The Battle for Praethea

[FrostedZipper]

Greetings, this is my first post on this board. I'm a little uncertain as to whether or not this is suitable, being that it centers around a Storm Trooper of the Imperial Guard (though numbers of a certain two Legions will make an appearance as the story goes on). This is not my first Warhammer 40,000 story, though in my opinion it is my finest. That said, it is still a work in progress, and as such, mistakes with grammar or lore inconsistencies and the like may be present. I would appreciate it greatly if any readers would point such mistakes out to me over the course of the story.

 

Thank you.

 

The Battle for Praethea

 

Chapter One: A Rude Awakening

 

Corporal Adrian Brevek’s world was one of screeching noise.

 

He groaned and grit his teeth in the vain hope that doing so would end the audial assault that leeched at his nerves. He had endured it for what felt like aeons, praying that it would end soon. Instead it had increased in volume, with fresh voices joining the unholy choir every minute. Even in his slumber he could feel sweat bead and run down his shaved scalp as the screaming rose to a crescendo.

 

‘In the name of the Throne shut up!’

 

He awoke with a bellow. Sweat stained his cot and the bland white medical gown he was garbed in, and from the looks of it he was in the Triage Centre in the city of San Zamora.

 

He was also not alone.

 

And now he knew the source of the racket that had grated at him the last ten minutes.

 

Laying on the cot not half a metre from his right lay a guardsman. Both his legs had been amputated from the knees down and his arms lay slack at his sides. His skin was deathly pale and his silver eyes bore signs of torment Adrian had never seen in a man.

 

His guts decorated the floor… and the foetid maw of the plague zombie feasting on the contents of the poor soul’s torso. The guardsman turned his head towards Brevek, catching his movement. His abominable, agonised moaning stopped as he looked pleadingly at the recently awoken guardsman, who was transfixed by the horror before him. Movement beyond caught the recently awoken Corporal’s gaze.

 

The scene to his right was replicated all over the infirmary. Plague zombies – victims of foul archenemy magicks – streamed inside. Scattered limbs and pieces of flesh littered the entrance where the first luckless men and women had been devoured. From there the walking dead had scattered, chomping through the wounded – many of whom were awake and even now singing their agony.

 

The plague zombie feasting on the guardsman next to him froze. It raised its head slowly, until it locked its cloudy, soulless eyes with Brevek. Its mouth glistened with blood, a piece of half-chewed liver rested in between rotting teeth. The monster ground the meat and swallowed before rising and stumbling away from its dying meal, its gaze never leaving the Corporal.

 

Brevek panicked; his limbs spasmed as his brain remembered how to use them. He felt weak, hungry and wanted nothing more than to nod off again but to do so would be to die. He rolled and dropped out of bed, slamming against the cold, uncaring ground. The plague zombie had reached the edge of his bed and it extended a skeletal arm towards him, its jaw gnashing and grinding as it eyed its next meal.

 

‘Freck that,’ Brevek whispered to himself as tears began to stream from his eyes, ‘freck that, freck that, freck that, freck that!’

 

With a heave of effort he pulled himself to his feet–

 

–and almost collided with the foot of the bed of another unconscious guardsman as his legs gave out from under him. He groaned and glanced back to check on his pursuer. The plague zombie stumbled ever closer. Brevek grit his teeth in helpless frustration. If only his legs would just…

 

MOVE!

 

Suddenly he was up, his limbs strained and protested from the sudden usage but he shoved the treacherous concerns to the back of his consciousness as he bolted for a set of double doors at the opposite end of the infirmary. Dozens, perhaps even hundreds of beds filled the room, some occupied, some not. Had Brevek been in a calmer state of mind he might have thought to wake some of the unconscious wounded laying in their beds.

 

He did not. Instead he fled through the doors as though Horus himself pursued him, abandoning his brothers-in-arms to their fate.

 

He entered a dull, grey corridor. A window allowed him to peer outside and Brevek found that the building the infirmary was located in was a good ten stories high.

 

Naturally of course, he was on the top floor.

 

Brevek slammed a weak fist against the glass and cursed. A piercing shriek of pain jolted him and he cast a frightened glance at the entrance to the hell he’d escaped. The shriek became an agonised wail and Brevek squeezed his eyes shut as he tried not to imagine what exactly was going on back inside.

