FSE

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This story is purely fictional and is in no way affiliated with or endorsed by Games Workshop.

The factions mentioned, the settings, and some of the characters are copyrighted by Games Workshop and are used without permission.

As fan fiction, this story falls under the term fair use.

This is the 41st millennium. For more than a hundred centuries, the Emperor has sat motionless on the golden throne of Terra. By the will of the gods, he is the master of mankind and, through the power of his inexhaustible armies, the ruler over millions of worlds. He is a decaying corpse, imbued with misunderstood powers from the dark age of technology. He is also the eternal ruler of the Empire, for whom a thousand souls are sacrificed every day so that he may never truly die.

But even in his immortal sleep, the Emperor continues his eternal watch. Mighty war fleets traverse the demon-haunted miasma of the Warp, the only connection between distant stars, illuminated by the Astronomican, the psionic manifestation of the Emperor's will. Huge armies march into battle in his name on countless worlds, and the most powerful among them are the Adeptus Astartes, the Space Marines – biotechnically bred super-warriors. They are supported by thousands upon thousands of Imperial Army soldiers, countless planetary defense forces, the ever-vigilant Inquisition, and the Tech-Priests of the Adeptus Mechanicus. But their deeds are barely enough to keep the ever-present threat of xenos, heretics, mutants, and worse at bay.

To live in this time means to be one among countless billions. It means to live under an unimaginably cruel and bloody regime. This is the story of this time. Forget the power of technology and science, for much has been forgotten and will never be learned again. Forget the promise of progress and enlightenment, for in the dark future there is only war. Peace is unthinkable among the stars, only eternal struggle and the laughter of bloodthirsty gods.

The Deliverer of the Emperor's Will glided silently through the vacuum between worlds. As sedate as a bear just awakening from hibernation, the troop transport moved with its escort from one crisis hotspot to the next. The sector to which they and their escort had been assigned was too small and insignificant to justify a permanent, larger presence of the Imperial Army and its fleet, which is why the option of a mobile intervention force had been chosen.

The Deliverer was not an elegant, sleek, or even dangerous ship. The nearly twenty-kilometer-long freighter resembled a gigantic coffin rather than the flying cathedrals of warships used by the Imperial Navy. Its squat hull, several dozen meters thick, was scarred and marked by centuries of service, during which it had transported its cargo of troops, vehicles, and ammunition through the ether with the elegance of a walrus.

For the regiments of the 100th to 111th Generika, as the troops of this contingent had been named, it was a recruiting office, training and education center, barracks, manufactorum, and transport for an entire army in one, practically a city at war, always bringing the troops exactly where the planetary defense forces of their sector faced an overwhelming enemy.

And it was always needed, which is why the Deliverer had been on the move practically non-stop since its launch – to bring the Emperor's peace to his worlds.

Its constant hunger for new recruits was satisfied anew by every world it visited, only to flare up again in the next conflict when the fresh soldiers had been fed directly into the meat grinder of war.

It was a constant cycle in which a single life was worth only as much as it cost the enemy to extinguish it, and you were already considered a veteran if you survived your first week in the trenches.

The troops of the 106th Generics had just put down an uprising on one of the sectoral agri-worlds, and now they were gathering up the remaining soldiers before heading off to the next crisis.

So the huge ship still hung sluggishly in orbit, while the smaller landing craft buzzed around it like bees, waiting for landing clearance in one of the huge hangars. It was a spectacle that – given the multitude of vehicles and the miraculous absence of collisions – was astonishingly reminiscent of organized chaos and filled an uninvolved observer with awe.

However, those involved in this ballet in the vacuum had no eyes for the bizarre beauty of what they were doing there, for they were not only used to this sight, they were tired of it.

All who had once become part of this reality and settled on one of these cruisers were chronically tired and tense, for they knew that even when this operation was over, they would have little time to catch their breath.

