by Henry Zou
As they came to the fifth and last village on their route, Lieutenant Barcham began to instinctively feel ‘the churns’. It was something a veteran Guardsman picked up the longer he was deployed: a finely honed instinct that warned him something was amiss, a cold dreadful nausea at the bottom of their bowels. All Guardsmen knew of the churns and, in the past four months, Barcham was more than familiar with the feeling. He could not exactly express his concern but something was wrong about the village. Inawan was similarly grave and he vigilantly trained a vintage autorifle on each thatched window and door they passed. To their relief, the platoon passed the village without event and reached their designated checkpoint.
Although they had not spotted any signs of enemy activity, Barcham and Inawan agreed that their presence was certainly known to the insurgents by now. Deciding not to make camp in unfamiliar territory, the lieutenant hoped to race the dusk and return to base camp before nightfall. As they came down the mountain, the sinister fifth village was the first settlement they reached on the return path. Here the dirt road funnelled into a ravine that led a winding path through the hamlet. It was late afternoon and the monsoonal skies were swollen rain clouds, cradling the village in deep shadow.
Tribesmen lingered along the dirt road but fled at the sight of the platoon. They faded into their stilt-huts, some sprinting away to shutter their windows and bar their doors. Barcham ordered the four Chimeras to advance in single file, cautiously nursing their engines down the slope. Once again they rumbled through the village unmolested, coming around a bend in the path. The first carrier in line negotiated the steep twist.
That was the signal for the ambush.
Las-fire, rockets and heavy calibre rounds drummed down on the armoured carriers. The Chimeras rocked on their suspensions, hammered from all directions by enemy fire. Guardsmen scrambled towards the vision slits of the Chimeras, firing blindly out with their lasguns.
‘Get going! Don’t stop moving!’ Barcham barked into the vox-unit. It would be their only chance to survive the ambush.
Insurgent heretics swarmed out from hiding, rushing in to mob the Chimeras. Some of them were not even armed, pelting the carriers with rocks and debris. Others were Kalisadors, armed tribal warriors who, according to Imperial intelligence, were ferociously cruel in combat.
Lieutenant Barcham socketed his bayonet onto his lasrifle just as the top hatch of his carrier was pried open. An insurgent Kalisador slithered into the compartment, brandishing a machete and machine pistol. The Bastón warrior was garbed in traditional battledress, a loose cotton tunic and breeches with calf-length sandals bound by intricate hemp cord. Around his shoulders, torso and headdress was the chitinous plate of a cauldron crab, heavy and dark grey. Fluttering paper litanies and shells woven into coloured string clattered against his armour. Around his legs and hips, beards of knotted string interwoven with coloured glass proclaimed, in their way, the great reflexes and stamina of the warrior and the great length of his sword arm. This was the ritualistic battledress of a heretic; the lieutenant recognised this, as Inawan spoke often of the superstitions of his people.
The lieutenant fired once from the hip at point-blank range. The shot flashed white in the confined compartment, hot and brilliant. In the sizzling haze the insurgent bounced off the metal decking and lay there unmoving. The lieutenant stepped forwards to inspect the body.
That was when the hatchway swung open again. A hand appeared, tossed in a grenade, and slammed the hatch shut. Lieutenant Barcham dropped into a crouch and turned his back to the grenade. It went off with a stiffly concussive report. Something stung his back. ‘Direct hit!’ he shouted at his men, turning to inspect the damage.
That was when he saw Inawan curled up on the floor. His insides were spilling out from the middle of his torso. Inawan wore no chitinous plate, or the trinkets and fetishes of heretic Kalisadors. He simply wore loose cotton garments bound at his calves and forearms by intricate rope work, eschewing the heretical magicks of the insurgents. Inawan had professed a strong faith in the Emperor and that was all he had needed to protect him from the guns and bullets of his enemies. Barcham had never met a man more stoic in his belief.
But there was no time to mourn. ‘Don’t stop to fight back! Just keep moving,’ the lieutenant shouted at his driver. The remaining Chimeras fell into line, following their lead.
