose and thin-rimmed eyeglasses gave him a look that always chilled Luc, like he could see right through him. He fought it in the only way he knew how.

"At least some fether wasn't trying to kill me back there," he retorted, and for a moment Tarn looked confused, as if struggling to connect Luc's words with their respective meanings. "I'm not talking about the Xenos," he clarified.

"I see. Well, enough of that." Tarn examined his pocket chronometer. "Three hours until dark, and I think we can pull off another wave before then. Rally what's left of your men, corporal, and we'll overlook your insubordination this time. But don't try anything funny again."

"As if I would," he replied, and at the same moment, both he and Tarn glanced down at the wounded solider, whose murmurs had grown fainter as they had argued. The sudden silence from him could mean only one thing. Luc stared at the man's eyes, but only glassy reflections looked back.

"Get to it," Tarn ordered, not taking a moment for pity, and Luc fixed him with a glare that sent a thousand curses.

"Get fethed," he spat back, but a second later he was on his feet and sprinting to what was left of his men. He sent up a flare as he leapt into a crater, before crouching low and checking his own timepiece. Five minutes, he gave them, and then whoever had made it to him would be plunging once more into battle.

Seconds ticked by, punctuated by the eerie shrieks of missiles and the buzzing of the Xenos weapons, and in ones and twos the members of Luc's platoon ran, crawled or dragged themselves to his position. Thirteen in all made it there alive, and of those, two were in no condition to fight. He gathered the able close to him, and shouted over the cachophony.

"Tarn's trying for another assault before dark, with whatever we've got left, and you can bet your breeches we're in the front and centre," he began, and to the credit of his men, no faces fell.

"Just how we like it, sir!" Garloch chipped in, and a laugh went up, tense and fragile. It was better than nothing.

"Of course," Luc went on, "but it's still bloody suicide. I won't think any the less of you if you're not coming. It's a big place, this ravine, lots of nooks and crannies. Shouldn't be too hard to get lost, if you see what I mean."

"And we thank you, sir, for that, but if you don't mind see this through by your side." Luc didn't know the speaker by name, only by face, but made a note to get to know him better if they both made it through this. Loyalty like that at a time like this bound the men better than any orders or shared creed.

In the minutes that followed, Luc watched with a detachment he was all too familliar with as good men and bad men and men in between prepared to come face to face with whatever came after their impending deaths. Some curled in balls and sobbed. Some sat still as statues, their only movement lips in prayer. Some just fixed bayonets and tested their edge, for all the good a foot of metal would do them against such guns as the enemy possessed.

He grabbed a lasrifle of his own from a corpse too blackened to be recognised, and almost involuntarily, grabbed his tags as well, as if some part of him thought the promise to remember would be payment for taking the weapon. He holstered his pistol and fixed his own bayonet; he would die not as an officer but a soldier in the field. In the mud, a scrap of red cloth caught his eye.

He crawled to it, and hauled sharply until it came free. The flag, sans its pole, was almost intact, and without quite knowing why, he looped its tassles around the barrel of his rifle and held it aloft. All eyes turned to him and his makeshift standard as the wind of battle unfurled the banner, and, distant as he was, even Luc felt something stir inside him as the red and white flew high.

"All units, advance and assault, in the Emperor's name." Tarn's refined tones crackled in every vox, and all along the ragged ground, Guardsmen haulled themselves from the dirt like rising dead and surged forwards, chanting the regimental hymns and homeworld anthems, and Luc added his own voice to the chorus.

"Right, up and at 'em! Kill the fethers where they stand!"


***

Good start - look forward to more

2: Faith and Fury

"Two more, left side." Sister Ariadne swung her multi-melta along the cupola's rim and took aim, but by the time she had traversed the distance, there was nothing to fire upon. The Xenos, like all those before them, had slunk away into the shadows before the armoured might of the Sororitas' spearhead. Fear went before the column of Rhino hulls like a bow wave, and everywhere, the Tau ran.

"Negative, they've gone. Mistress Stephane, permission to engage at will."

"No, Sister Ariadne, have patience. Soon there will be nowhere for the creatures to run, and only then shall we smite their taint from the land."

Ariadne muttered to herself, inaudible over the din of the engines, and scanned the road ahead for targets. Stephane was right; the Xenos would soon have to stand and fight, and then her good work could begin.

Absent-mindedly, she traced the fleur-de-lis inlaid into the colossal weapon's housing, and noted how even with the dust that the convoy kicked up cloying the air, the metal still shone brightly and seemed to blaze in the sunlight, a forewarning of the fire in its heart trying to escape. She gave praise to its machine spirit and hoped her aim would ring true when it must.

Over the vox, she could hear the chatter of the Sisters in the rear of the transport, and was almost relieved to be the squad's gunner. The grumbling was faint, but it was clear they were far from comfortable, cramped in the back of the Immolator, relying only on clouded visual feeds and a sense of dread to know when the battle would be joined. Ariadne had no such impairment in the cupola, and the ghost of a smile passed over her lips as she spotted another half a dozen Tau warriors scramble down the crags to her left. She didn't bother trying to aim; they would be long gone by the time the gun was in position.

Minutes went by, seranaded by nothing other than the roar of the engines, until at last, from the cloying dust and smoke a blackness loomed. The road's end, and the battle in waiting.

"Squad Athena, enemy position sighted." Ariadne relayed, and instantly the lead tank slowed to a crawl, the others coming up behind it and also halting. Dust began to settle, no longer disturbed, and Ariadne caught her first glimpse of what they were about to face.

A single black spire rose from the mass of buildings, and from its tip sprouted the golden wings of the Aquila, gleaming in the sunlight, as if waiting to bring down holy fire on the defilers below. Closer, the outbuildings of the basillica had been mangled beyond recognition; The Tau cared nothing for the faith of Mankind, and thought little of tearing down their holy places, turning them to a fortress of war.

Whole buildings had been annihilated to clear fire lanes, and what was left of the intact structures had been fortified, not in the crude manner of the Greenskins but in a fashion that was as brutal as it was pragmatic. Her visor lit up the location of plasma mines buried deep, of forcefields spanning the narrow streets, and of gun emplacements erected with no thought to the sanctity of the place.

It almost brought a tear to one eye as Ariadne unconsciously thought of her youth; what little she could remember of Ophelia had been streets like this, buildings like this. What the Tau had done was more than defile one of His temples, they had taken a knife to the few memories she still held dear.

The vox crackled to life, and all around, the words of prayer suffused the air, rising up and blasted forth from the Proclamators mounted on the tanks' rooves. Ariadne added her own words to the prayers she knew so well, and it filled her with resolve as the force spoke as one body, exalting all that was holy in His name and His work.

"He is our shield in faith, and we are point of His sword and the mail about His fist.
He is our Lord and our Protector, and we bring His Light to all.
He is True and Just, and we would cast out those who violate his sanctity.
He is the final judgement, and we deliver Him as He delivers us."

"In His name, The EMPEROR!"

The last words were procalaimed with such force that a new cloud of dust rose, and Ariadne could only imagine the terror that must seep into the hearts of the enemy as they heard and saw the might arrayed before them. Secrecy was not the way to deliver Truth, and the faithless would tremble at the beautiful chorus that now faded out to deathly silence. The calm before the storm.

And the storm broke.

Engines surged to life, their machine spirits roaring prayers of their own, and the five white vehicles surged forward, the Immolator of Squad Athena leading the charge and the Rhinos of Squads Dominica, Helena, Hera and Persephone sallying forth behind her. Gunfire erupted from the ruined basillica in an explosion of light and noise and white heat, and Sister Ariadne prepared herself for her task ahead.

"Emperor shield me, and let my aim be true."

No sooner had the first wave of fire run empty than Ariadne brought the Multi-melta into position and cast forth a searing beam, scything through one of the alien powered suits at leapt to take off. The metal fell in a heap of slag, and before it had it the ground, Ariadne fired again. Again, Tau fell to the beam, this time their warriors were immolated and cleansed.

In seconds, the transports were drawing level with the outermost buildings, and great gouts of flame and gas sent the Tau running ever further back to defences that would not avail them. The top hatches of the four Rhinos flew open and the Sisters within added their own firepower to the inferno, the staccato beat of bolt shells marking kill after kill.

Ariadne kept firing, and not once did her aim falter; the Emperor must be smiling on her today, and she herself smiled as the Xenos were driven back. Ahead, a group of them rallied to a robed figure wielding a sword and staff, and here they stood their ground, held in check by his words or some other, more sinister means.

The figure was a mockery, too similar to a Priest of the Emperor to be anything but blasphemy, and Ariadne brought her weapon round to end his pitiful life. Pulse fire pinged from the Immolator's hull and gunshield, but it was not enough to deter her, and she resolved to turned him to ash. The gun flared, and a moment later, she saw again.

Somehow, the robed Tau was still standing tall, still chanting his sacrilige, and at his feet lay the glowing embers of the warrior who had lay down his life for his blasphemous leader. Even now, more Tau rallied around him, forming a shield and firing the whole time. Doubt crept into Ariadne's mind, and she voiced it.

"Mistress Stephane, the Tau are holding position before us. One of their number chants false truth, and the others rally to him. They will not fall back!" She fired again, but came no closer to wounding the robed Tau.

"I see him, Sister." The vox went quiet for an agonising moment, and then, at last, sparked back into life. "If they will not move, we shall remove them. Full ahead."

The Immolator surged forward, and Ariadne kept firing, and through the haze of heat and fire she thought she could see a grim realisation dawning on the face of the blasphemous creature. The shadow of the Immolator, cast by the fires of those it had already slain, rose up over the assembled Tau, and as it crested the rubble, the mass turned at once to run. Only the robed figure stood still, true to the last and fixed to the spot, as several tonnes of ceramite, plasteel and adamantium crashed down upon him.

Very well done, I especially like the description of the different races from the warp's perspective.

3: Into the Dark, Into the Light
Luc sprinted the last dozen yards of open ground, heedless of the gunfire raining down around him, and threw himself flat against the smooth black wall of the fortress-chapel. It was solid, indomitable, and though it housed the enemy that even now were trying to kill him, he felt somehow in touch with The Emperor's protection as he propped himself up on the stonework.

Across the grey field, hundreds upon hundreds of indistinct crumpled forms were strewn, some barely recognisable as the bodies of men and others all too vivid. Luc's mind raced, and he recalled with dreadful clarity how close he had come to joining them as he made the hellish mad dash across the killing floor. He had been one of thousands as he took the first step; now, he was among scarcely hundreds.

It was better than nothing, and as more and more men rallied to the flag still flying from his aloft rifle, Luc realised that all was not lost. The fire from the crags and heights was less now, for someone or something had driven the enemy from their vantage points. As the remainder of the men reformed their defensive positions, clinging to what cover they could, Luc began to feel some degree of control returning.

All thought of unit or rank was forgotten now, and in the huddling mass he made out the uniforms and insignia of men from all platoons and both regiments that had taken to the field, the deep blue fatigues and red sashes of Alderbelt's Dragoons striking amongst the pale yellow-grey overalls of the 116th Penal, the self-dubbed 'Alenian Irregulars'. Officers and file troops stood side by side, forming a thick ring around the black gates of the chapel tower and keeping up a constant fire upon the defenders above.

"Where are the demos?" Luc called to no one in particular, "Has anyone got any charges?" No one answered, and he muttered a curse before trying again. Before he could get the words out, a beam of the blue fire streaked by and fizzled against the rock barely inches from his left shoulder, and he dropped to a crouch. Garloch and a man he knew only as 'Thumbs' darted to him, and huddled close.

"Orders, sir?" Garloch inquired, and Luc shook his head weakly.

"We made it, man, we bloody made it, but it's no good if we can't get through the doors," he explained, voice halfway between relief and frustration, and a second later the latter won out. He yelled again. "Where are the charges? Does anyone have any fething charges?"

Again, no one came. Thumbs leaned in closer and held out a grendade.

"Well, that's no fething good, is it?" Luc glared impatiently at the man, waiting for some kind of apology, but none came. Thumbs waved the grenade again, then gestured towards the ring of men busying themself with holding position. "What the feth are you on about?" Luc demanded, and once more Thumbs gestured, as if a man possessed. He grasped Luc by the shoulder with his free hand and opened his mouth wide, to reveal the stump of a tongue that had long since been removed. Luc realised at last why he had never gotten to know the man.

"Ah, I see. All their grenades, at the door?" he asked, and Thumbs nodded. Luc considered it for a moment. "Well, they're not built for that, but what else have we got, eh?" He drew himself up to full height, set his vox transmitter to eleven, and issued the orders. At once, men turned to obey without question.

Those nearest the door quickly scarpered as the plan became apparent, and as soon as they were clear, every man not engaged in firing lobbed what explosives they had at the immense iron gates. Frag and Krak grenades and even spare lasun packs flew in a swarm at the structure, and the wall of sound and furious fire that burst from them nearly knocked Luc from his feet.