Not waiting to catch his breath, Brevek pressed on, staggering through the dull, grey building which sat just on the outskirts of a dull, grey city where its people had formerly lived dull grey lives. He paused as he reached a stairwell. A corpse lay pathetically on top of the stairs. It was clad in the livery of the 33rd Ustaric Mechanised Infantry, Brevek’s Division, even more importantly though; it was clearly a Storm Trooper. Closer inspection of the carapace covering the body told him that it was in fact, one of Brevek’s unit; the Spiders.

 

Brevek rolled the corpse over. The face was a cauterised, meaty ruin. A las-shot had burned the poor bastards face off. Dog tags told him it was Sergeant Etriak though. Shame. Brevek had rather liked Etriak, never a more easy-going soul in the whole 33rd. He’d clearly not been dead long, the wound was still smoking, which meant his killer could still possibly be around.

 

Brevek cast a wary glance back in the direction of the infirmary before peering down the staircase. More screams and moans of the plague-victims greeted his ears and Brevek grimaced. Getting out was clearly going to be an adventure in of itself. He turned back to the corpse and almost immediately felt his spirits lift. Etriak’s Hotshot Lasgun lay underneath him, and with any luck, Etriak still had some power packs and spare parts on his body.

 

Offering up an apology to Etriak’s soul and a quick prayer for forgiveness, Brevek set about tearing Etriak’s armour off him before hastily donning it himself. The boots were a little too large and even tightening them as much as he was able to didn’t seem to help, but Brevek immediately began to feel safer once he placed the helmet on top of his head. Brevek glanced down at Etriak’s naked corpse and offered his thanks to the Emperor and Etriak for his equipment.

Checking the Hotshot lasgun, Brevek found that the pack was half-charged, and Etriak had no less than eight more packs in ammunition pouches.

 

‘Shame he didn’t bring any rations,’ Brevek murmured. The dead trooper hadn’t even brought a canteen along with him and Brevek wondered exactly what his squadmate had planned on accomplishing here.

 

With a shake of his head, he decided it didn’t matter and began to descend the staircase slowly and cautiously. Leaving Etriak’s body to rot and fester rankled with him, but burying him was out of the question, and he had nothing to cremate him with. A frag and krak grenade rested in a grenade pouch on his hip, and for a moment he had considered using one of those, but he stopped that particular train of thought. He didn’t want to attract attention to himself.

So he trod on, hoping for the best and praying once more for his dead comrade’s forgiveness.

 

The floor below was a mess of drying, sticky blood, though no bodies were in sight. Brevek swallowed hard and held his weapon up, though his limbs screamed in protest. Brevek was no fool, fully aware that he was running on adrenaline and nerves, and that sometime soon he would crash. As much as he wanted out, he knew that he also needed something to eat and drink.

 

A check of a storage room yielded nothing but a few scattered medical supplies. Brevek was cack-handed at best when it came to first aid but he decided that something was better than nothing and picked up a discarded pack before dumping as much as he thought he’d need inside.

 

Footsteps paced outside. Brevek froze.

 

He edged towards the door to the storeroom as quietly as he could, stopping just before it and opening it a fraction in order to peer outside.

 

The crack of an autogun startled him, and he had to fight to keep his balance for a moment. Something slumped to the floor outside. Peering to the left, Brevek saw the corpse of a guardsman in a white medical gown, similar to the one he’d shed scant minutes ago. Two figures approached the body, an autogun and a lasgun between them. They were sorry sights; their leather outfits filthy with grime and other matter, loathsome symbols were scrawled all over them in blood or ink which hurt Brevek’s eyes as he gazed on them. Their faces were concealed by old, worn re-breather masks.

Cultists…

 

Heretics.

 

Enemies.

 

Brevek had little doubt that he could drop the both of them. The carapace armour covering his body was more than capable of shrugging off a las-shot or a slug round, and from the looks of it the flimsy, filthy leather garb the heretics wouldn’t withstand so much as a slap. However Brevek was still in a building housing Throne-knew how many plague zombies, plus an unknown number of heretic troopers. No, playing it silent was the only way he’d make it out alive.

The two heretics stooped low over the body and one poked it softly with his rifle. One barked at the other in a guttural tone, speaking a blunt, barbed language which sounded almost as bad as the heretics looked… and smelt. Brevek tried his best not to gag; it was, without much doubt, the foulest odour he had ever encountered.

 

One of the cultists got to his feet and barked what Brevek assumed was an order as the other cultist nodded and the pair turned on their heel before heading further down the corridor. Brevek waited a minute after the footsteps had faded before peering out. The corridor was unoccupied. He took a cautious step out, weapon raised. Nothing shot at him. Brevek finally exited the room and decided to head to the lower floor, unwilling to risk a chance of running into more of those cultists.