‘We were shooting as much as we could, in any direction,’ Barcham recalled to the old woman. ‘The men were hosing guns out from their vision slits, lobbing grenades out from the hatches. The enemy chased us, hugging the tree line and firing as they came.’
Of the four carriers, two remained, but in weary condition. Black smoke plumed from their engines, small fires fluttering from the treads. Snipers popped shots off their battered hulls and mortars burst before them, sending shrapnel hissing through the jungle canopy. But the platoon moved on, down another narrow gulley and up a sharp cleft in the terrain.
‘Once we crest this gorge, we’ll be in open ground and they won’t follow,’ Barcham urged his men over the vox systems.
Gunning the last dying splutters from their engines, they cleared the final crest. The enemy fire waned as the Chimeras surged on and left them behind. But the platoon did not stop for another five kilometres, until one of the carriers finally rolled to a halt, its engine dead and its armoured compartment filled with oily black smoke. By now, Vulture gunships were making low attack runs on the village and its surrounding region. The Imperial retribution was furious and coils of orange tracer lit up the sky long into the evening.
Back at the base camp, Lieutenant Barcham waited to gather his dead. Throughout the night Vultures touched down to refuel, bringing back with them the plastek body bags of his broken platoon. They would unload the remains of his men before whooping away on their turbine engines, back into the night. The dead – fifteen men in all – were laid out on the parade ground. The injured – twenty-two including Barcham himself – were taken to the infirmary. Three Guardsmen remained unaccounted for. The insurgents had cut out the livers of those who had been left in the field for several hours, but Barcham did not tell the old woman this. The practice of ritual mutilation was bating bating, a grave insult to the dead and strictly forbidden.
‘My platoon was no more,’ the lieutenant concluded. ‘Not one man emerged unharmed.’
Within a week, those of his platoon with minor injuries were dispersed into other fighting units. Lieutenant Barcham, limping with shrapnel in his left leg and lower back, was placed on temporary administrative duties until recovery. He was a grade three – wounded with grievous bodily harm – and given two weeks’ recuperation.
But before they were disassembled, the men who survived held a service for the fallen. Kalisador Inawan was included in the platoon’s registry and buried with full honours, as befitted a Guardsman of the 31st Riverine. Back home on Ouisivia, fallen soldiers were set adrift in the bayous. Here their bodies were cast on rafts down the waters of the Serrado Delta.
‘That is how your son died. If there were more loyalist men on Solo-Bastón like him, this war would already be over.’
Chapter One
Out across the oceans of Solo-Bastón, far beyond where the muddy inlets gave way to thrumming tides, the water became a foamy jade. From those frothing waves rose the towering might of an Imperial Argo-Nautical, a warship of distant Persepia. From its forward-jutting ram prow to its stern, the Nautical was a vast floating gun battery. The solid, blue-grey sheets of its hull towered over the water like a fortress, sloping up on an incline towards the deck. The Argo-Nautical dominated the ocean, eclipsing the horizon as it drew astern with an offshore platform. Its sheer bulk made the support girders of the platform appear frail and dwarfed even the Vulture gunships roosting on the landing pad.
Upon the platform, the high officers of the Bastón campaign were assembled with their accompanying ceremonial guard. They had been summ
oned by Cardinal Lior Avanti, head of the diocese on Solo-Bastón, acting governor-general and, without a doubt, the most powerful Imperial authority on the planet. Rarely was such a meeting requested of them; the staff officers shifted uncomfortably as they stood to attention.
Also present was Major General Gaspar Montalvo of the Caliguan Motor Rifles. He sweated in the sun underneath a furred mantle and a full suit of burnished copper. Accompanying him were two of the tallest, most imposing men in his regiment. The soldiers were men of the 105th Motor Rifles, a mechanised formation from the oil-rich world of Caligua in the Bastion Stars. They wore loose-fitting jumpsuits of dusty brown with pads of ballistic mesh sewn into the thighs, chest and shoulders of their utility uniforms.