He wiped his eyes, the searing heat dying down enough to look closer, and sure enough, through the conflagaration a rough hole had been blasted in the metalwork. Spars and sheets of iron hung, bent and twisted, from the hinges, and through the portal, Luc could see only darkness. The fires were hot, almost too hot, but Luc knew every second he waited, the Xenos would be rallying behind the door, and the fight through the maze of corridors would be all the more deadly.

Rifle in hand, flag still draped from it though it was torn and charred, Luc steppted into the breach, and men followed behind before he could even give a command. Luc found himself noting how easily they obeyed, and had obeyed before, even the Dragoons that thought themselves so far above him. He wondered if Tarn was in the press of soldiers that trod behind him, and then realised it didn't matter.

Ever since he raised the makeshift banner, the mena round him had followed and obeyed his every command, sticking close in the dash across the wasteland and defaulting to him to lead them now. By the simple action, he had become a symbol, more than a man.

The thought chilled him. This place, with its eerily silent stone walls and leering gargoyles and cherubim, exuded a sense of dread, of defilement, of danger, and he instantly wanted nothing more than to run, as every man behind him surely did. But now he was their de-facto leader, their inspiration, and if he didn't lead them on, who would? For all their high-mindedness, no Dragoon would take the first steps on this path, and of what was left of the Irregulars, Luc could scacerly pick a leader. He wouldn't pick himself, either, but fate left him no choice.

The darkness seemed to press in ever closer as the Guardsmen moved through the ruined temple, and Luc could feel eyes in the dark, watching intently. The enemy, certainly, watched as the men walked further into their trap, but even more than that, he felt something ethereal, like every broken statue was judging him, weighing up his deeds and his days and all his darkest hours. No prayer could save him from their introspection, but still his thoughts went to the Emperor.

It was impossible to keep track of time in the blackness of the chapel, and Luc took to counting its passage simply in corridors marched down and levels climbed. At each intersection, the units fanned out, and by the time he had reached the fifth floor, only ten men stood at Luc's back, Garloch and Thumbs among them. Occasionally, he would hear bursts of gunfire and yells, human and alien, from above or below or off to the side, but all he could do was focus on what was ahead.

Every sound tested his nerve and sent shivers along his aching spine. The drip from a pipe was artillery-loud, the shink of light streaming in through a crack in the wall was a flare of gunfire. More than once, he fired blindly at an enemy that wasn't there, only the illumination of the lasfire showing there to be nothing but shadows in his sights.


Beads of sweat ran down his neck and arms despite the cold, and every sensation was at once dulled but sharp, so sharp in the shapeless, soundless catacombs. He knew that once, this chapel would have been flooded with the light of sconces and the warming chant of prayer, but now, all that was inverted, the silence and darkness testament to the barbarism and hateful otherness of the enemy.

As they rounded the eighth corner of the floor, Luc paused for a moment, taken aback by the sudden light. He stepped out onto some kind of internal balcony, and in the chamber below, illuminated as if in daylight, he saw something that made his blood run colder than the stone of the statues at his back. Xenos. Hundreds of them.

Luc held up a hand and ushered the others back, dropping to a crouch himself in an attempt to remain hidden. A white light suffused the chamber from a globe hung high above, and every shadow was dangerously sharp. A wrong move could give him away in an instant, and then, there was nothing he could do but die.

The Xenos, however, seemed utterly oblivious to the Guardsmen that must have been converging on them from all sides, and went about their hurried activity without a stray glance cast up at the gantry on which Luc and his men sheltered. Certain he was undetected, he opened the vox.

"All units, the Xenos are gathered in a large chamber, third or fourth level," he whispered. "Converge, but do not engage. Repeat, do not engage, we're outnumbered and outgunned. Wait for my orders. Out." No reply came, and all he could do was hope the message was recieved. Intrigued now, he risked a peek over the bulwark, and studied the Xenos' movements intently.

It was all so familliar, he realised, and a scene he had seen a dozen times in his years of service. Supplies were being piled in crates and loaders, and inventories checked. Teams of engineers crawled over the hulls of transports and battle tanks, readying them for action. Troops sat idly by, awaiting their next orders and counting the seconds until something, anything, broke the agony of waiting.

That the Xenos could be so familliar troubled him; they were not human, they were an abberation, and they could not be let live. But here, they were at peace, and for a second he found himself wondering what thoughts must be going through the primitive minds of the alien warriors. Did they dream of a home so far away? A family? A better life?

He shook himself from the reverie; of course they didn't. They were mindless, they were simple and they were the enemy. They were not of the Emperor, and they must be destroyed. Why was he even considering them as anything other than beasts? He muttered a repentant prayer, hoping that even defiled, the chapel would carry it to divine ears.

Movement above, and his eyes flicked up. On the next floor's gantry, more Guardsmen had appeared, and as his eyes focused, he found himself staring at Tarn's hook-nosed glare. So he had survived after all. A pity. As Luc expected, his supercilious voice crackled from the vox.

"Corporal, why haven't you engaged? The enemy are unaware, and you have a vantage point. You are not wounded, are you?" Luc rolled his eyes.

"No. No, sir."

"Then why the blazes haven't you-" He clamped a hand over the reciever before the whispered shout could carry to the wary ears below, and met Tarn's eyes, drawing his free hand across his neck. The message was simple: Shut the feth up.

Of course, it had no effect.

"Engage at once, grenades first. We'll rout the blighters before they even know we're here." Luc glared up at Tarn, but it was no good, the Lieutenant was already sliding a fresh clip into his autorifle, readying himself for more bloodshed and not giving a gak who got in the way. Luc absent-mindedly wondered how many men the officer's vain pride had gotten killed today.


At that moment, three things happened almost in an instant, and the world flipped on its head.

A single Xenos, shorter than the rest and maybe younger, burst into the chamber, yelling in its foreign tounge and waving its arms madly. It pointed over its shoulder at the far wall, and ushered its fellows away from the masonry as if it were volatile.

In surprise at the sudden turn of events, Tarn's hand slackened, and the battery he was loading fell, as if through treacle, to the stone floor below, whereupon it burst into fragments and gave a crack that split the silence like a gunshot. As one, the eyes of the xenos force turned to stare up at the guardsmen above them, and alien hands reached for alien weapons. All but the newcomer forgot their panic and prepared to take aim.

The far wall the young xenos had gestured so madly at exploded inward, sending chunks of rubble flying through the alien ranks and causing a sudden updraft of searing, promethium-scented air through the gantries. Through the new breach came a blocky form, the blackened and dented hull of a Rhino-pattern tank, and resplendant upon it was the fluer-de-lis of the Adepta Sororitas.

Luc smiled to himself. It seemed sometimes prayers were answered

You better explain what the hell an Ethereal was doing messing around chanting like some sort of shaman for...

They're not priests, they are political leadership, philosopher kings if you've read your Plato. The Tau don't even believe in the supernatural, their ideology of the Greater Good pertains to material reality and they're atheists. Which of course, is the point, 40k being a universe with many gods.

To clarify, the 'chanting' was only what the Sister saw, as was the likening to a priest. Because the concept of atheism is alien to her, she assumes he must be doing something religiousy, and hates him all the more for it. To her, a guy in robes yelling in the middle of a battle is a priest, therefore a Xenos doing the same is a perversion of that concept.

In truth, he was likely doing a combination of extolling the Greater Good and yelling orders. It's all a matter of perspective, so I hope that clears it up.

@Morden and Nobody: Cheers!

4: Holy Work

To the administratum adepts and Inqusitorial paper-pushers, they were the Adepta Sororitas, the Sisters of Battle. To the Eccelesiarchy, they were the Defenders of the Faith, and the Handmaidens of the Emperor. To the Guardsmen, they were the Nuns with Guns, or the Bolter Bitches.

But names and epithets mattered not, for to the Xenos, they were Death.

Two more dented and scorched hulls burst through the wall into the great chamber, one ploughing straight through a Xenos transport, and from above, Lucien Tarn watched in awe and admiration as their cargo disgorged at once, instantly forming neat ranks and taking up firing positions. The Sororitas were as disciplined in the heat and press of battle as they were on the parade ground, and not for the first time, he wished his own troops were even half as well-drilled, precise and deadly.

For untold moments he watched the Sisters go about their lethal work, pushing his spectacles back up his nose each time they came close to slipping down into the combat below. He could not bear to miss a moment.

Behind him, something moved, but he made no attempt to turn, transfixed as he was. It wasn't until he saw the rifle barrel in the very corner of his vision that he snapped from the spell he had been under. One of the men, a Penal and a rough-looking one at that, stood ready, preparing to take aim at the enemy from above. Tarn grabbed his rifle by the tip and shoved it back sharply.

"What do you think you're doing?" he demanded of the shaken guardsman, who could barely stammer a response, shocked as he was.

"I was... I was preparing to lend fire supp... I was going to shoot some of those alien fethers." Tarn raised an eyebrow and the man physically recoiled. "I was going to shoot some of those alien fethers, Sir." Having mumbled his way through the correction, he slumped.

"And what, exaclty, did you expect to achieve by that?" Tarn adopted his best tone of command, lest any other nearby guardsmen get any ideas. The Dragoons he could trust, but the Penals, they were an unknown quantity, and there was only one language they understood. Power. "Aside, of course, from fething up your aim and killing one of the Emperor's Finest?"

"Uh, Sir, isn't that what they normally call the Astartes, not the Bolter Bit-"

The speaker barely had time to move before Tarn's fist connected with his jaw, and he stumbled back into the shadow of the doorway. Tarn reached out and dragged him back to the parapet, forcing his head over the edge. "See that down there, private?" He too looked down, to where the Sisters were still carving a bloody swathe through the Xenos, and seemed almost to glow in the act of killing, purifying. "See that? That, there, is proper soldiering. They haven't broken rank, like you bastards did. They know what must be done, and they fething do it. So compared to you lot, they're the finest fething troops in the galaxy. Understand?"

"Aye, sir," the Guardsman whimpered, and slunk away as soon as he had been released. Tarn rounded on the remaining guardsmen. "Anyone else have something to add?" They shook their heads, and he turned back to face the battle.

The three transports the Xenos had been loading were now smoking and shattered wrecks, and in the few hiding places that remained, the aliens cowered before the might of the Sororitas. So often, their attempts at concealment were futile, as gouts of burning promethium or salvo upon salvo of explosive bolt shells scoured them from their refuge, and they were cut down as they ran.

The only sound from below was that of the guns, roaring constantly in exultant prayer, and the screams of the Xenos. The Sisters themselves were all but silent under their full-faced helms, any communication confined to their own vox-net. There was a clarity in that silence, and an understanding. Their sanctified weapons would speak for them, and bring death to any they turned their fatal words upon.

And then, just as suddenly as it had begun, it was over. The last few shells rang out, the explosion as they met their targets and the high-pitched ringing as the casings hit the stone floor equally audible, the final note in the symphony of combat. For a moment, there was nothing but silence, and then the cheering started, guardsmen emerging from the shadows and lining the gantries by the dozen, all at once relieved and apprehensive, not entirely sure what was to happen next. The enemy had been driven back, and then slain to a man, and as the realisation dawned that the hours of bloodshed were at least temporarily at an end set in, the wave of relief that rippled through the ranks was almost tangible.

All at once, the grim resolve that had seen the guardsmen through alive seemed to shatter like glass, and the men of all ranks descended into a disordered mass of bodies and embraces and cheers and cries. Tarn felt the tension break, let it wash over him like the tide, but did not turn his gaze from the floor below. The whoops and yells of victory seemed to him the sounds of children at play, hardly fitting for officers and men of the Imperial Guard.

Another sound, deeper, louder and altogether more real, rose up from below and echoed from the vaulted ceiling high above, suffusing the chamber. Slowly, it overshadowed the unruly chorus of the guardsmen, and their celebrations fell silent. Now every eye, not just Tarn's, was on the Sororitas on the chamber floor.

The hymns of the Sisters alternated between High Gothic and the more natural tounge that came to the guardsmen, so Tarn could only make out snippets of the wording, but the intent was clear. There was something pure and clean in the keening voices, their only desire and intent to venerate the Emperor in whose name they fought and killed and died. He did not understand why they had to pray so soon after combat, and doubted he ever would, but it did not detract from the captivating beauty of the spectacle.

After a while, all but one voice fell silent, and the sharp and clear words of one Sister was borne upwards by the resonating echoes of the rest. The sheer rawness of the hymn, almost a lament, was not lost on Tarn, and he felt a lump rise in his throat as she sang. The voice rose and fell like ripples on a still pond, bright as starlight and clear and fragile as glass, more vivid and real than anything he could recall.

Without warning, and in a single motion, every Sister but the sank to one knee, their armour ringing almost musically as they dropped. A moment later, and again as one, they proffered their weapons to the sky, holding them at arms length and perfectly still. Now, to the beating of a great drum, three robed men swinging incence-burning cencers entered from the battlefield outside. As the Sisters began to sing again, they joined the chorus, their tone distinct and somehow harsher, but entwined with the same singular intent.