The enemies of the Empire never slept, and the Empire had many enemies; here in the borderlands, they were more numerous than anywhere else.

Every recruit, every soldier, and every pilot who had completed their mission rushed back to their quarters as quickly as possible to make the most of the time they had left before the inevitable happened again.

The quarters, as they called the cells provided to them by the navy, were cold, barren, dark, and less than five square meters in size. The only light illuminating the small room was a small, illuminated chronograph that slowly but inexorably counted down the seconds until the next roll call, its pale green glow reflected off the bare walls made of plasteel and plastic. This pale light made it possible to see the furnishings, if one could generously call them that. They consisted of a narrow bunk that could be folded up against the wall if a little more space was needed, and in the corner next to the entrance was a wet room with a shower and toilet, separated by a folding wall, which did not really deserve to be called that. In front of the bunk bed was a small but surprisingly sturdy folding table attached to the wall, and behind it was a rudimentary kitchen unit with a kind of refrigerator and an oven module, the latter also serving as a meager heater. The walls also generously featured a few storage compartments where you could stow your belongings, if you had any.

Spartan, even under the best of circumstances, but it was already one of the better cells, because it was not located directly on the outer hull of the gigantic troop transporter, where temperatures often dropped below freezing or where there was no chance of survival if the hull was breached. Here inside the ship, the temperatures were at least more stable, and there were plenty of bulkheads between the hull and the corridors where this cell was located. It was noticeable that these areas of the ship were much busier than the outer ones, and thus the noise level was significantly higher, but this was more than compensated for by the lack of snoring comrades in the neighboring bunks of a crew quarters. To top it all off, it was a single cell, not one of the mass quarters where they housed the rookies. After all, these truly luxurious cabins were reserved for the veterans, the sergeants and officers; those who had survived the first days of the campaign and had already climbed the ranks. It was a dubious privilege that usually did not last long, because even these infantrymen rarely survived the first weeks of a campaign.

A deceptive silence hung over the small room, and the recycled air hung heavy and dust-laden in the cell. The tiny particles danced in the faint breeze from the ventilation system, and whenever one floated through the glow of the time display, it seemed to glow green briefly before retreating back into the shadows.

However, the silence was abruptly interrupted when the keypad next to the door came to life and impassively announced that the opening mechanism had been activated from outside. For a moment, nothing happened, then there was a beep and, with the hiss of escaping compressed air, the door's pneumatic cylinders sprang into action. With a creak, they pushed the heavy steel bulkhead aside on its rails, revealing the dimly lit corridor in front of the cell. The vaguely humanoid-looking shadow in the light of the corridor swayed slightly and waited a moment longer before squeezing through the narrow door into the room, cutting off the thread of cold light from the lumen strip.

The darkness in the cell enveloped the shadow, and for a moment it seemed as if it were relaxing before the door closed again with the same hiss, shutting out the world with all its noise, light, and hustle and bustle and locking it in the gloom of the cell. In the silence, the shadow's quiet, regular breathing and the soft rustling of his uniform as he slowly raised his hand and searched for the light switch drowned out all other sounds. After a moment of blind groping, the familiar click of the sturdy switch, which had felt more hands than there were people on this ship, finally sounded.

It remained dark.

“Poukram!”

the shadow cursed wearily and pressed the switch again. Nothing. The typical hollow sound of metal hitting metal followed before the shadow pressed the switch once more. The lumen strip on the ceiling of the small room came to life, flooding it with its dirty, yellowish glow and just managing to dispel the shadows, only to create new, deeper abysses under the furniture.

The outline transformed into a female guard of the Imperial Army, her olive-green uniform worn and dirty. She squeezed her eyes shut and groaned at the sudden brightness, turning her head away as it began to sting.

“When will I finally learn …?”

she muttered in frustration, fumbling with the switch to dim the light. Only when it had faded to a dim twilight and the stinging had subsided did she open her eyes again. It still took a moment to adjust to the light, and the effort was written all over her young face. She looked around her small quarters wearily before taking her lasgun from her shoulder and clipping it into a holder near the door.