Standing opposite was Admiral Victor de Ruger of the Persepia Nautical Fleet. He stood smartly in his sky-blue dress coat, with silks arranged in layers across his left shoulder and a feather-crested helm curled under one arm. A coterie of attendants and officers flanked him, bearing his personal shield, standard and refreshment towels on platters. Persepian Nautical Infantry were arrayed in ordered ranks behind him in their chalk-blue frock coats and polished chrome rebreathers. Lasguns fixed with boarding pikes were held vertically in salute, a bristling forest of steel that glinted with oceanic reflection.
Almost unnoticed, Brigadier Kaplain stood off to the side. He hated ceremony, like all men of the Riverine Amphibious. Regardless, Kaplain had shaved and even pressed his uniform that very morning. A tall, thin man of late middle years, the brigadier looked more like an administrative clerk than the commanding officer of the wild Ouisivians. He wore fatigues of muted swamp camouflage, standard issue amongst all Guardsmen of the 31st Riverine. Even as the docking ramp of the Nautical was lowered towards the rig platform, Kaplain continued to smoke his tabac. There was no way that he was going to salute a man who had never earned his right to be saluted.
Overhead the Nautical sounded its boarding horns, braying with tremulous urgency. Air sirens whooped as the boarding ramp locked into position. Below, the assembled soldiery snapped their heels and stood to attention in unison. Kaplain sighed wearily and stubbed out his tabac with the heel of his boot.
Slowly, with measured strides, Cardinal Lior Avanti descended the ramp. Avanti was overwhelmingly tall and upright for a man of so many centuries. Although the skin of his face was like veined parchment, his features were heavily boned and well proportioned. A web of metal tubes sutured to his nostrils trailed into his voluminous robes, connecting him to a life-support system deep within his attire.
His every movement was deliberate and sure, exuding a great conviction that he could do no wrong. His holy vestments of embroidered tapestry, rich with midnight blue and purple, cascaded in perfectly measured lines, strangely unmoving despite the whipping ocean wind. Over this he was draped in a cope of needled gold and a lace train of tremendous length. Behind him, walking two abreast, sisters of the Adepta Sororitas in white power armour carried his lace train for a length of eight bearers.
The cardinal finally reached the ramp’s landing and levelled his gaze on the Imperial officers. He drew an imperious breath.
‘Gentlemen. Every morning I pray for victory. Do you?’ Avanti asked.
Major General Montalvo risked a sidelong glance at Admiral de Ruger, syllables stuttering behind their teeth but not forming any words. Kaplain, however, kept to the old regimental adage – ‘Keep your chin down, your eyes high and your mouth shut.’ He did exactly that, keeping himself towards the rear of the assembly. For Kaplain, this entire meeting was a farce. He would have much preferred to be back on base camp where he was needed. In the past few days they had experienced a spike in insurgent activity and there were even rumours that they had lost favour with the local loyalists in the surrounding provinces. In his opinion, he had much better things to do than curry favour with the Ecclesiarchy, but orders were orders.
The cardinal approached Major General Montalvo and placed a hand on the officer’s shoulder. The squat, pugnacious officer shuffled uncomfortably from foot to foot for a brief second. Kaplain almost pitied the man. He was already sweating profusely underneath his fur mantle and copper plate and doubtless the cardinal’s attention did little to abate his condition.
‘It hurts my heart,’ the cardinal proclaimed. He turned to address the entire assembly before continuing. ‘It hurts my heart to think that men of the Imperium are not fighting hard enough or faithfully enough to have ended this war already.’
Montalvo looked to Admiral de Ruger for support. De Ruger simply stared straight ahead to attention, evidently glad that he was not the object of the cardinal’s ire. When no help was forthcoming, Montalvo gritted his teeth. ‘We are operating at maximum capacity considering the situation. Strategically, the enemy hold the mainland and its super-heavy siege-batteries,’ he conceded.
‘Yes, I’ve already heard enough about the curtain guns that it hurts my head at their mentioning. I’ve known about these siege-batteries since you landed. I can’t figure out why, with so many troops at your disposal, you cannot wrest control of these defence silos from the enemy?’ At this, Avanti directed his gaze on Admiral de Ruger, expecting an answer.