The priests made their way to the front of the chamber, and what was left of the altar, and as each passed a kneeling Sister, he anointer her weapon with the sign of the aquila. Whether they were giving thanks or offering service, Tarn did not know or dare to wonder. At length, the priests reached the altar, set down their burners upon its scorched and cracked lectern, and bowed deeply, at which point the assembled Sisters rose with a final mechanical note, and stood, statue still, with their gaze towards the heavens.

Silence, and nothing more, and as the hymn ended, Tarn felt a single tear fall from the corner of his eye, and down, down onto the distant ground below, where it would be lost among the dead and the living, the Heretic and the Holy.

5: Real Life

The tramp of hard boots over hard ground. The groans of battle-weary men, rolling across the column in an endless cycling refrain. The coughs, cries, winces and curses of the too wounded to march, but too tough to die. All of these sounds were somehow distant to Luc as the survivors made their way back across the fields that had, merely hours before, been a seething pit of fire and death and wanton bloodshed.

No effort had been made to recover the dead of the Penal battalion, and their monochrome forms littered the landscape like fallen leaves without trees, this final rest the only burial they would get. Some were scattered, blown to the four winds by the tender touch of missiles and shells. Some were burned, simply blackend corpses consumed by fires now as cold as their victims. Some, at least, were buried, thrown high and sent deep under mounds of earth that hid them from the sight of all but their own ghosts.


Some did not even have that mercy, and everywhere Luc would see reminders of where men had been, but not where they were. A hand reached up from the mud, locked in the freeze of death, groping for sunlight from somewhere far below. He mumbled a prayer that the soul, at least, would see light once more, though the body was left to rot.

Further on, and a face smiled back from under a ruffled cloth cap, trapped in a rictus grin unnervingly close to a smile, yet so far from one. He could be a pictograph, Luc decided, but only a bust shot. Below the chest, all that remained was a wet red mess. He looked away, but everywhere, there were unmistakable signs of the hell he had endured and so many had not. No facet of this landscape had been left unscarred by the battle, and he could scarcely recall what it had been like when he took to the field that morning. It was like stepping into another world.

There was no colour to the grey-brown expanse, for Lord Alderbelt had been sure to arrange for the body of each and every Dragoon to be collected from the battlefield at once, and borne back to the base for full funerals. The arrogance of it appalled Luc, but it was beyond his power to stop or change, and all he could do was ensure that, in their own right, the fallen men of the 116th Penal Battalion would be remembered as well.

Try as he might not to notice, he, too had been changed. Though he ached in every joint, his movement was somehow faster, sharper, as if even now a second's delay meant death. His eyes still scanned the ridgelines, every crack and shadow giving him pause, sending impulses down his spine to be ready to move should the blue light spark again. More than once, he brought his hands up, ready to fire, as the fading sunlight reflected off streams or rocks or fallen debris. After the first instance of this, he had slung his rifle across his back, lest he accidentally fire on instinct.

Coming so close to death, though, Luc found himself feel more and more alive. There was a clarity that came with the sheer thrill of survival that made everything sharper, brighter, more real. He had first noticed it when the Sisters had taken to prayer in the great chamber, and the sound seemed to echo not just from the walls and ceiling but from inside himself, like his very core was resonating.

A single blade of grass among the trampled, barren field caught his eye, startlingly green and somehow still rooted in place, a testament to what could endure. As Luc marched on, he realised it was not alone, and the further he went, the more he noticed. Blade after blade of greenery, now so precious, had somehow survived, and each one brought his spirits a little higher. Better to think on what was saved, than dwell on that which was lost. Life, simple, tiny, insignificant life, meant more than the weight and sorrow of death.

And with that, he started paying more attention to the men who marched with him back to their lines. He listened to them recounting the stories of narrow scrapes and near misses, and whispered a prayer for the soul of each dead man mentioned. He even laughed at some of their jokes, though the timing still sat ill with him, and accepted their praise for leading the final assault, though he tried to explain that he had no choice.

"It's no good," Garloch told him, "They've seen you lead them now, and they'll expect to see it again before this job's up. If Tarn wasn't such a bastard, and Alderbelt wasn't a weak-willed cronie, you'd be up for promotion in no time."

Luc shook his head. "I don't need promoting. I don't want it." He let Garloch fall into step beside him, and lowered his voice. "But you're right. They'll expect more now than I can deliver. I mean, what do they want me to do, carry this into every battle?" He tugged at the flag that had been draped over his shoulders before he had even left the chapel. "Seems like a good way to get killed if you ask me."

"You mean more than being in this fething unit already?" Garloch's tone rose to anger without warning, and Luc halted. "Sorry. It's just something that's bugged me ever since Their Most Holy Reverences burst in and finished our job for us."

"How so?"

"Did you know they were coming?" Luc shook his head again, and Garloch gripped him roughly by the shoulder, meeting his eyes and lowering his voice to a seething whisper. "No, and neither did any of us. We went in there thinking it was all on us, we ran across this fething field into a killing trap because we thought we were the only ones that could do the job. And all the time, we weren't."

Luc was silent for a moment, unsure how to respond. Garloch was questioning everything he had been told, everything he had understood, but beneath it all, he was right. The Penal troops hadn't been told the Sororitas were mounting another assault. They hadn't been given that information because they didn't need to know. He needed to be certain that Garloch was saying what he thought he was.

"You're saying we were lied to? You're suggesting the brass don't trust us?"

A flurry of movement, and for the first time, Luc noticed Thumbs, the mute, had stepped up beside Garloch. He was madly waving his left arm, and knowing he could not speak, Luc tried to trace the shapes it made, what meaning he was trying to convey. Then, something else, and he noticed Thumbs' right hand had jabbed into his shoulder, entirely unseen.

"He gets it," Garloch nodded. Luc was puzzled for a moment, and then it fell into place all too obvious.

"A distraction. You're saying we were a distraction."

Garloch and Thumbs both nodded, and before he could say any more, vanished back into the column of men, leaving Luc along with reeling thoughts. Part of him wondered if they had been there at all, or simply a subconcious manifestation brought on by the heat and the fatigue, playing on his fears.

A distraction. Fodder for the Xenos guns while the Sororitas made their assault. Surely not, surely the Guard that so readily lay down their lives had a greater part to play than that in the grand scheme of the commanders. They could have taken the chapel on their own. They so nearly did, and Luc couldn't help but be more than a little proud of that.

A fething distraction.

The word burned; it was a brand, a classification, a simple, inanimate, emotionless word. It was cold, and it was brutal, but it got the job done. It was a footnote on a battle plan that cared nothing for life. What if Garloch was right? And what could he do if he were?

Any further thought was cut off mid stream as the lights of the encampment came into view. All Luc's worries faded to the back of his mind to whisper in dark corners, replaced by thoughts of hot food and warm beds and a chance to finally rest.


6: Survivor

Dark. Everything was dark, a blacker darkness than that of night, and colder too, the stone he lay on sapping all the heat from him. The air around him was still, stiller than he had ever known it to be, as if even the wind held its breath. For untold hours, he lay flat and motionless in the still, dark, cold shadows, and he waited.

What for, he did not quite know. One need burned in the back of his mind, the need to get away from this place, but it was too soon, and the signals his brain sent not reach his limbs, and there was nothing he could do but remain still and be patient. As time wore on, he found he could see hues to the darkness, faint shapes that betrayed objects. Far away, a light flared into life, buring fire surrounded by a thick cloud of incense. Others joined it, and what looked to be a wall was soon ablaze with torches and braziers, filling the room with a yellow haze and grey shadows.

Warmth, too, came with the fire, and worked its way back into unmoving limbs; he felt as if life were slowly seeping back into him, fed by the fires, maybe the same fires that so recently had done nothing but destroy. He twisted his face into a smile at that irony, though the movement hurt.

And with the feeling came memory, his mind also awakened with new focus. He recalled his comrades in arms, torn apart by explosions and shrapnel and flying chunks of masonry. He recalled their screams as they died, and how they twitched on the floor as the life left them, spasms wracking their bloodied forms.

He remembered staring into alien eyes, so full of fury and hatred that he dare not look away. He remembered the arc of liquid flame that had leapt from the weapon, or maybe just from those glaring eyes, and how it had struck him even as he raised an arm to shield himself.

An arm. His arm.

With agony in every movement, he slowly turned his head to see, and when he did, fought back a tide of vomit. The arm that had saved him from the deadly flames was no charred as black as the rock it lay on, and he knew that if he were to touch it, skin and fabric and melted metal would come away from the flesh in a thin dust. It looked so fragile, so weak, but he saw again the dreadful conflagaration and knew it had saved him. The limb had perished, but against all odds, the body had survived. A sacrifice made for the greater good.

But there was no time for pity, though, and he had to get away. Every second he delayed was a second that he could be seen, slain, or worse, captured, and he had no wish to be at the hateful mercy of the enemy. He breathed deeply, sucking in all the air he could, and prepared to move.

One fraction of a motion at a time, he began the slow crawl towards the nearest darker shadow of an exit. First, his good arm, reaching out and groping at the stone for purchase, hauling himself along. Then, both legs, pushing off against something soft; he daren't look round and see what, but he had a good idea. Again, the good arm, and another minute span traversed.

At last, the time came to move his burned arm, for he could go no further with it dragging at his side. Had he had more time, the thought crosssed his mind that he would sever it; the limb was dead weight, and would only slow him down. But there was not long enough, and he was not strong enough, for that. He closed his eyes, focused, and put all his will into urging the limb into life.

For a terrifying moment, nothing. No movement, no feeling, no pain. And then, all three at once, searing but elating and the arm snaked forward. As he slid it along the rough ground and grabbed at the stone floor, he could feel the charred layer of skin and cloth slough away, like shed hide of some reptillian beast. Liquid, some concoction of blood and half-melted flesh, seeped from the joints of his hands as he gripped at the rubble, warming but repulsive, and so very painful, but he put it aside. There was no room for doubt, and none for revulsion.

It was slow going, crossing the cold stone and keeping to the shadows, and laying deathly still whenever foreign voices came near, and he did not know how much time had passed before he reached the shadowed alcove of the passageway. This chamber was like another world, a timeless, ageless pit where death and darkness were all that remained. Again, the thought of escape set his mind afire, for if he were to die, it would not be here, among the mausoleum of his brothers and sisters. For their sake and his own, he would escape.

Certain he was unseen, he hauled himself to his feet as quietly as possible, and winced as the unfamilliar weight fell on his knees and hips. Instinctively, he reached out an arm to steady himself, and too late, realised the pain it would cause him. The black hand hit black stone, and fire surged through every nerve. He shoved his free hand between his teeth to stifle the cry, and noticed with some small part of his mind that one was missing, knocked out in the fighting.

Voices, cold and sharp, suddenly came from the chamber, and he flattened himself against the wall, pressed flat even as the ornate architecture jabbed into the small of his back. He could not understand their foriegn words, but there was unmistakable malice in their tone, and a moment later, an all-too-familliar roaring that conjoured images of a sheet of whooshing fire unbidden to his mind. He knew he should not look, that he must not, but without knowing why, he did.

He was appaled, but not surprised, at the sight that greeted him. As he expected the sound was a flame-weapon, and it was now being turned on the bodies of the dead, turning them to nothing more than piles of ash. Not content with killing them to a man, the barbarians now erased every indicator of their vanquished foe from the battlefield, not even pausing to honour the valour of the dead. They had no respect for what had gone before, none at all.

There was no more to see, and he leaned back into the corridor, eyes scanning the gloom even as the gouts of fire lit it up with stark shadows. He was unobserved, and while he was loath to leave the dead to burn, there was nothing to be done. Again, he decided, his escape would be their memorial, and with that, darted off into the dark as fast as his aching limbs would allow.

The corridors were labyrinthine, twisted, and by keeping only to those as-yet unlit, he had no idea if he was drawing any closer to the exit. Nonetheless, he dragged himself along with a steely resolve, for now, freedom was no longer a possibility, it was an imperative, and it was a duty.

As his legs grew tired and his thoughts turned only to rest, the idea of halting seemed all the more tempting, but he could not and would not allow himself to fall. The same sheer will that had empowered him to inch his way from the chamber filled with dead drove him now, and step after step, he pressed on.

Twice, he had to sink low in the shadows as the armoured, faceless forms still reeking with the scent of bloodshed passed by, but each time, he remained unseen, and dashed away as soon as the coast was clear in the wake of the figures, retracing their steps in the hope it might lead him away.

At long last, he began to see chinks of light in the thick walls and ceilings, almost unnoticable but to him unmistakable, the telltale sign that he was so very close to daylight and freedom. Spurred on by this, he quickened his pace, and a few turns later came to a wide window, high and arched, from which daylight streamed in in wonderful, copius floods. He gulped in the clean air that came with it, checked furtively that he was still unseen, and stepped into the light.

The drop was maybe three times his height, but the ground below looked soft, churned by the guns. He was confident he would survive it, not least because he must. In the distance, a grey line of men snaked away towards their ugly and black encampment, departing victorious. He spat after them, a token gesture of hatred.