She leaned against the bare wall as if seeking support and took a deep breath.

“Another day …”

It was a statement that held no joy, only the certainty that with each passing day, the last one was another twenty-four hours closer.

Slowly, she raised her hands and opened the chin strap of her helmet. As soon as the pressure of the small pad under her jaw eased, she moved it carefully and removed the reinforced composite fiber shell.

It was part of the standard equipment for every Imperial Army guard and had changed repeatedly over the centuries to ensure optimal, or rather, optimized protection for soldiers. Just enough to block hits that would be fatal without a helmet, but not enough to ward off those that would probably kill the soldier anyway if they landed.

“Don't waste any material …”

She repeated the mantra that the tech-priests always recited to her when she asked for more equipment. A soldier was equipped with exactly what was known to survive long enough to be thrown at the enemy. No more – but also no less.

She looked at her helmet, whose scratched top had suffered a few new wounds during today's fighting. Miraculously, none of the projectiles had penetrated the hard shell.

“Lucky …?”

The question was justified, because most guards did not survive the first days of combat, and those who did usually found themselves facing even worse enemies. A quick death could therefore be as much a mercy as a long life was a punishment.

Lost in thought, her finger traced almost lovingly along a deep, smooth groove left in her helmet by an enemy lasgun, whose poor marksmanship was the reason she had survived. As her finger continued to slide back and forth along the groove, her thoughts wandered to memories of some of her comrades who had been less fortunate than she.

Only when her fingers felt a sharp ridge at the end of the groove, which almost cut through her glove, was she able to tear herself away from her thoughts. She looked at the helmet again, turned it over and over in her hands, and then decided to exchange it for an undamaged one at the next opportunity. For now, however, she put it back on a shelf and began to open the individual fasteners on her bandolier, which held the breastplate and shoulder armor of her armor to her body.

“Oh … I knew I registered an impact,”

she murmured almost indifferently as her fingers ran over a melted fastener that could no longer be opened. Her lips twisted into a wry smile.

“The power pack must have been empty …”

she noted with the weary conviction of a professional who had seen similar hits dozens of times before. As she looked down at herself, she examined the many small metal beads on her clothing that were so typical of such hits. Some of her comrades had them on their faces and hands, but she seemed to have been spared that. The incredible heat of the flash vaporized the metal and any other material. However, if the weapon's power pack was almost completely empty, then it was only enough for a melted lock.

She wasn't fooling herself: if she had taken the hit directly and not her armor, it would still have been a pretty nasty wound.

“But not today … Not today …”

she whispered, slowly opening the remaining fasteners. It was still possible to take it off, it was just a little more complicated and would require a bit more flexibility; something her body was vehemently refusing to do at the moment. She considered for a moment whether it was worth the trouble to simply cut the strap and beg the quartermaster for a replacement, but ultimately decided against it.

The soldier performed a minor circus act as she wriggled backwards out of the bandolier like an escape artist, much to the displeasure of her tired and cramped back. However, once this battle was won, she took the harness and hung it, along with the armor plates, on a coat hook embedded in the wall next to the entrance door. The plates, made of the same material as her helmet, didn't weigh very much, but now that she had taken them off, she felt a lot lighter. She looked down at herself again and examined her uniform. If she didn't know better, she could have sworn she had been wearing the same one for many years. The heavy synthetic fabric from which the clothing was woven was considered indestructible, and under normal conditions of use, it probably was. However, during the trench warfare she had been involved in over the past few weeks, the uniform had been subjected to stresses far beyond what the Munitorum had deemed necessary.

Similar to the helmet, the uniform had been designed on the assumption that the soldier would not survive higher stresses anyway, and therefore it had not been deemed necessary to increase the wear resistance of the fabric.