Kaplain was now more amused than before. Admiral de Ruger, a thin man with avian features, long of face and long of neck, began to fumble for an explanation. For a moment, the wide-eyed look on the admiral’s face threatened to dislodge the monocle he wore over his left eye. It amazed Kaplain that two of the most dominant military officers in the subsector were being terrorised by an old man with barely functioning joints.
‘We’ve performed numerous bombing runs but the canopy is dense and the super-heavy batteries are well fortified due to terrain. But we will send more, increase bombing runs twofold, supplies allowing.’
Avanti leaned in close, a smile curling the corners of his mouth, but there was no mirth in his slitted grey eyes. ‘Then why can we not dissuade these indigenous savages from undoing the good work of the God-Emperor here? What is it about these savages that His armies cannot overcome?’
Now it was Admiral de Ruger who looked to Montalvo for support. Neither officer spoke a word.
‘Because they’re holding the super-heavy battery on the mainland and blasting the snot out of our transport craft every time we attempt to deploy anything,’ Kaplain called from the rear.
The brigadier could not help himself. He would bring an end to this farce. He had little regard for the Ecclesiarchy. As far as he was concerned, the military and theology were distinctly separate entities and he did not answer to the cardinal. Pushing his way through the ceremonial troops, jostling aside platter bearers and junior attendants, Kaplain emerged at the front of the assembly.
‘What my comrades here are trying to say, in the simplest terms, is that the insurgents have captured the island’s big gun. This big gun blows up big boats. But we need big boats to deploy troops onto the mainland, and we need big boats to run supply lanes in order to sustain any mass mobilisation. But as long as this big gun remains in enemy hands, we have to skulk beyond their range.’
Although Kaplain’s fellow officers were glowering at him with unrestrained anger, the brigadier continued. ‘So, for the past four months, we’ve been sending piecemeal patrols into the wilderness and getting thoroughly licked. I would send in an expedition, but my esteemed comrades here,’ Kaplain gestured at his fellow high officers, ‘outrank me, and refuse to do anything but send high-altitude bombing to disable the guns. They don’t seem to understand that the heavy canopy cover and terrain protect the battery and renders it almost impervious to bombardment, and I can’t send my boys out there without support. And that, my surly friend, is why these savages are tying your hosieries into a knot.’
There came a collective gasp from the audience. Several members of the Adepta Sororitas took a step towards the brigadier, their plated boots thudding with intention. For a moment, Kaplain wondered whet
her his Ouisivian manners had pushed the cardinal too far. But the cardinal began to chortle. His laughter wheezed through bundles of tubing that connected his nostrils to pressure filters hidden beneath his voluminous robes, sounding like a discordant metal organ.
‘Well said, brigadier. I appreciate your candour,’ commented Avanti with his eyes twinkling. He turned back to Montalvo and de Ruger. ‘You could learn much from this man. You propose a different method, brigadier?’
The generals began to trip verbally and wring out excuses. They listed a lack of sufficient logistics, supplies and even blamed the monsoonal weather. But the cardinal had ceased to pay them attention.
‘It’s hot and I don’t like this weather. I need to retire to my chambers,’ the cardinal decided. ‘Brigadier, if I give you authority to commit to an inland operation, can you break this stalemate?’
Kaplain nodded. ‘Yes. But my men will need low altitude overhead support. I won’t send my soldiers out there into enemy territory without any lifelines. I expect Vulture gunships and Persepian aviators to ghost them.’
‘Pure folly,’ the admiral interjected. ‘The enemy have access to anti-air weaponry. I will not expose my fliers on low altitude runs.’
‘Stop saying words,’ the cardinal ordered. ‘You will give the 31st Riverine all the support they need to conduct this operation. I want those guns silenced with all possible haste.’
The officers knew that all discussion was over. The admiral saluted crisply, and Montalvo slapped the breast of his armour with the flat of his palm in respect.
The cardinal turned his back on them. ‘Excellent! Dismissed.’
The assembly dispersed swiftly as the generals stalked away towards their waiting Valkyries. Already the engines were whirling to life and ready to airlift them back to their mainland provinces.
Kaplain watched his fellow officers leave, growling angrily and snapping at their attendants. Chortling, the brigadier reached into his breast pocket and slid out a tabac stick.