Movement to the left, a whiring and humming, and he turned, staring back into the gloom. Something emerged. Not a warrior, but a floating skull, some hideous relic of conquest and defilement, and no threat. He was untouchable now, and nothing would stop his escape so close to freedom.

Alarms blared. Sirens wailed.

Armoured footsteps tramped down the corridors, far too close but not close enough.

The clean outside air gusted in and out again through the window, inviting, beckoning.

Shas'la O'tana hauled himself up to the parapet, gave one last glare into the darkness, and jumped.

I really like chapter 6. It's good to see Tau written in a serious fashion, there's just not enough about them.

 Mr Nobody wrote:
I really like chapter 6. It's good to see Tau written in a serious fashion, there's just not enough about them.

Glad you liked it, and there's a lot more where that came from. I have a very interesting arc planned out for Shas'La O'tana...

More on the way tomorrow, and cheers to anyone who's stopped by to read this so far!

On a less interesting note, I hit 10k words at the end of Chapter 6, and got another long chapter done this evening, so I'm well on target for the 50k words by the end of the month target. At this point, though, I'm more focused on telling a good story than meeting a self-imposed word count..

Really enjoying this - thanks

7: To The Emperor Commended
All that was left of the Tau was embers, their light and warmth slowly fading as the night grew colder, the last signs of their trespass carried away on the mountain wind and washed clean by the cleansing rain. The battlefield where the armoured onslaught of the Sororitas had ploughed through their ranks was already still, not a single movement among the vista of ruined temples and shattered walls. Even the carrion that circled above had flown on, presumably down onto the plateau where the dead of the Imperial Guard still lay in unmourned droves.

The walls of the great black chamber marked so many boundaries, Ariadne thought as she surveyed the scene, and what was only a few yards away may as well have been continents apart. Inside, servitors, magos and priests set about the work of rennovating the Temple with all haste, light flooding the great chamber and constant motion casting flickering shadows across the walls. Here, in the cold of the night, there was only her and the ashes of the dead, the panorama so motionless it could be an illumination, an illustration in the history of His work performed. She wondered what her place in that great tale would be, where on that page she could see her own face staring back.

As herself, a mere footnote. One more name on the list of the victorious. But as a Sister of Battle, a part of something so much greater than herself, she was as much a legend as any who had gone before her. The Living Saints of ages past to the Novitiates just leaving Ophelia, all were simply a part of the combined power of the Sororitas, a force so mighty and so faithful it could never be challenged.

That, she realised, was why the Tau had been so easily routed. To the Sisters, every inch of this ground and every drop of blood shed to retake it was sanctified, holy and pure. To purify this place was not simply a duty, it was an offering to His glory, a sacred act of faith. To the barbarian Tau, it was simply a position like any other. It commanded high elevation and good fields of vision and fire and everything a tactician could want, but it still meant nothing to them, the faithless.

Faithless. They were faithless. "Faithless." The word felt strange on her toungue as she whispered it to the wind, like even voicing the word was somehow forbidden. It was something solid and real, tangible and sour. "Faithless," she said again, and this time, it came more naturally. This time, there was a meaning to it.

"Faithless." It meant the lack of faith, but it meant more than that. It meant every Sin that could be committed, it meant every forbidden thing was permitted, it meant that the Xenos believed they could never be held accountable for the crimes they committed, their defilements. It meant an escape from judgement and justice.

It meant hatred. The faithless were not something to fear, that much she had learned, for those without faith were easy to displace. But they were something to hate, to despise, to revile with every breath. Their very existance was a blight upon the Emperor's realms. For perhaps the first time, Ariadne was content that the rest of her life's work would be to undo their taint.

Someone approached from behind, a Sister from the sound the armoured boots over cobblestones. She turned, recognised the newcomer, and saluted. "Mistress Stephane."

"Sister Ariadne," the Sister Superior replied pleasantly. She looked around. "What drives you to stand among the dead? It is cold here at night, and within we have warmth and shelter. Will you not withdraw?"

"Of course, Mistress. I was simply contemplating the nature of our task here. Meditation of a sort, if you will." Ariadne thought she detected the hint of a frown pass over Stephane's visage, but it vanished in a split second, maybe nothing more than a trick of the flickering lights.

"And what conclusions did you reach, Sister?"

"That the Xenos are faithless, and must be destroyed. They are a curse and a taint upon His Imperium," she replied slowly, uncertain if she was about to put a foot wrong, and unknowingly commit some offense. Something about Stephane's pious curtness always put her on edge.

"And have you not always been taught such? Why the sudden appreciation of our Holy Work? Did you have doubts?"

"Of course not, Mistress. I serve the Emperor with my life, and if it be His will, my death. It's just that everything seems somehow clearer now. I understand that I cannot understand the Faithless, and that therefore I must hate them all the more. It is as I have been taught every day of my life, but here, now, having done the deed, I feel purer. More true to myself and true to His Holy Power."

Stephane's face cracked into a smile at last. She clapped Ariadne on the shoulder. "Ah, I see. You get used to it. Fight this crusade for as long as I have, and you'll face all manner of foe; those who worship dead gods, or false ones, or no gods at all, which is worst of all, but you will always remember your first. The day you realise that we do what we do, not because was can or we should, but beacuse we must. Because without us and our work, this realm would fall to chaos and disorder in an instant. It is good that you are sure of yourself now, for you will need surity in the days and years to come.

"It is your lot in life to walk this path to your grave, for there is no end to it, and there will be days when your faith is tested. You will do battle with myriad foes and you must triumph over all of them. You will see thing no other can or should, and you will overcome them. You will witness the impossible, and you will prove that no matter the abberation, faith conquers all. You are ready for that now."

Ariadne felt herself swell with pride and just a little embarrassment at Stephane's words, and wondered who had given her this speech, and on which of the Emperor's worlds. It was as if she were being handed a torch, passed down an heirloom, and honoured with a comradeship only the fire of battle could forge.

"Thank you, Mistress. You have cleared my mind somewhat," Ariadne said quietly, and inclined her head in deference. "I assure you my faith is true."

"I do not doubt it. Now, come, our Sisters are gathering to commend the fallen. As our newest companion, I would have you read the honours." Stephane turned on her heels and marched swiftly back to the Great Chamber, deviating only to avoid the craters and detritus of the battlefield. Ariadne followed some while later, not entirely sure how to respond, either to the wisdom her Superior had imparted or the honour she had been given.

As she had been taught, she simply forced the feelings down below the facade of calm, and strode back across the battlefield herself, towards the light and warmth of the hall. As she stepped inside, immediately heated and half-blinded by the light, she was startled at the change the chamber had undergone in just a few hours.

Every last scrap of evidence that the place had been defiled by combat was removed, not a single bone or round or scrap of metal was left, all burned to ashes and cast out of the Holy Places. The golden aquila, once more taking pride of place above the altar, now shone in the torchlight, the fires dancing across the metal surface and sending patches of light rippling across the floor and walls. The altar itself had been cleansed entirely, and the white marble stood strikingly above the obsidian black floor of the chamber, drawing the eye to the holiest point of the room, evoking a sense of purity and safety that Ariadne found reassuring.

Most striking of all, though, were the four jet sarcophagi set to one side of the raised dais. Each was draped in two shrouds, one showing the warm red and deep blue of the Order, the other the squad livery of each fallen Sister. Though covered, the coffins were open, and Ariadne knew that if she drew closer, she could look one last time on the faces of the comrades that gave their lives.

It was tempting to, and she felt she should pay some last respect to them, but she had not known them in life as anything more than fellow warriors of the Emperor, and almost felt it would be an isult to their memories to seek in their death what she had not done in their lives. More than that, though, she did not want to see those faces swimming before her eyes as she led their commendation.

Slowly, the hall began to fill with Sororitas, and any not of the Order filed out, for this ceremony was not for them. Banners and canvases were hung from the open wall to keep out the chill and uninvited eyes, and fires were stoked in each of the ten grates, their roaring flames dramatically illuminating the statues above them; the firelight made the Emperor and his nine sons, the Primarchs who had fought in his name, seem alive and present as the glints and flashes played over their copper and brass forms.

Without being told, Ariadne knew that it was time, and a moment later, a great horn sounded, confirming the same. At once, the Sisters formed the same neat ranks they had after the battle, each in the same spot as before, and knowing what was coming now, Ariadne found herself looking not to where they stood but where they did not, the four gaps in the otherwise-pristine arrangement grim reminders of the fallen. She stopped searching the room as Stephane took to the pulpit, Alicia and Ellyria behind her bearing banner and torch. Stephane stepped forward, and as one, the Sororitas saluted.

"At ease." The hands fell as neatly as they had risen. "Sisters, today we gather in triumph, in victory, but also in mourning, for in carrying the light of the Emperor to those who would remain in shadows, we have lost four of our number. Four valiant warriors who gave their all in His name, and who, on every day henceforth, we shall honour in our hearts and souls." Even without amplifiers, Stephane's voice easily filled the room, clear and loud, and Ariadne felt at once nervous and honoured, knowing that this would indeed be a tough lead to follow. She silently sent a prayer to the heavens for strength. "I call upon our newest comrade, Sister Ariadne of my own squad, to lead us in prayer."

The ranks parted before her as she made her way from black stone to white, and Stephane respectfully stepped back as Ariadne took to the pulpit. The assmebled Sisters before her all focused intently on her, and she could not help but feel a little judged as she opened her mouth to speak.

"In His name, our comrades gave their lives, that we might bring His light to the faithless. They are, as we are, Sororitas, and the comradeship we share ensures that their good work shall go on, in our every word and deed. We shall remember them, we shall avenge them, we shall honour them." She fell silent, not certain where to take the speech next, and to her relief, the assembled Sororitas chanted back without prompt.

"We shall honour them." The sound echoed inside her and outside, and from somewhere within, more words started to flow. She wondered if this was what the priests felt when they made contact with the Emperor himself.

"Today, we learned that not only would the invaders defile His holy temples, but they would shed our blood, the blood of His warriors, on their ground. They think themselves free from judgement, that when we slay them their deeds will not be weighed nor their fates decided, as they are godless." A tear welled to the corner of her eye, entirely unbidden, as the hatred she had known she felt for the Xenos came to the fore for the first time.

The sheer arrogance to assume they were beyond the reach of the Emperor almight was appalling, sickening, and the thought that these animals could take the lives of her sisters sent shiver of rage down her spine.

Ariadne stopped speaking, though the speech went on. It was not words she proclaimed, but her deepest rages and innermost hatred given life. It was a lament for every second of the lives her fallen sisters could not live. It was a promise, made manifest in words, that they would be utterly avenged, in their name and the Emperor's. Finally, vehemence spent, she halted, fell silent, and made the sign of the Aquila over her chest. The Sisters below did the same.

There was but one more thing left to say.

"In life, through His wisdom, the Emperor commended them to us. In death, in our sorrow, we commend them to Him."

Sisters bearing torches now marched from the ranks, and each took a place at the foot of a sarcophagous. All other lights and fires were put out or dimmed by unseen, unseeing attendands, until only the fallen remained lit.

"For their duty, His mercy." Ariadne finished. Solemly, and in perfect unison, the torch-bearers lowered their flames to the shrouds and set them alight, before stepping back, heads bowed low, to let the purifying flame do its work. Ariadne was glad for the the dark, for perhaps no one would see the tears she cried, unchecked and unabashed, as those she had prayed for were consumed in fire.

Great work really well done

8: A Game of Regicide

At last, it was over, the thirteen-gun salute sounded and the fifty eight coffins fed into the makeshift crematorium, in truth little more than a collection of flamers rigged to a single trigger. Just one more little inconvenience of the continued unsupported deployment of the Dragoons. Three months they had been here now, long enough to watch the scorching summer fade to a winter that was only slightly less warm in daylight, but icy cold at night.

It was too long, and Tarn knew it. The Dragoons were a mobile regiment; they got in, got the job done, and got out again. But through some maze of beaurocracy, here they were, barracked in structures that by now were almost permanent fixtures, only a mile or two from the reeking outer reaches of the Penal encampment. They were all but entrenched, for Throne's sake!

Entrenched. It was wrong. Tarn didn't do entrenched. He didn't dig up great clods of mud and fling them onto makeshift barricades, he didn't scurry along soaked duckboards only to miss his footing and plunge into rancid liquid mud. He didn't hold lines, he broke them. This kind of warfare was for faceless Kriegers or fur-wrapped Valhallans or the Penal scum he somehow ended up fighting alongside.

Troublemakers, the lot of them. Murderers, thieves, some even their comrades didn't look twice at for fear of being somehow complicit in their acts. A rabble of nutjobs and psycopaths that could give a small greenskin tribe a run for their money when it came to brutality, stupidity and sheer insanity.

Twice, now, he'd lodged a complaint with Lord Alderbelt personally in writing, and twice, the response had been the same. They were 'needed' here. Not that there was any explanation of who or what it was that needed them so badly, mind. Tarn sometimes wondered if Alderbelt knew himself, or if he was just doing what he was told. Either way, Tarn decided he had seen too many of his Dragoons killed in this wretched campaign, and needed some answers.