There were new holes on her knees where the armored knee pads had rubbed through the fabric, and there were a few small burn holes where the clasp of her bandolier had been hit. With a sigh, she ran her fingers over the new holes and decided to make a makeshift repair later. A few more patches wouldn't be noticeable. They would probably even contribute to her camouflage.

After completing her superficial analysis of her uniform, she opened the snaps on her gloves and took them off. These protective gloves, made of synthetic leather for once, were thin, but over the last few weeks they had become something like a second skin for her. It almost felt wrong not to wear them, because without the tough protective layer, her hands were vulnerable and far too soft for the harsh everyday life in the Imperial Army. She tugged at the individual fingers of her left glove to remove it from her own, until it finally slipped off completely, revealing her delicate hand. She rubbed her fingers together briefly and clenched her fist a few times before repeating the procedure on her right hand. But when the glove finally revealed her second hand, all that was there was a crude prosthesis made of black plastic and steel, whose usefulness was undeniable, but whose visual appeal left much to be desired.

“Appeal … pah …”

she muttered grumpily. Appeal was the last thing she really cared about as she began to unzip her uniform jacket. The familiar sound, which she thought sounded like a plastic spoon being dragged across the rough surface of a rifle stock, filled the room briefly before she finally took off her jacket a little awkwardly and laid it on the table.

Her gaze fell on her arm again. This little miracle of technology. Normally, the hospital sisters and tech priests wouldn't use any of the really good, new bionics on someone like her; those were reserved for the generals and commissars.

For frontline pigs like her, there was the leftover box, prostheses and bionics that had already been fitted to dozens of other soldiers.

So she was all the more surprised that her arm prosthesis was almost a small work of art, even if it still wasn't state of the art.

Of course, she wasn't the first to wear this prosthetic limb, and once again she wondered how many other soldiers had already used this part. The battle scars on the chassis, the countless small scratches, the peeling paint, and the rounded edges told of many battles, but unfortunately for her, there was no manufacturing stamp, model number, or anything else on the entire prosthesis that could have been used to determine its age. One of the tech-priests had made it at some point, probably from leftover parts, or as a kind of prototype for a prosthesis that would later be used for a higher-ranking officer. That would at least explain the quality.

The sight of the prosthesis no longer shocked her, but the memory of how she had lost her own arm crept back into her consciousness uninvited whenever she saw the bionic limb.

In retrospect, it had been a perfectly normal day in the life of a guard. They had landed on Artreiius III after the planetary defense forces had desperately called for help. Orcs had gained a foothold on the planet generations ago and were now engaged in a never-ending war against the local militias.

The original invasion by the green-skinned creatures had been successfully repelled, but these muscle-bound aliens were like cockroaches: you could never really exterminate them. At best, their population could be kept in check by conducting regular, systematic punitive expeditions into the infested areas, slaughtering the existing orcs and burning their carcasses with promethium. In the end, however, they would always come back and cause problems again and again.

Apparently, the current administration had not taken the threat seriously enough, and the punitive expeditions had been suspended for a long period of time. This had allowed the green-skinned creatures to significantly increase their troop strength, and with their numbers, the raids on neighboring areas had also increased. By the time the planetary leadership finally took the matter seriously enough, it was already too late, and the local troops, with their inadequately equipped soldiers, were no longer able to control the orcs.

By the time reinforcements from the mobile task force finally arrived, the militias had their backs against the wall and faced an enemy numbering in the millions who would stop at nothing.

In a battle that lasted weeks, the regiments of the 102nd and 103rd Generika had pushed the greenskins back into their original territories. Despite heavy losses, morale was high and victory seemed certain.

It happened on the afternoon of the twelfth day, when a final, desperate attempt by the greenskins to break out of their positions surged forward. Led by a mob of gigantic orcs, the force encountered well-prepared defenses.

