The rain had been falling for several hours now, turning the fields to mud and bringing upon an unnatural twilight. With the sun buried beneath the deep gloom of the storm, all was dark. Maybe it was even daytime. No one knew any more, all the chronometers had stopped working hours ago. As the skies let loose their torrents, the dugouts slowly filled with dampness, removing all the remaining comfort that the glorified holes had held. They were graves now. Cold wet and muddy. Welcoming, too. The holes embraced those that cowered within them with the friendliness of inevitability At once, the distant sky turned to fire. Darting among the forked strikes of lightning were the telltale streaks of orbital landers and drop pods, the streaks of fire illuminated the storm from inside and below, bringing moody light to the scene. Only the suggestion of their ungodly impacts could be heard in the distance over the primordial chant of distant thunder. It was beautiful.

Are we going to die?

The man looked over at his comrade, a fellow soldier, a boy. He crouched in the mud, wearing only his fear and a uniform for one much larger. Pale, scared and alone, the boy looked small against the backdrop of the storm. The man looked back towards the distant impacts of lightning and drop pods, towards the end of the world, and lied. The boy nodded, his fear not swayed as he buried deeper into his trench coat. It was soaking wet and offered no warmth. A small string of beads in his hand, he began to pray quietly.

The rain seemed to lighten a bit as the air went still. Not a breath of wind moved across the plains, nothing stirred the dead air. It was as if the sky were choking. The rain began to feel warm, sickly even. The impacts drew closer.

At once, the long dead vox unit sprang to life, spitting static and garbled noise. Surprised at the resurrection, the two soldiers turned to stare at the unit that sat against the opposite wall of their hole. Slowly, the static resolved itself into panicked cries for help, prayers, and the disembodied screams of those who were dying. The boy began to sob, though his tears were lost among the downfall of rain.

We’re not going to live, are we?

The man turned to face him, his face expressionless. There was nothing to say. His thoughts turned to his family, to his wife. They were gone, taken from him by the sickness that had ravaged the world, the plague. The officers had told the soldiers that more were coming to spread Death. The man would fight them, kill them in order to save others from his loss. His family was gone, all gone, swept away from him by Death. The scream of the falling drop pods could now be heard in the distance, their impacts felt through the earth. Once again, the vox fell into silence, mercifully cutting off the stream of prayers and agony. The dead air was once again silent but for the falling rain and the soft scream of death falling from above, falling ever closer. The boy had curled around himself. Still sobbing, he reciting prayers and called out for his mother, for anyone. The man looked away and began to cry.

We’re going to die.

It was calming, in a way. The inevitability of the end brought a sort of clarity to the man, helping to steel him against his fate. Almost laughing, the man thought of his family, knowing that he would soon be with them. The boy sat up, sniffling and still quaking with fear. The man turned to face him, his face set in a grim expression. While he had died with his beloved, the boy had never gotten his chance to live. He never would. In silence, the man checked his weapons, cleaning out the grime that had found its way into the mechanisms, though it mattered little. Down in the muddy foxhole, he made his peace.

The impacts of the drop pods sounded ever louder, beating out a near constant drumroll now. The man thought of their last briefing. He knew that the archenemy was bringing its full weight to bear upon their heads, but he did not realize how heavy that weight was. The screaming of rockets and of men soon drowned out the petty noise of the falling rain, crescendoing into an earsplitting wall of sound. The man grimaced and slotted a new cartridge into his lasgun. He saw the boy do the same. The man laughed. They may take some of the enemy with them. He was going to go see his family, to meet the Emperor.

The impact was so close that it caused part of the dugout to collapse upon itself. The man dug himself out of the dirt and helped the boy do the same. Cautiously, he looked over the side of their hole towards the drop pod that he knew had just landed. The metal of the pod was corroded and rusting. The rain that hit it simply evaporated off the scorched metal hot from reentry. The ramps of the pod burst open and the man ducked behind the comforting soil. The boy had no such caution. The man looked towards the boy’s face and saw that it was white with shock. He peeked over the edge and saw Death. They were nine feet tall, armored like beetles. They clutched massive weapons that no man could have lifted. Outlined by lighting strikes and gunfire, the man recognized their silhouettes. He had seen them before, within the cathedrals, etched upon the walls. By the Emperor! Space marines! The man had never seen one before, but these looked wrong. Evil.

The boy panicked, opening fire with his lasgun. The beams of light that would slice through a man hardly slowed the marines. The boy screamed, continuing to fire wildly. One of the figures in rusting, oozing armor raised an ancient bolter and fired once. The boy’s head and torso disintegrated in the blast. Stunned, the man wiped the remains of his young friend from out of his eyes, looking to the blood on his hands. As he stared, he felt a warmth dripping down his collar. Reaching a hand to his neck, he felt the wound that the shrapnel from the bolt threw out. The man’s blood mixed with the rain.

The man slumped back against the wall of the dugout, staring up at the clouds and the rain and the fall of landing craft in the distance. As his vision began to blacken, the man smiled a little. It was beautiful. The man died next to the boy, slumped in a muddy foxhole chipped into the earth.

The rain continued to fall.