And so it was that after the funerals of the fallen men, through which he had only remained focused by counting the cliches in the send-off speeches, he strode through the neat rows of reinforced barrack blocks to the quarters of Lord Alderbelt himself. As he marched, snippets of the ceremony came back to him, and he rolled his eyes again.

"These men were the best of us," the preacher had intoned, and had Tarn barely kept his laugh suppressed. Evidently they weren't the best, or they'd be standing here, and some other poor bastard would be in the boxes. "They died with honour." No, they died running headlong across a field into enemy fire while their supposed allies the Penals hid and cowered. "They did their duty."

That he couldn't argue with, but the fact remained that it was a duty they were never supposed to have to do. The regiment were not trained for this kind of warfare, and with 'friends' like the Penals, it was a miracle they had lasted this long. Something had to be done.

The two men standing guard at Alderbelt's door steeped forward neatly as Tarn approached, and crossed their swords over the entrance, barring his way. It was a well-drilled motion, but Tarn still frowned; ever since he had witnessed the spectacle of the assembled Sororitas after battle, he had begun to notice tiny imperfections in the practices of his own troops. One blade had arrived at its position a moment after the first, and it was not good enough. He made a mental note to request Alderbelt give these men another five hours drill, preferably next time the icy rain was coming down. That ought to teach them sharpness.

"Tarn, to see Alderbelt," he said mechanically, and without a word, the swords parted. The guard on the left moved to open the door, but Tarn intercepted him, grabbing the handle itself. Image was important here, and he would look the better for opening the door himself. The guard looked startled, but stepped back, somewhat downtrodden. Tarn knew it was nothing to what he would be feeling in the last minutes of his extra drill, and smiled knowingly at the thought.

He swung the double doors wide, allowing them to almost clatter against the shelves on ornaments on each side before deftly catching them, and made a show of checking the porcelain for signs of damage before he turned to the commander. Tarn could not stand the decorative rubbish himself, but the commander would look favourably upon him for his care, and every little helped. At length, he turned.

"Nothing broken, Milord." He snapped a salute and gave a smile he hoped wasn't too hollow, and approached the desk at which Lord Alderbelt sat. The servitor behind the chair paused for a moment, and the Lord looked up, with a startling resemblance to a startled fish, mouth hanging open and eyes blinking confusedly. "Tarn, sir." He resisted the urge to sigh at the fact the commander still did not recognise one of his most senior and distinguished officers.

Lord Alderbelt was, in Tarn's eyes, perhaps the most unfortunate accident to receive a hereditatry title the galaxy had ever seen. Scacely five feet tall, with a stomach bulging under his uniform like an overstuffed cushion beneath an Ogryn and a face as pale as curdled milk, he scarecly looked the leader or warrior, and in this case, it was perfectly safe to judge the book by its cover. Alderbelt, by all accounts, had all the tactical acumen of a household pet, and was only marginally better at following instructions. But he had his uses, and Tarn getting what he wanted was one of them.

"Ah, yes," Alderbelt not so much said as mumbled, and as he drew his chair closer to the desk and proffered one to Tarn, there was a look behind his eyes of a man not entirely sure what he was doing or why, but that was doing it anyway. "The chap from, err, what'sit, Third Squad. The one with the badges that always look a bit too shiny! What can I do for you today?"

Tarn smiled. This was too easy. "Oh, nothing much. I just wanted a chat. You know how dull the ranks can be."

"Oh, quite, quite, frightyfully dull." With more effort than was right, Alderbelt turned to the servitor and fixed him with a superior stare. "You, tea, now, for this good gentleman and myself." He clapped his hands at the servitor, who shuffled away, and turned back to Tarn, giving him a knowing look. "Sorry about that. Of course, I'm used to better, but we make do with what we have, don't we? Regicide while we wait?"

"Why not, sir?" Tarn said obligingly, and reached across for the round board and set of finely detailed playing pieces. It would be a matter of a few moves to crush Alderbelt's feeble and predictable tactics, but while it was no harder than taking sweets from a baby, it would be immensely more satisfying. Twice, before the game even began, Tarn at to correct the positions of the pieces, and by the time he was ready to make the first move, the servitor returned with a whirring of motors. While Alderbelt launched into a tirade about the performance simply not being good enough, Tarn pushed a pawn forward and let the game begin.

They traded several moves in silence, Tarn remaining half a dozen steps ahead of the incompetent commander, and by the time Alderbelt set down the teacup and returned his attention to the board, four of his pieces were stacked in a neat pile, the way to his King, represented by a model of the Throne that looked to be solid gold, was wide open. He made his move, which was utterly ineffective, and Tarn moved to finish the game in one fell swoop, but paused in mid-movement. He would let it play out a while longer, make Alderbelt think he had a chance for once. He shifted an inconsequential piece on the left, and looked up.

"Ah, cracking move!" Alderbelt exclaimed, and Tarn could see he genuinely thought he had a clue what was going on. "So, what was it you wanted?" He seemed confused yet again, and Tarn found himself drumming impatiently on the table. There was only so much scope to find the buffoonery amusing, and he was reaching its limits.

"Just to discuss the day's hard battle, to appraise our tactics. Maybe together we can even crack this little puzzle as to why we're here and what we're doing." He made the first move of an ending.

"Ah, that. Well, I'm sure we'd all like to know a little more about that, but what can you do, eh? What can you do?" He shook his head gruffly, and slammed his hand down on the table. Pieces jolted on the board, and Tarn quickly steadied them before the game could be disrupted. Alderbelt seemed barely to notice, and simply made another move, apparently without any thought at all.

"I don't know, sir. What can you do?" Tarn brought his Priest across the width of the board, placing it firmly among Alderbelt's pieces yet entirely safe. The look of alarm that crossed Alderbelt's face was hilarious, but Tarn remained stern, only mocking him inwardly.

"Well, I've tried reasoning with them, but you just can't get through to them sometimes." Tarn clenched his fist under the table. So close to the answers now, he could feel it, but for all his idiocy, Alderbelt was being far too vague. Tarn did not credit him enough to assume it was deliberate. Nonetheless, he kept his focus, making another ultimately pointless move, but one that threatened several of his opponent's pieces. If he could just apply enough pressure, Alderbelt was sure to let something slip.

"Stubborn, are they?"

"Oh, yes indeed, that's the word for it. No reasoning with them, you know." A vein pulsed on Alderbelt's temple, and a look of pained concentration etched itself into his face, as if the game was still in the balance. It was hard not to pity him.

"Yes, you just said that."

"Oh, so I did. Well, they just drive me so mad sometimes, I forget myself. It's not healty, this kind of stress, you know. Not healty at all."

Enough was enough. Tarn slowly, deliberately, made his final move across the board, placing a piece squarely before the golden king. "Regicide," he declared, and Alderbelt made a noise somewhere between an indignant snort and a pathetic sob as he toppled the king. He was outplayed, outwitted, and entirely under Tarn's thumb. It was only a matter of moments now.

"Well played, sir, well played indeed. But, if I may say so, I am not quite on form. Lot on my plate and all that. Like I say, those bloody Sororitas demanding we just sit here and wait." There it was. The rest of the words didn't matter, Tarn had what he came for. The Sororitas were what was keeping them here. He pushed back the chair and drew himself to his full height, proffering his hand to the commander, still in mid flow.

"Afraid I have to dash, sir. So I'll just take your wager and be off this that's all right."

"Wager?" Alderbelt looked as puzzled as he had expected, and Tarn smiled, gesturing to the board now dominated by his silver pieces and almost bare of gold.

"The twenty cigars you bet on the match. I'll take them now, if you've got them?"

"Ah, yes, of course. Blast me for forgetting, eh?" Alderbelt dissappeared behind the desk, fumbled with the latches on his cabient, and then bobbed back up holding the winnings he had never promised. Tarn took them, saluted, and made for the door, the cigars, and the commander, in the palm of his hand.

9: Across The Barren Plains

It rained, and the rain turned the ground underfoot to mud, and the mud clung to his legs, as if urging him to stay put, but O'tana pressed on regardless, sometimes needing the extra strength of his one good arm to haul himself from its cloying grip. It was slow going, but as the moons reached their highest and the stars their brightest, he could no longer see that terrible black spire on the horizon that marked the graves of so many Tau.

His burned arm, the left, hung across his chest, bound in a makeshift sling, little more than a torn rag found on the battlefield and mostly unsullied. It was not much, but it kept the pain at bay somewhat. Every so often, he would look at the blackened limb, and every time wondered why, for the sight was repulsive. But as curious as it was, the strange impulse to keep looking did reassure him somewhat. The injuries were getting no worse, and there was no sign of infection that he could see.

On worlds he had had longer to study, retracing his steps to the outpost would be easy, but these stars offered no guidance. This sky, with its blood-red moon and alien starscape, was as foreign as any, and there was nothing to be gleaned from the starlight that night. As if to spite him, the clouds soon parted, laying the stars in their strange constellations out before him in a shining expanse, a map he could not read.

He could, at least, admire their beauty, for though they seemed almost unnatural, unfamilliar, the stars shone brighter here, none of the thick layers of fumes that covered them in a pall that he had so often seen. He could stare up at them, alone in the wilderness, and they could stare back, and he could dream, at least, of fleeing among them from this dreadful place.

For no matter its natural allure, the wonders of this world would be forever tainted by the memories of bloodshed and death, wanton and cruel. He understood, or at least had been told, that this world was sacred to the barbarian humans, somehow a site of reverence for their corpse-god so far away. They had taken its natural perfection, its earthly beauty, and they had polluted it with ugly black towers, and tainted it with the blood of helpless prisoners shown no mercy. No place such as this should ever have been a battleground, but here, it had been made one.

He recalled the carrion field he had jumped to to escape the tower, and once again found a bizzare dichotomy form in his mind. The humans had fought so brutally and so fervently to maintain their fragile grip on the ruins of their sacred city, but paid their own dead no more respect than the enemy, who he still saw burning each time weariness forced his eyes shut. They were left to the birds and beasts to devour, ensuring their taint would forever be a part of this place now.

In the last day, he had seen more of the humans than he had ever imagined he would, and he had walked away from the encounter no less enlightened. They fought for this world, yet did so little to defend its precious grace. They died to protect it, and did not honour the dead. And when they had finished their fell deeds and their deadly devices were done, they simply stopped.

Since he had broken free, and set out across the dead fields, he had seen neither hide nor hair of the humans. None had tried to pursue him, despite the vehement hatred they had exacted upon his brothers and sisters, and even more startlingly, they had made no move to continue their assault. Such fury and such speed, and then, nothing. He wondered for the first time if the humans actually thought of strategy, or if they were, in their own way, as short-sighted and dim as the greenskin, living only from fight to fight and blind to all but the most basic concepts of battle.

At last, a time came when he could go on no longer. The tugging of the soft ground had taken its toll, and the chill air seemed to sap the life from him, leaving him drained and frozen in stark contrast to the heat of the day. He checked the horizon; there was no dawn creeping over the grey hills.

It was not hard to find fuel, the scorching heat having dried any wood or plant matter not still growing, and moments later, O'tana had a small fire lit. From his satchel, he pulled a small ration pack, and set it beside the flames to warm before searching the immediate area for leaves and lichen, anything to hold in the warmth. He piled his findings in a hollow, covered them with his unfolded travelling cloak, and returned to the fire.

Staring at its blazing heart, he thought back to the moment flames just like these had leapt to his own arm, made into an indiscriminate weapon by the human warriors and consuming all it touched. His own people, too, used such weapons, but they were somehow more refined, more focused, and more delicate in what they touched. To his people, fire was a tool first, and a weapon only when it had to be; to the humans, it seemed this was reversed. They would unthinkingly unleash great gouts of liquid fire, not caring who or what its destroying tendrils touched, and so often marring that which was clean.

So many times, he had seen the battlefield where the humans had been routed scorched indiscriminately, their dead and their possessions put to the torch simply to spite a foe that had no use for them. He had heard tell, from veterans of older, larger wars, that they had raised whole cities, not for defence, but as punishement from their own. He laugh despite himself; it seemed that whatever the humans did, they placed yet more obstacles between themselves and their goals.

Was it any wonder so many flocked to the Gue'vesa, the humans who had joined the Tau for the Greater Good, when their own masters treated them as little more than cattle? Was it a surprise that they lost ground, when every time they reached an objective they would waste time on rituals and pointless ceremonies while the enemy recovered. Their incompetence was almost comedic, but for the truth O'tana knew only too well.

For all their folly, the humans did battle with such hatred that none could stand before them. They would make any sacrifice, not in the name of their brothers, but for their dead master whom they dogmatically served. It was backwards, it was primitive, it was wrong at such a fundamental level, but somehow, it worked. Their empire spanned a galaxy, and millennea, despite all their such obvious faults.

As the stars wheeled slowly above, and the fire's fuel started to burn out, O'tana put these musings aside, and crawled under the meagre layer of insulation, almost immediately finding sleep as his eyes snapped shut.