What had initially looked like an easy victory turned out to be a merciless slaughter as wave after wave was cut down, only to be replaced by more orcs. While the greenskins continued to throw themselves into battle openly and relentlessly, equipped with crude melee weapons and roaring, they ran out of ammunition after a short time. As part of the defense forces, she had been assigned four power packs, and even though each of these batteries had enough capacity to power her laser rifle for about 80 shots, she had used up the first three of these energy cells alarmingly quickly.

The empty magazine clattered to the ground as the soldier reminded herself that the 320 rounds might have been enough under normal combat conditions, where an enemy could be pinned down by a demonstration of superior firepower. However, in the face of an enemy whose morale could not be broken, but on the contrary, was fueled by it, such a meager reserve was only a drop in the bucket.

She was in the process of ramming her last power pack into her weapon when she saw the huge shadow jump over the barrier.

It all happened so fast, and the force of the impact knocked her off her feet. The Nob, who, despite all his injuries, had taken advantage of the brief ceasefire and sprinted across no man's land, came leaping over the last barrier with the war cry characteristic of his species and straight into her. Even today, she could still hear his “WAAAAAAAAARGH!” as if it were yesterday.

He had knocked her to the ground and literally buried her beneath him. As soon as he was back on his feet, she had desperately tried to aim her much too long rifle at him. Too slowly, because he had already raised his cleaver and shouted his ferocity in her face before he had brought the crude blade down on her and severed her left arm just below the shoulder.

That moment was indelibly burned into her memory. It wasn't so much the pain that haunted her, no, it was pretty much everything else.

As quick as the attack itself had been, what happened afterward felt as if it were happening in slow motion. The wild, yellow eyes of the green-skinned creature, sparkling not with anger but with excitement and amusement, the untamed, rough laughter he let out as his heavy, muscular arm swung down, and then that feeling.

It was hard to describe. It started with pressure, incredible pressure, as that blunt axe in his paw struck her arm. The fabric of the uniform, which was cut and tear-resistant under normal conditions, put up all the resistance it could muster, while beneath it her upper arm was already being crushed.

Then came the moment when the fabric finally gave way and the blade hit her skin, a tissue that was significantly more elastic but much less tear-resistant than her uniform. The coldness of the steel that pierced her skin in a fraction of a second remained in her memory, as did the warmth of her blood, which instantly spurted from the gaping wound.

Her muscles, battle-hardened and trained incessantly since early childhood, were as little an obstacle to the orc's brutal strength as her skin had been. One after another, they tore under the unstoppable swing of his weapon, and her muscles, tense with adrenaline and stress, snapped back like rubber bands, exposing her upper arm bone.

She would never forget the feeling of the jagged edge of the cleaver hitting her bone. The unrelenting pressure and the scraping as it slid across the surface of her humerus for a moment. Finally, the blade caught hold and continued its path through her arm almost unchecked, shattering her bone and then shredding the rest of her arm.

What seemed like an eternity to her had in reality lasted less than the blink of an eye, from the moment the axe struck her arm to the moment it impacted one of the support beams behind her. The force of the blow had driven the blade deep into the wall, and it was only her good fortune that the blade seemed to have jammed in the wood when the orc, still laughing, pulled on the handle.

As her opponent braced his foot against the wall and placed his second paw on the shaft of his hatchet, she finally raised her laser rifle and fired.

The explosion that followed the discharge of her power pack into the orc's head was like catharsis for her.

“Only in death does duty end.”

she had muttered at the time, shortly before losing consciousness, fully convinced that she would not survive the injury. When she regained consciousness in the infirmary a little later, she felt as if a herd of Grox had trampled her.

---

She was now sitting on the bunk, this barely padded caricature of a bed that was uncomfortable even compared to the nest she had lived in as a child in the lower town of her old home. Nevertheless, it was better than sleeping on the hard, cold floor and certainly better than being housed in one of the crew quarters.

Absentmindedly, she ran the finger of her remaining hand over the scars where the sisters of the Ordo Hospitalis had fused the bionics with her flesh. It was strange; she felt the pain, that typical burning, stinging pain when a wound had not yet fully healed and the inflammation still lingered in the scar, but her brain did not seem quite convinced and sounded as if everything was fine.