 

Brevek trod softly, his weapon constantly up and his nerves on a hairline trigger. The floor below was similarly decorated to the one above. Patterns in the blood, footprints and scare, scattered, spent power packs told a story of token resistance. Still no bodies though. Perhaps they were all upstairs munching on the soldiers lying in their beds? The thought was both comforting and disturbing.

 

A check of a few rooms yielded a stale ration bar. Brevek wolfed it down anyway, but that seemed only to worsen his pangs. He wanted more, and he wasn’t entirely certain there was more to be found.

 

A cluttering from behind him as he scrounged through a cardboard box in a room full of monitors brought his attention up. He dived for cover behind a desk and snatched up his lasgun, his heartbeat skyrocketing as he waited for the door to swivel open and for the dead to come swarming inside…

 

Nothing happened.

 

Brevek waited a minute. Two. Three, before finally peering around the corner of the desk. The door was still shut. Brevek breathed a heavy sigh and almost slumped to the ground. He stopped himself an inch before, hauling himself upright. If he lay down now he’d just continue to lie there until his already fledging strength finally bled dry. Despite his aching joints, he knew that – until he found more sustenance – he had to keep moving.

 

Digging up fresh resolve, Brevek stalked towards the door and exited–

 

–bumping right into the chest of a heretic at the head of a small gang of the dead.

 

The heretic froze for a moment, and Brevek could almost register shock through the sickly green lens of the heretic’s re-breather mask. Brevek’s hesitation lasted far shorter. Needless to say, it proved fatal for the heretic, who soon crumpled to the ground, his guts a smouldering pulp.

 

The dead, unfortunately (and ironically), reacted much quicker than the mortal who had herded them. The first – a medical orderly with half her face burned off – charged and latched onto Brevek’s arms. In peak condition, Brevek might have been able to handle the dead woman, as it was; the plague victim bore the Storm Trooper to the ground and latched onto his wrist with her slavering maw, Brevek’s lasgun caught in between the two.

 

The teeth were stopped only by the layers of carapace padding that covered Brevek’s body, but even through the armour, the force exerted behind those teeth was formidable. Brevek kicked out and dislodged the woman’s grip on one of his arms. Reacting quickly, Brevek clutched the grip of his weapon and threw the butt of the lasrifle into the jaw of the plague zombie with as much force as he could muster. It seemed to be enough as the disgusting creature released its grip on Brevek, who pulled his feet up towards him and pushed. The woman sprawled onto the floor away from him, but the Storm Trooper had little time to react as the other plague victims were already pressing in.

 

Brevek, now beginning to panic, pushed himself away from the gang of stumbling horrors, all thoughts of resistance abandoned even in spite of the weapon in his hands. He crawled to his feet and ran, abandoning all pretence of stealth.

 

Three flights of stairs rushed by, faces both dead and masked caught sight of him and surged after the fleeing trooper. Hasty shots were taken, but aside from one that glanced off a shoulder guard, none touched him. As he descended he became vaguely aware of shouting coming from outside in the same barbed tongue the heretics spoke, but his brain, operating solely on the ‘flight’ instinct, ignored the information.

 

A large, brutish heretic wielding a power mace blocked the exit to the building, a butcher’s apron clothed him, which was spattered with dried blood, and a collection of cruel looking blades was attached to his waist. Without even thinking about it, Brevek shot the heretic in the head and was out of the building before the corpse had even hit the ground.

 

Gunfire stitched its way towards him and Brevek dived behind a pillar.

 

The heretics had brought out a stubber and were now perforating the air with heavy calibre slugs. A glance from behind the pillar, followed almost immediately by muzzle flash and another barrage of gunfire told Brevek that the weapon was set up in a half-destroyed industrial building on the opposite side of the street. He had nothing on his person to even think about making a move, which left him two options as he noticed the first of his undead pursuers lurch out from within the triage centre:

 

Stay put and die.

 

Or try to run and die.

 

No wait… three options. Brevek decided he could simply put a hotshot round through his skull and deny the scum the pleasure of watching him squirm. It could also potentially stop his return as a member of the plague-ridden undead. Brevek sighed heavily in defeat as he shouldered his weapon and took aim at the forehead of the closest of the plague zombies, preparing for a painful death.