The rest waas a tortured one, full of dreams that were recollections of scenes he had no desire to relive, and they were amplified. It was not the dead that he saw gathered and burned, but the living, still sceaming, still crying, all their pleas unnoticed by the dour human incinerators. He saw his whole arm sloughing away in blackened tatters, leaving a bloody and useless stump. He saw himself standing stock still, as if from far away, as he was fired on by lines of humans, each impact bringing pain, but none the mercy of death.

When the searing sun awoke him, he was glad, for the dreams had grown steadily worse, and even as the heat of day rose, he set off at once, eager for the physical exertion to distract him more his mental fragility. He could not put a name to the feeling for the humans that had coalesced since his escape, for it was neither fear nor hatred, nor pity or mockery, but some combination of all of those and more. They were aneathma, and yet, barring the quirks of evolution, they were so similar. Humans could walk like Tau, and talk like Tau, albeit with a thick accent, but they were so determined not to be like Tau, not to embrace the freedoms from dogma and the enlightenment of belief in the real, the physical, the Greater Good.

After a while, O'tana consciously fought to keep his thought from straying near the humans; they were too convoluted, too confusing, and too wrong for the continued pondering on them to do his already-tired mind any good. Instead, he put his mind to looking for a way back from this seemingly endless expanse.

To the east, hills rose, grey hills with no greenery, and he knew that maybe, in those hills, he might come across an outpost or at least a detachment of Pathfinders, but to turn towards them would be to almost double back on himself, wasting precious effort and only going closer to the place he had just escaped. North, then, it had to be. That way, he knew he would eventually find Tau, or they would find him, and at the very least, keeping his back to the memories of the black spire would do him good.

He trudged on, paying little heed to the sun as it rose, fastening a strip of cloth around his head to keep off the worst of its heat. Water he rationed carefully, and replenished where he could, usually pools of water that had frozen and melted from last night's rain. Food was scarce, and there was little opportunity to hunt, but he had rations for a least a day's march.

It was easy to lose track of time and distance in the silent stillness, and what little noise he heard, the occasional birdcall or rustling of leaves, was startlingly loud between the silences. Several times, he talked to himself despite the irrationality of it, planning missions in his head or playing over old conversations. He laughed to no one in particular, just to clear the air that grew hot and clammy around him.

As the sun began to set for the second time on his journey, O'tana began to worry, and doubt started gnawing away at his confidence that he would make it. The determination that had driven him thus far, that he simply would survive, started to crumble. What if he ran out of food? Water? What if there were more wild beasts than he had counted on, predators among them? What if he got lost, or delerious, and wandered this wasteland forever, never seeing another living creature?

The silence changed as night began to fall, somehow droning rather than shouting, and yes, there it was, unmistakable, the low hum of an engine. Life. Other living things, when he had spent what seemed like so long among the dead. The thought of it gave him new strength, and he went on almost at a jog, good arm held above his head and waving furiously. He called out to the darkness, and after a moment's dreadful quiet, the engine hum replied, coming closer and growing louder and louder.

As it reached its crechendo, and the sound seemed to assault his hearing, O'tana suddenly collapsed, his legs buckling under him. They had carried him this far, far enough, and their work was done. The engine stopped, so close by, and he heard voices, but could not place them or understand their words. Every last drop of effort spent, he let himself sink into blackness. The last thing he was aware of was being hauled up, and the engine started again.

10: Restless

Morning. Probably. Luc sat up, blinking away the last vestiges of sleep, and rubbed his eyes to clear them. The thick black canvas of the tent made it impossible to tell if the sun had risen, but at least it felt like a morning. Regardless, he could hardly sleep now. Second later, he had pulled on his uniform, straightened it as best he could, and groped for the exit.

The air was cold still as he stepped out, but the sunrise was coming. Already, there was a white glow on the far horizon, the first fingers of dawn clawing their way across the sky. Extricated from the tent, Luc looked around, not entirely sure where he was going or why. For the first time in days, there were no predetermined orders for the battalion. This was as close to relief as they got, although Luc guessed this was more the result of an administrative error than any good will towards the men.

Up on the hill, the Dragoon were already drilling, the yelled orders of their officers echoing down to where they were barely louder than whispers. Luc had never gotten a straight answer as to what all that marching up and down and saluting actually did to help them win a battle, but apparently, it did. Somehow.

And won they had, with the help of the Penal who seemed to have been largely forgotten, and the Bolter Bitches who had vanished into the black walls of the fortress, made a great show of chucking everyone else out, and not been heard from since. Luc wondered what could be taking them so long, giving the routed enemy ample time to recover its forces and draw their own plans.

The official reports, disseminated among both Guard regiments as a matter of course, listed the Adepta Sororitas as the force around which the victory had revolved, supported as they were by 'the brave soldiers of the Imperial Guard'. Not even the regiments' names, just 'the Imperial Guard'. Were they really that faceless?

Of course not, and Luc knew it. He knew that, no matter what the reports said, it was the men he had seen band together and assault the fortress with no thought for their own safety, that had carried the day. The Nuns with Guns may have put the final nail in the enemy's coffin, but it had been the men of the Guard, and the 116th Penal at that, that had built the damn thing.

Garloch's words came back to him, haunting and clear. Distraction. Was that all they had been? Perhaps. But if they were, both the Penals and the Dragoons held that title, and he didn't see Tarn letting that go. Alderbelt may have been in charge of the detachment, but everyone knew, although no one knew quite how, that Tarn was the real power here. And he wouldn't take kindly to his own regiment, his high and mighty Dragoons, being used as a distraction.

Then again, Luc thought, he was probably too obsessed with extolling the seemingly endless virtues of his regiment's victory to have bothered to read the reports, or notice the lack of respect shown to the guardsmen as a whole in the wake of their sacrifice.

He shook his head; it was too early and he was too tired for this kind of thinking. He set off through the camp, past rows and rows of the thick black tents, past the meagre selection of vehicles that consisted of just two Chimeras and a Russ with some improbably big gun, and at last, reached the mess tent, where the cooks were just preparing breakfast.

If it could be called that. The slop ladled onto his plate, variably green, white and red, and just warm enough to be consisdered cooked, hardly passed for a meal, but as ever he would take what he could get. Whatever he could get. The cook seemed so taken aback as he praised the food and asked for more that he failed to notice Luc pocket an extra knife and fork.

In the early days of the regiment, when it became apparent that gathering a collection of hive-gangers, cutthroats and theives in one place might not be the best idea, the presence of blades outside of the armoury had been swiftly banned. But if you knew the right people, they were easy to get hold of, and Luc had made it his business to be that person. Through a few select others, he ferried weapons, information and messages across the camp, and for it enjoyed more respect than most from his comrades in arms. Respect that might mean the difference between life and death in battle.

Luc had only been at the long table a few minutes, picking through the whatever-it-was mixture of so-called food, when Garloch and Thumbs appeared behind him. For once, Garloch looked deadly serious, and Luc noted the twitch at the corner of his eye that he knew meant bad news was coming.

"Out with it," he preempted as Garloch took a seat. Thumbs slouched down on the other side, and began shovelling his own breakfast down, his injury giving rise to a strange rotation of his jaw and repeated tipping of the head as he ate. Absently, Luc wondered what it was that he had done to lose his tounge.

"Sharp as ever, sir," Garloch began, and set down his fork. "Can't hide nothing from you."

"No, you can't, so out with it." Luc replied, already growing slightly irritated. The relative calm of the early dawn was falling apart as more and more men emerged from their tents, and before long, the shouting, cursing and general ill manner that dominated the camp during the daylight hours would start up in earnest.

"Well, sir, it's just that... oh, it's nothing." Luc raised an eyebrow, and Garloch seemed almost to shrink despite his huge build. "Well, not nothing, exactly, but not much. Well, not much, just that..."

"For Throne's sake get it over with, man, or you're on latrine duty for a week." Garloch turned to Thumbs, who shrugged and rolled his eyes.

"Blimey, can't help some folks, can you? Anyway, sir, me and the lads, well, we was chatting in the mess last night, you know, all informal, like, and some of the guys started going on about what you did, you know, with the flag and all. And we got to thinking, and don't ask me how, that if that arse Alderbelt wasn't going to promote you, we'd do it ourselves, like. If you was agreeable, and all, that is, sir."

Breath spent, Garloch fell first to mumbling, then silence, and Luc tried to make some sense of his ramblings. Had he not told Garloch just the day before that he didn't want promotion? He didn't need that responsibility, and didn't need these men under his command any more than he needed the orders of some toff to get him to fight. But maybe, though, it was already too late.

As the breakfast queue formed, it was somehow more ordered, less unruly, and as he looked closer, he could see that so many pairs of eyes kept coming back to where he was sitting, as if waiting to be judged, or reprimanded, or maybe just curious as to what he would do next. Even the gaze of the Wardens seemed drawn to him, and not with the threatening stare he was so used to.

It appeared, then, that he had no choice. If these men wanted him to lead them, then maybe he could make some good of that after all. Perhaps, he reasoned, he could even stop the likes of Tarn and Alderbelt using his men, his comrades, his friends, as fodder for the guns.

"Oh, feth it," he exclaimed, climbing to his feet and stepping up onto the table. At once, the whole place fell still, silent, and every eye now fixed its gaze on him. "but if we're doing this, we're doing it properly. Fetch the priest, and swear me in."

Garloch dashed off, and the expectant crowd moved closer, any thought of food quite forgotten, and not least because the chefs themselves had joined the throng. In the heat of battle, Luc realised, this loyalty and expectation was a blessing, a motivation to keep on fighting, holding the flag high. But here, it was something different.

He was being elevated, praised, hero-worshipped, by the most some of the most ruthless and least decent men he knew, men that Tarn and his ilk wouldn't even stop to spit on. He might well know them as more than that, not as villains but as the desperate seeking a redemptive second chance, but it was still unnerving. Fail them, and he might be in more danger here than on the battlefield.

As Enoch, the priest and the closest the battalion had to a commanding officer, pushed his way through the sea of faces, clutching some holy scroll or other and rubbing the sleep from his eyes, Luc wondered if this was the right thing to do, but by then, it was too late. Enoch stepped up beside him, and proffered the scroll. Luc placed a hand on it, and recited the words Enoch whispered to him, not having to raise his voice to be heard, such was the silence that gripped the men

"I, who have been chosen to lead, shall lead with courage. I, who have been chosen to command, will command with surity. I, who have been chosen to judge, shall judge with justness. I, who have been chosen, in the Emperor's name to-"

The silence broke. To his left, Thumbs started making obscene gestures, and slamming his fists on the table. A ripple of dissatisfaction passed through the crowd, and now it was Luc's turn to be silent.

"Feth the Emperor!" one man called out, and others joined him in the chorus. Enoch covered his ears to shield himself from the profanity, and more than a few eyes turned north, to the great black chapel-fortress whose spire still haunted the horizon. Several of the more pious men made the sign of the aquila, that they should be spared punishement for the blasphemy. At last, the noise faded. One man spoke, the same one as before. "Will all due respect, and apologies to present company, of course, we're asking you to lead us, not some holy man. You've done more for us this past day than Him on the Throne and his Bolter Bitches ever have, sir. You lead us because we trust you, and 'cause you're a good fighter, not because some arse in robes- sorry, Enoch, no offense meant- ordained it. You happy with that?"

The man's tone left it clear that there was only one acceptable answer.

"Fine. Fine." Luc stepped down from the plinth, face burning and heart racing, and silently sending a hundred prayers up to apologise for the heresy. He knew they meant no harm by it, but it still rankled. Two men ran up and draped a flag, the same one he had borne to victory, over his shoulders, and he waved them away, marvelling at how quickly they scurried away. "Right, you want orders from your new leader? Here's one; Feth off!"

A cheer of approval went up, and the guardsmen went back to whatever they were doing before. In moments, the scene was just as it had been minutes ago, but Luc could not see it in the same now. Where he once just saw faces, he now saw soldiers, responsibilites, men whose lives may well be in his hands. He turned to find Enoch before the priest could vanish into the crowds, and pulled him aside by his robes.

"I am sorry, Father, for their blashpemy. My faith is as strong as ever it was, though I can't speak for that lot." He paused for a moment. "Bloody typical that my first act as their leader is to have to apologise for them." Enoch looked up at him with something akin to pity, and laughed hoarsely.

"No need, my boy, no need. Faith is faith, after all. Whether it's the Emperor they fight for, or some fool in a flag, they're still doing His work, aren't they? You'll see them right, and He'll see you right, and we might just make it through this."

Loving the story! Thanks for doing this.

Great story

Cheers to all who have commented. As I'm having a bit of a delay getting through the next chapter, I thought I'd just throw up some thoughts on what's come so far for this evening's update.

First off, I am very happy with the pace this is going at. A week since I started writing the prologue, I'm on 19,147 words, so averaging nearly 2k a day, more than enough to hit my 50k target. That said, I think the story as a whole may end up being a quite a bit longer than that; as these characters fall into place and I've given more thought to the arc that each of them are heading on, there's a lot more to it than I had first imagined, so I could be looking at 70-80k for the finished piece before editing.