“It feels wrong …”

she whispered, slowly clenching her fist a few times. The movements seemed somehow artificial. They lacked smoothness, refinement; they were stiff, inorganic… numb. Numb wasn't the right word, because the artificial nerves did generate stimuli, registering her movements and reporting them and the accompanying sensory impressions to her brain, but they weren't right. They felt as if they weren't her own.

One of the nurses had explained to her that since she had never experienced the pain of losing her arm, she would never really be able to accept these new impulses. Her body simply regarded this prosthesis as an additional limb, not a replacement.

It was all too much for her to comprehend; she was a simple soldier, not a specialist in biomechanical integration. With her lips pressed together, she watched her arm move with the almost inaudible whirring of the actuators and servos. Sometimes it seemed to her as if it had a life of its own when it made these small, unconscious movements. A slight twitch here, a little tension there. She had been told that the machine spirit of her prosthesis first had to learn to interpret the signals from her nerves, to filter out these subliminal, unwanted signals, and that it would take some time before everything worked smoothly. Until then, it would simply creep her out.

The sigh that escaped the soldier sounded exhausted and worn out. It was pointless to think about it too much. She bent down to her boots and untied the laces one by one, wondering why the Munitorum had never developed a better, faster method of tying these boots. However, the thought was dismissed as quickly as it had arisen, because it was not her job to worry about these things; that was what tech-priests and the Munitorum were for.

She widened the first boot and pulled her foot out. It felt good to be able to move her toes freely again. Although the guard had to admit that once broken in, these combat boots were surprisingly comfortable. After three full days, however, she was usually glad to take them off.

She gently massaged her battered foot a little before placing it on the bare floor of her cell next to her footwear. The floor, made of plastic steel and covered with a thin layer of linoleum-like plastic, was cold and hard, especially compared to the sultry warmth that had prevailed in her boot. However, this did not bother the young soldier; she was used to much worse.

Now that her first foot was freed from its prison, she turned to the second. Again, she widened the shaft and lifted her foot. However, it looked less elegant, and she had to hold the boot with both hands as a black, less articulated foot emerged.

Another prosthesis, simpler and cruder than the arm prosthesis, but significantly more robust and reliable. With a soft click, she placed the artificial foot next to the other and compared the two. The prosthesis was purely mechanical, with only a few joints, but it worked perfectly, unlike her arm.

Even as she ran her hand over the plastic of the prosthesis, she thought she heard the whistling of artillery shells flying overhead, and when she looked up, she found herself back on the battlefield on Antrakes II. Back in the trenches, back in the dirt, back in hell.

She felt the familiar weight of her rifle in her hands and she felt her right foot. The heat of the Antrakes sun burned her neck and sweat pooled in her boots, with nowhere else to go.

Then came the first explosions, shock waves and fine dust washing over her trench. The Earthshaker shells lived up to their name as they destroyed enemy positions on the other side of no man's land, just before the next salvo made its long journey from their own artillery positions, thirty-two kilometers behind the front line, to their opponents' trenches.

In moments like these, just before the guns' maximum range was fully exploited, you could see the shells flying through the sky as they slowly but surely tumbled back to earth.

For the guards on the ground, every single salvo sailing across the sky was a blessing that meant death and destruction for their enemies, especially since they would no longer have to deliver it themselves. It was an assurance that the command had their backs.

The enemy's anti-aircraft defenses, which had previously been busy monitoring the airspace, began firing at the artillery shells. It was a hopeless endeavor, a sign of the desperation that must have reigned in the enemy's ranks. The entire trench section cheered as another salvo struck unhindered.

But then the unthinkable happened.

This time, one of the shells was hit and exploded over their own positions. The shrapnel, now raining down from the sky red-hot, was at least as deadly as the enemy's shots.