 

Gunfire suddenly ripped into the shambling dead, tearing rotting limbs and great chunks of foetid flesh from their bodies. Brevek blinked in confusion. Had the heretic gunners mistaken the dead for other Guard? Impossible, the lurching gait of the plague zombies was easy to make out, and even at that distance – barely fifty metres away – the only explanation would be short-sightedness.

 

Brevek poked his head out from behind the pillar.

 

The gun opened fire, and Brevek flinched, but the torrent of slugs only struck another small gang of plague zombies who had shuffled outside. He could see many of them clustering around the entrance, and in their desire for Brevek’s tender flesh they had gotten each other stuck in the doorway, a seething press of bodies. Brevek could just make out some of the masked heretics behind the throng of walking corpses, and grinned at the idea of their frustration.

 

‘Come on out! It’s clear!’ a voice in clipped Gothic called out from the other end of the street. Brevek peered cautiously towards the position of the stubber.

‘Come on already!’ the voice called urgently, ‘we need to get out of here before more show up!’

 

Brevek paused for a moment, casting an uncertain look at the open street before him and the press of undead which were just now beginning to untangle themselves and escape the confines of the entrance to the makeshift triage centre. Brevek squeezed his eyes shut.

 

‘Nothing ventured, nothing gained,’ he muttered and took a step out from cover.

 

He stood with his eyes shut, just waiting for heavy slugs to rip into him and end his miserable life then and there.

 

‘What are you doing?’ the voice called in exasperation, ‘don’t just stand there like a witless mutant; run already!’

 

Brevek ran. As he did he became aware of the dead beginning to stream out from the ten story building behind him. The stubber opened up again, tearing through the dead with quick bursts of fire. A couple of heretic troopers took a few potshots from the entrance of the building, though these were poorly aimed at best and none found a mark in anything short of an uncaring rockrete wall.

 

He crossed twenty-five metres. The stubber was still blazing automatic fire at the steady river of bodies following the fleeing prey and the roar of gunfire. An aimed shot from a window chipped the road not a foot from Brevek but he kept pushing himself onwards until eventually he made it, diving through a blown-out window and making his way towards where he thought the stubber was. It was as then that he realised with sudden, clenching panic that the gun had stopped firing.

 

Las-shots and solid slug rounds began pelting the factory as heretics brought more guns to the windows while others took cautious steps outside, trailing the still considerable number of plague zombies who stumbled towards the building. Brevek hauled himself up a half-destroyed staircase and crashed into another body as he rounded a corner.

 

Soon as he was down his weapon was up and pointed at the threat…

 

Only it wasn’t a threat.

 

If the stubber one of them was lugging was any indication, chances were that Brevek had stumbled across the very group of people who had saved his life. There were six of them; three were clearly civilians, two men wearing dirty, grey overalls and a grey-haired middle-aged woman in a clerk’s business attire. All three of them clutched pilfered lasguns and a shotgun.

 

The other three were military; the first – a woman Brevek’s own age if his eyes told him correctly – appeared to be a member of the San Zamora Militia in her uninspired, dark brown fatigues with the crest of Saint Zamora embroidered on the left breast of her uniform. Brevek noted that she was not unlovely, though her nose hooked a little too much for his liking and scars cris-crossed her left cheek, marring her otherwise slightly above-average features.

 

The second was definitely Guard; a massive bastard who looked like he hailed from the Grecidos 8th Drop Trooper Regiment. Good soldiers, solid and dependable but more than a little fanatical in their faith to the Emperor, which was fine when directed at the enemy (when they weren’t ignoring orders or charging unsupported at fully manned fortifications) but they seemed to hold themselves in higher regard than the other regiments for their ‘purer’ faith. This Grecidan was large, youthful and tanned with hooded eyes and a tired expression.

 

The last was a man of average build with silvery hair and intelligent, suspicious eyes that seemed to bore into Brevek’s skull. He seemed to be in his mid-forties and was clothed in yet more dull grey flak armour, covered by a dirtied maroon greatcoat. A grandiose, peaked cap rested atop his head and the instant Brevek laid his gaze upon it his eyes widened in horror. However, it had been the aura of stern authority he carried which had alerted him as to what this man was.

 

‘Oh Throne…’ Brevek heard himself mutter to himself unconsciously as he stared at the Commissar looming above him.

___

[Brother Tyler]

Fiction at the B&C must feature characters from our focus armies as the subjects. If you can shift your story appropriately, it can remain.