These characters so far have given me a lot to work with, and while at first I was going to go with 5 narrators, the 5th being either another Sister or perhaps another Gue'vesa, I think I have enough here to be getting on with. Mainly, though, I've been working on getting each viewpoint to be increasingly ideosyncratic without being cliched, and to work into that some complete contrast between them. Where I think this has come through the most has been in Ariadne and O'tana's chapters. The idea of faith, its nature and its consequences is really what this whole tale revolves around, so I found chapters 7 and 9 particarly fun to write in that regard, as they get right to the heart of the matter. Luc and Tarn contrast more in terms of personality and character, but broadly hold the same kind of outlook, again that's interesting to write, but I haven't had any chance to play with that directly, though.

The final thing I noticed, somewhat unexpetedly, is that nearly 20k words in, I'm still basically setting up characters. In these first few chapters, all of them are going through the changes that will set them up for the rest of the novel. I had planned the first Act to be up to 25000 words, but it looks like it will be a lot more than that to give me time to flesh everything out properly. Things change quite dramatically later on in terms of plot, but its in these first chapters that the characters themselves undergo perhaps the most significant changes. There are plenty of parallels in their repsective deveopments, but I'll leave you to figure those out yourselves at this stage1

Lastly, I did notice quite a few typos in this earlier, so apologies for that.

Thanks again to all those sticking with this, hope you're enjoying reading along as much as I am writing it!

Just starting reading this. Great work!!!

11: New Prayers

Fire to cleanse, water to purify, and now both have done their work. For the first time since arriving on the planet's surface from the cruiser, Ariadne felt clean and unmarred. Flames had at last scoured every taint of the Tau from the chapel, and holy water had at last washed the dirt and mud and blood that had somehow covered her despite her armour. Wrapped in simple robes of the order and free of the weight of her powered suit, she could finally find comfort.

Slinging her bolter over her shoulder as she left, Ariadne made for the great chamber at a leisurely pace, revelling in the fact that, for once, there was no rush. In the corridors, now dimly lit by burning braziers rather than utterly dark, several other Sisters of the order passed her, and to each, she nodded a muted greeting, pointedly not meeting their eyes.

Ever since she had read the eulogies for the fallen the night before, there had been something in the gazes of her Sisters that put her on edge. It was not respect, for she had already earned that through long years in the proving grounds, and nor was it deference, for though she might have stirred something in their hearts with her words, she was still their newest and least tested comrade.

Perhaps, she mused, it was an acceptance of sorts; maybe her deeds in battle and words after it had proven to her Sisters that, though still raw and inexperienced, she was just as devoted, dedicated and dangerous as any of them. She cast the ponderings aside, clearing her mind with a prayer, and quickened her pace.

The great chamber was all but deserted by the time she reached it, the adepts having concluded their rennovation for the day and the Sororitas not yet gathered for prayer, and Ariadne was glad of it. So long now, she had been surrounded and cramped, trapped by eyes that judged her every deed or stuck between walls that separated her from any kind of outside. Here, though, she stood alone in the hall, seeing her own face reflected in the polished black floor and the flickering lights of a hundred candles dancing in the dark.

Almost on instict, she sank to one knee beneath the golden statue of The Emperor Enthroned, and began recanting the prayers of cleansing and healing, before moving on to the holy scriptures that she had rigorously committed to memory. It may have been hours that she knelt, alone, in prayer and recital, before a thought flitted unbidden through her mind.

These prayers were said by a multitude across the stars, from every point and every moment of His domain, always the same words, and He must surely grow tired of them. Was that why the Faithful had still fallen? Was their god looking away, too bombared for the same prayers, the words that were spoken by every one of his flock, from the lowest hive ganger to the mightiest Living Saint?

Ariadne sat up a little straighter, and blinked, trying desperately to mask the thought, to focus on the words she knew she must say. Such musings were close to Heresy, and to doubt His protection would only invoke misfortune. She continued with the well-rehearsed recitals, but every word was more of an effort, robbed of impetus as the burrowing doubt that He might not hear bit deeper and deeper.

It was no good. Even with the candles burning and the floor clear and the statue at her head, the exact replica of the halls she had learned to pray in, she could not press onwards with the prayers; her mouth and tougue produced the words in hushed tones, but there was no heart to them, and no soul. Only one thing would resolve this, and there was only one way to anwer this quandry.

Ariadne closed her eyes and leant forward, bending low until the tips of her hair touched against the floor and she could feel the marble sapping the heat from her face. Her hands she clasped tight before her, ignoring the sweat forming on her palms, and alone in the dark, spoke a prayer of her own making.

Later, she could not recall the words she had sent to the silence, or even if there were words; sometimes, she wondered if it was merely a coalescence of thought and feeling made manifest, the same kind of freeing but free speech she had made the night before to the gathered Order.

To the cold dark, she whispered, or maybe just thought, invocations of hatred of the enemy, the Faithless and False, and promises to purge them from the Holy Places. She gave voice and form to her grief at the loss of her Sisters and to the regret that she had never known them, and with all her heart and soul, reached out to Him to protect those that were left that they might do His work anew.

Ariadne knew other prayers would suffice, prayers that had been sanctified and approved and handed down over countless generations, but now she had taken this step into the unknown, she wondered if there would ever be a time to go back. As she let the words escape, out into the vastness of the chamber, she felt her soul bared to His greatness, and knew without a doubt that, from whatever place He chose, the Emperor was looking back at her, a single voice that had dared say something different. She could only hope He would smile on her words and bless them.

At last, and after a length of time that seemed both infinite and infinitessimal, Ariadne opened her eyes and sat back up, blinking as the blood rushed back to her head. For a moment, she felt unbalanced, but the sensation soon passed, and she climbed to her feet steadily, the cold stone chilling her bare soles. Prayer done, she turned to go, but then halted.

Someone was watching, and had been for some time, and somehow, she had known the whole time, but not noticed. The shadows against the far hallway parted, and the unmistakable white-haired form of Sister Stephane seemed to glide across the floor to meet her. There was that look again, and at last, Ariadne realised what it was.

Or rather, what it wasn't. In those eyes she had become so used to seeing inflamed with rage or piety, there was an affection, and a trust, but for the first time, no doubt. Not one inkling of judgement or uncertainty in her faith or her skill. She had been tested in battle and out of it, and not found wanting.

Part of her stung as that thought sank in; had her Sisters, who she trusted so completely, been so unsure of her all this time? But at the same time, she knew the bitterness was wasted and misplaced. That had passed now, and childish as it was, she barely resisted throwing her arms around the aged Sister Superior. Instead, she simply inclined her head, finally at ease.

"Mistress," she said, unsure as to quite why she had been approached, and wary that she may have committed some ignorant wrong in her ad hoc prayer.

"Sister Ariadne," Stephane replied with a polite nod, "I trust you are well?"

"As well as one might expect, Mistress. And clean, for the first time in an age. Next time, may we bathe before the ceremonies?" She smiled, trying to inject some levity into the conversation, but a flash of indignation quickly told her this was neither the time nor place for such talk. Stephane strode off, giving an unspoken command for Ariadne to follow.

"Sister," she began as they rounded a corner into an empty stretch of corridor, "I notice some disquiet in your countenance. Tell me, what is troubling you?"

So she had noticed the irregular prayer after all. Ariadne considered lying, somewhere in the back of her mind, but knew that would be a crime and a sin. Instead, she simply replied with guarded words, giving no more away than was neccessary.

"I merely wonder how the Emperor hears us all, Mistress. All our years of prayer have taught us the words through which we can speak to Him, but surely, even He cannot discern each voice among the multitudes?" Ariadne was thankful for the darkness, as she knew that if Stephane could watch her face fall it would prompt a barrage of questions she was not ready to answer.

"Ah, it is a common question among those as young as yourself, who have seen so little of His realm. What you must understand, my Sister, is that though He may not answer so directly, it is through the skeins of fate that He deigns to respond to our prayer." Ariadne noted a genuine compassion in her tone. This was not a reprimand as she had feared, but a lesson. "He can hear us all, because He must, and though His ways are mysterious, all of us are answered in time."

Ariadne paused, visions of the dead Sisters she had lamented flashing before her eyes, and opened her mouth to speak. Before she could utter a single word, Stephane preempted the question; she had evidently had this conversation many times before. Once more, Ariadne was deeply thankful to the Sister Superior for sharing her teachings, though she was under no obligation to.

"You wonder, don't you, about the fallen, yes? You wonder if they were answered, even as they are slain."

"Indeed."

"Some would say, in their ignorance, that the dead fall because they have no faith, or that they turn at the last from His light, and such people must be enlightened. Some would take their deaths as proof that the Emperor is not as divine as we know him to be, and such people must be cleansed. Some, even in this, our most Holy Order, wonder every day what befalls those we have lost, and why."

Ariadne smiled in the dark, grateful that Stephane had years and wisdom enough to so clearly define these rights and wrongs, and quiet any doubts. More than a warrior, Stephane was a mentor and a teacher, and Ariadne knew she was lucky to have been assigned to her Order. But it was only theories Stephane illuminated, not truth, and she needed more than that.

"Mistress," she asked, "What do you believe?"

"Perceptive as ever, Ariadne. What I believe is of little import, for I am no priest, but if it will calm your fears, I shall answer."

"It will. And thank you, Mistress."

"Think nothing of it, for it is only words that I profess. But I, I believe that every one of His servants that has fallen, and every one that still shall fall in the long years ahead, does so because He means them to." Stephane paused, then turned to Ariadne, placing a hand firmly on her shoulder. Was it her imagination, or was there a hint of sorrow in the old warrior's face? "The Emperor has a part in His great scheme for us all, my dear, and it is not ours to question Him. He will reveal His purpose in time, and when he does, then, you shall know peace in yourself."

With that, the Sister Superior vanished into the dark, and Ariadne was left standing, suddenly cold and isolated in the narrow halls. Taking one last check to ensure she was unseen, she closed her eyes, thought of new words and new prayers, and asked that question she must have an answer for.

"What is my part, and where is my place, and what must I do, my Lord?"

Really excellent writing

Cheers!

Sorry for the lack of updates, anyone who is reading along. I've been kind of busy in the last few days but there should be more to come soon!

Are you going to be updating soon?

Oops, meant to update here that my keyboard is currently kaput and has been for a couple of weeks, so I'm unable to write more at the moment. There will doubtedly be more as soon as I get it fixed/replaced, hopefully in a week or so.

Apologies to those of you who were reading along, as I say I'll endeavour to get back to it as soon as I possibly can.

Thanks! Really been enjoying it.

12: The Return

Darkness. Light. Darkness. Now light again. O'tana thought on this as the medics worked behind their thin screen, how the last days and hours had passed in nothing more than an endless circle of darkness and light that paid no heed to the natural shift of day to night. The darkness of subterranean tunnels as he sprinted to warn the Cadre, the searing-hot light as they had been immolated, he alone surviving the conflagration. Darkness, darker, as he kept to the shadows, evading the watchful eyes of the enemy.

Light, cold light, as he fell from their black fortress, and marched onwards over the plateaus and tundra, darkness as he had at last succumb to the hunger and weariness and overwhelming grief.

And now light again. This light was white, sterile, clean, and unlike the light of the flames that groped for him every time he closed his eyes, it did not burn. It did not heal, or guide, or aid him but it did not burn. His tired, bored eyes scanned the chamber, finding nothing in the white glow to linger on. All that moved or mattered in this isolation was the frantic, numbed activity behind the hanging sheets.

O'tana did not appreciate this gesture, of hiding the worst of his injuries from him. For so long he had carried them, or at least it felt like a great while, and now whatever they had become, it could not alarm him more than what he had already seen. For the third time, he craned his neck to see what the Earth Caste medics were doing out of sight, but once again, they panicked as he straightened, and darted round the hangings to lay him back down. He contemplated fighting back, but no; it would do him no good, weakened as he was and armed as they were with the tools and toxins of their trade. He leant back, fixed his roaming eyes on nothing in particular, and waited.

Time became something else as he sat there, no longer related to the passing of suns overhead or the distance traversed underfoot; it was measured in comings-and-goings of medical staff in their brown overalls, and the glasses of water and nutrients he drained all too quickly, and the subtle shifts in the glimpses of light he seized whenever the narrow door opened to admit or release those who kept him here.

And as this timeless span passed, O'tana's thoughts grew darker, more scathing, until he glowered at each new arrival for no fault of their own. He had crossed a deserted wasteland evading capture with his arm still injured, he had made it this far with no help. He alone had survived the massacre at the black fortress, and returned with the oath of vengeance still etched on the walls of his mind. Was that not proof enough of his fortitude?

From whispers of conversation and snatched glances at the reports the medics ferried back and forth, he could piece together too little of what went on outside this four-walled world, but enough. The humans were not pressing their advantage, but holing up behind their walls, stalling when they should be driving home their thrust. The Tau should attack now, he knew. He should be with them, leading his still-living brothers and sisters in crushing strikes and silent raids, and with every drop of human blood shed, garnering some revenge for deaths of so many.

But instead, he was confined here, hidden even from himself by the overcautious medics that did nothing more than insist he rest and sleep and wait. His replies to their suggestions grew venomous, and by the time the shifts had rotated again, he found they didn't even bother to try and converse with him, conducting their work in silence, still hidden.

At last, maybe days after he had first awoken, some change in the monotony occurred. As the shining white door slid aside, he prepared another scything remark, but the words died on his lips as the room was invaded not by the dull brown of an Earth Caste uniform, but the bright robes of office of an Etheral. What had been a smirk became a smile as he recognised the face among the robes, the furrowed brow and dark stare of Ko'Vensa.

“Leave us,” the newcomer ordered, and the Earth Caste crew scurried away through the open door, which snapped shut behind them. Ko'vensa drew a stool from behind the screen, and planted it facing O'tana, who raised a hand in greeting. The Etheral nodded back.

“Aun' Ko'vensa,” O'tana intoned, “This is an honour.” Ko'vensa waved the formality away and reached for the untouched glass by O'tana's bed.

“It may be,” he laughed, “but please, dispense with the formalities.” Ko'vensa gestured to the untouched glass by the bed. “If you're not going to...” O'tana nodded, and drank deeply, before setting the glass back down and sighing. “Shas'la O'tana, my friend, you return to us at last. It has been two rotations since our scouts reported the worst from Blackspire, and we have done nothing but fear for you since. All of you.”

O'tana propped himself up on the headboard and clenched his free hand. “And you were right to, Ko'vensa. Those humans, they are butchers. Not content with killing us in our droves, they piled the bodies of my fallen brothers and sisters, burned them, as if they were nothing more than driftwood!” Something broke within him, a dam that had held back the worst of his fury now cast asunder as he voiced it. “We must retake the Spire, not for us but for them. Let me go, sir; let me lead a Cadre and oust them from the places they have defiled! Let me-” Ko'vensa raised a wrinked hand.

“All in good time, Shas'la. All in good time, but first, you must heal. You have come far and survived much and that is no mean feat, but even you could not pass through that unscathed, in body or in mind.” He lowered his eyes to the floor. “You are out of balance, O'tana; your thirst for revenge may be your undoing. Let your anger cool, temper it, and when it is calmed, forge it into a blade that will cut the heart from them. Control yourself, or the enemy shall control you.”

O'tana felt himself weaken as the Etheral's words washed over him; he knew they were wise and they were right, but he could not reconcile their meaning with what he had seen, the bodies flayed and charred and the barbarian fury of the human warriors. He too looked away, for fear of meeting Ko'vensa's piercing gaze.

“Now, then, let us see what the humans have made you,” Ko'vensa intoned, “Your hand?” He reached over and pulled the screen aside, and O'tana knew at once he had been wrong; what he had seen, the flesh still raw and damp, was not the worst.

Somehow, the limb seemed even less a part of him now. The flesh was no longer a dark ooze but as rough and black as coal, and while he could flex and move the muscles beneath, the outer layer cracked and snapped as he did so. In the stark white light, he almost made out a patina of dust, his very body flaking away against the air. He fought the urge to vomit, and saw at last why the medics had kept him only to liquid since his arrival. For perhaps the first time, he was grateful to them.

The hand did not hurt as he had expected, did not burn with an agonising flare at the slightest touch as it had done before, but as O'tana gingerly took his bad hand in his good, realised why, and found himself longing for the pain. It did not feel the red-hot flames still burning beneath the flesh, for it did not feel at all. Testing what he knew but could not believe, he tapped the charred palm, pounded gently on the white wall, but to no avail.

Everything it touched came away blackened, but still he did not feel a thing. Ko'vensa placed a hand on his shoulder, and O'tana turned to the Etheral, seeing his own horror reflected back in the face of an old friend. There was a glint of a tear in the old warrior's eye, but the ghost of a smile on his lips.

“You see? Their weapons have made you unfeeling, uncaring. I could cut away that hand with my own blade and you would not notice. You understand now why I cannot let you lead a war?”
O'tana did not, and said as much, but Ko'vensa did not admonish him.

“O'tana, your hatred for the humans would do to me what they have done to you. They could sever my hand, my army, while the head, bent on their destruction, carried on. You will have your justice, but not at the head of my troops.” O'tana opened his mouth to protest, but Ko'vensa silenced him with a wave of his hand. “I am sorry, old friend. In time, you will lead again, that I am sure of, but not here or now.”

Ko'vensa stood, sweeping his robes around himself, and made for the door with one last look at O'tana. The young Shas'la rose from the bed himself, and met the Etheral's eye at last, understanding.

“Then they have not made me anything, master,” he said as Ko'vensa reached the exit. “The humans with their flames have unmade me, for if I cannot feel, I cannot live. They have reduced me, as they have reduced this world to nothing more than a charnel house, and I will make them pay.” O'tana wiped the blurring tears from his eyes, saw the emptiness where Ko'vensa had been, and wondered how much of what he had said had been to the wind.

13: Chains

The cold of the iron seemed to sap all heat from his hands as Luc was led forward by the masked Arbite, tight around his wrists and pressing into the veins that still pounded with adrenaline. Even the warmth of blood on his palms, blood that had so recently been flowing, now felt distant and surreal. Maybe he could move his fingers, maybe that would bring some spark of life back into them, but for now, it was all he could do to march forward, never any further from the barrel forced against the small of his back.

He cast his eyes around for some distraction, but the high spires and elaborate facades offered no comfort or respite. Even the sculpted visages of Angels and heroes leered down at him from on high, silent in their judgement, but still so very sure in their condemnation. Like the black plasteel mask of the Enforcers that flanked him, these faces from ages past betrayed nothing but what the imagination could conjure. That was enough, though, to damn him forever.

Without moving his lips, not sure he could, Luc sent a scattering of prayers skyward, past the black spires and into His eternal view, hoping that in the next life, at least, he would be absolved. Surely He at least would know the truth of it, know that what Luc had done was not through malice or ignorance, but nothing more than the desire to do good. His only crime, he surmised, was that he was a good man in evil times. The thought offered no comfort as the stub of the shotgun prodded him forwards once again. He shot a glare at the Arbite over his shoulder, but moved on, into the relative brightness of one of the Hive's wider streets.

Here it would be worse, and he knew it; it would not be eyes of stone and ceramic that judged him, judged the blood on his hands and the walk of a man who had nothing more to lose. It would be eyes that he knew, eyes that knew him, but not as this, a ghost at gunpoint in cold iron shackles. Already the confusion swept before him, a bow wave of sideways glances, falling jaws and silent conversation. It was oddly satisfying to know that all of this was because of him, but not enough to haul him from the depths he sank further into with each accused step.

Now more than ever, Luc realised, he wanted to hate. He wanted to hate the rats of men that had driven him down this road and hounded every step along it. He wanted to hate the blank-faced Enforcers that marched him further on, that would not leave before the end of the road. He wanted to hate the glares and stares from familiar faces that paved the way, but he could not. Each one was nothing more than him, and nothing less; all victims of circumstance, doing only what they thought was right.

These were not xenos, not heretics, they were human beings, and they were not wrong. Just as he had believed, known, he was right as he brought down that knife, again and again into weak and fragile flesh, they were right to scowl and curse and hate the bloody figure paraded before them. He was, to them, an abhorrence, a violation of that most sacred of rules. He was the taker of a life.

After one hundred and thirteen steps, Luc could bear it no more, and finally succumb to the urge to lower his pleading, guilty eyes and let matted hair fall to hide his face. The tally was not a bad one, he noted with some pride, but ultimately, meant nothing. One little victory on the road to the greatest of defeats.

The last of the adrenaline fading at last, thoughts that had flown past now began to settle, a flock of musings and delusions all vying for the same space, and at last, Luc could recognise some of them as they pushed to the forefront. It wasn't so bad, perhaps; he had done what he needed to, taken a life to save one. He was even. No matter what came next, his one last task was complete, and how many would go on in safe, blissful ignorance thanks only to his conviction. They could shoot him, here and now, and he might not even care.

Another hundred steps, and a hundred more before he at last lost count, or the will to, and Luc grew tired of waiting. There was only one end to this, only one solution, and the least he could do was make sure it was on his own terms. One last act that would spare another.

He turned to the Enforcer on his left, bringing up manacled hands and swinging chains straight into the mask, feeling it crack under the force. A moment later, a movement, and the gun was in his hands, turning all too slowly to its target, its moment of destiny brought forward at its victim's hand.

The remaining Arbites scrambled away, bringing up their shields and yelling too loud, words familiar but foreign.

A crowd formed, panicked, ran.

Luc brought up the gun, stared down the barrel.

Pulled the-

***

Luc's eyes snapped open, the restless fuge broken, and he screamed. It had never ended like that before, so very close to changing something, but still so far away. He balled his fists and brought them down on the desk, scattering the piled forms he had attempted to work through. As the last of the papers settled, he checked over his shoulder, a certain awake awareness returning moments too late. Garloch ducked into the tent and wordlessly handed Luc a cup of something that might once have been hot.

“Everything alright?” Luc asked, and Garloch gave a curt nod, giving away at once his sudden and newfound insecurity at addressing his old friend as an officer. It seemed to be somewhere halfway between a fear of punishment and a desire to know that Luc was still present and real, not some faceless commander half a world away in thought. “Relax, Garloch, it's still me, and I'm not having you shot just because this is cold as a Valhallan's piss.” Luc forced a laugh, for which the private seemed grateful.

“Good to know, er, sir. Just got word from Alderbelt's lot, they said you're fine to lead us but, and I quote, 'if the murdering bastard's out for a commission and a pardon, forget it'.” Luc smiled and shoved the now-redundant report papers aside.

“I see, the diplomatic approach. Well, I couldn't have expected anything better. Someone needs to lead this rabble, and I'd sooner take that myself than let Tarn and friends start running things from up on that hill.” He allowed himself a brief smirk at how the arrogant officer would react to Luc's impromptu promotion. “Anything else?”

“Yeah... I mean, yes, sir. There's some kind of command summit at the Chapel at eighteen hundred tonight, sir, and they want us.. that is, you, to turn up. No idea what they have planned, but I'm sure it's got to be better than here. Never know, sir, you might even get something to eat that isn't tepid.”

“I live in hope, Garloch, I live in hope. Call Sullivan, get a Chimera prepped and a crew together. Under yourself, of course. That'll be all.” He nodded, and Garloch barged out of the tent with a little more haste than was strictly necessary. Before Luc's thoughts could stray once again to that dream, he checked his chronometer. Fifteen twenty seven. Three hours until his first real duty as the closest this band of brigands had to a commander.

His eyes settled on a large brown case that had been left beside his bunk, evidently while he was sleeping, and seized with a sudden curiosity at the presence of something new, hurried to open it. The thick wood and gold, not plated, clasps seemed exceptionally out of place in the run-down encampment, and more at home in the prefab semi-permanent fort of the Dragoons, up on that hill. That almost gave Luc pause, but a moment later, he had lifted the lid and set it down, before turning back to the contents.

On the top of something red and white was a smaller packet, and this he came to first, prising open the casing to reveal yet more shining gold and dark, stained wood. The weight and shape were so very familiar, but the aesthetic so totally at odds with Luc's memory that he had to do a double-take.

Sure enough, he had not fooled himself. In his hand he held the most ornate and beautiful Laspistol he had ever set eyes on. A case of polished wood engraved with a dozen lines of oaths and litanies almost too intricate to read. Workings made of gleaming metal, so clean he could note the unshaven stubble on his dim reflection. A grip that was just heavy enough, tipped with an elaborate golden symbol. It was a fine weapon. An officer's weapon.

Almost wistfully, Luc put the pistol aside and lifted the red and white object, which once again set his memory racing. Red and white had been the colours he had led men to victory under, and now here was a uniform in that same livery, the symbols he had followed emblazoned across his chest and on his epaulettes. Tentatively, he pulled the jacket on over his fatigues and fastened the brass buttons, the material stretching but not tight.

Luc paused to wonder where all this had come from, and spotted something else in the bottom of the chest, a single folded sheet of paper. He fished it out, noting the rough way it had been bent in half, and read the brief message scrawled in a spidery hand.

'With complements, the Regiment.'

Luc chuckled to himself without quite knowing why. Before, it might just have been an illusion, a haze that passed over the men that made them follow him. The heat of battle and the drunkenness of victory could easily have clouded their judgement. But now, Luc was wearing and holding real, tangible proof that they had accepted him. As he fastened the pistol to his belt and checked his changed reflection in a pool of water, he realised there was no going back now.

That man in chains, so long ago, was gone. It did not matter what he had done and how he would be remembered in a place so far away. Where he had been, a new Luc stood a little straighter, smiling at nothing and knowing that finally, after an age of waiting, he had been handed a chance to do something right. A second chance.

In the silence of the tent, he whispered an oath to the Emperor, and the air, and anyone who would listen, that he would not waste it.

Awesome. I always look forward to the next installment.