Even as she and her comrades took cover, the first ones struck around them.

When her lower leg was hit, it didn't even hurt for a split second. The shock and adrenaline were so strong that she didn't notice until she stumbled while sprinting. She hit the muddy ground of the trench and slid another meter before coming to a stop; only then did the pain hit her like a bolt of lightning, shooting from her foot through her entire body.

The burning hot agony almost robbed her of her senses as her body struggled for breath. Unable to crawl any further or even scream, she lay face down in the trench.

Time is a capricious lover: when something is beautiful or fun, it escapes you and you can't hold on to it, but when it's hell on earth, or even just boring as hell, it sticks to you like a love-crazed Grox.

She didn't know how long she lay in the ankle-deep mud without any of her comrades checking on her, but eventually, despite the pain and heavy blood loss, she managed to pull herself up against the wall of the trench. She used her belt to tie off her leg, but wasn't sure if it would be enough.

There was still no sign of the other soldiers; the position had probably been abandoned and no one would come looking for her, let alone find her in time. As a simple guard, she didn't carry a voxcaster and was therefore unable to call for help.

“And even if I did, no one would believe me. It would be too obvious an ambush by the enemy.”

she admitted to herself with narrowed eyes, the sarcasm bitter on her tongue. She would die here, she was sure of that. Alone.

The pain slowly subsided and gave way to a dull throbbing, which in turn slowly slipped into numbness. It was a clear sign that it would soon be over. With this grim certainty, she fumbled for her sidearm.

She had been one of the lucky ones who had been issued a laser pistol in addition to her laser rifle. Not really useful in this war scenario, where it was basically a sign that the battle was lost if the enemy had already gotten close enough to use this weapon effectively.

For a headshot at close range, however, it was more than adequate.

With trembling hands, she lifted the slender weapon and checked the power cell, which was inserted into the grip of the weapon like a magazine. It was loaded.

“Wonderful …”

she murmured softly and raised the weapon. She closed her eyes and clenched her teeth as she slowly wrapped her index finger around the trigger.

“Recruit, the Emperor forbids even the lowliest soldier to end his own life.”

His voice was hard as steel, yet there was an understanding in it that she had rarely heard among the ranks of the Guard. She opened her eyes and looked up, but did not yet remove the pistol from her temple.

Standing on the upper edge of the trench was one of the commissars assigned to her unit. His wide, red coat fluttered slightly in the wind as he scanned the horizon for enemy movements before turning his gaze back to her.

“Lower your weapon, recruit. Ammunition that is not fired at the enemy is wasted ammunition. If you are unable to continue fighting, go to the infirmary, but do not weaken the morale of the troops by shirking your duty!”

The order was clear and his tone brooked no argument, but as she slowly lowered her weapon and tried to formulate a suitable response, an officer came to her aid.

“Commissioner, allow me to take the recruit to the infirmary. She is the only survivor in this section and clearly unable to reach the infirmary on her own.”

She couldn't see him directly, as he was standing on the other side of the trench, but his voice was angelic, warm, and caring. When he jumped into the trench to her, his shadow darkened her view, and all she could see for a moment was a dark outline whose broad shoulders and strong arms bent down to her without hesitation.

“Good, take the recruit to the infirmary, but hurry up, we have a war to fight. March, march!”

ordered the commissar as the soldier lifted her off the ground, pressed her against his chest, and immediately strode off with her toward the infirmary.

She remembered clearly that he smelled of sweat, smoke, and blood, but also of something else she couldn't quite place, something that made her feel safe. In general, when she thought back on her time in the army, she had never felt as safe as she did in that all too brief moment while the officer – she didn't even know his name – carried her to the field hospital.

She remembered how she had desperately tried to express her gratitude, how she had clung to his broad shoulders and didn't want to let go, afraid they would turn her into a servant because she could no longer fight. He had reassured her the whole time, encouraging her and assuring her that the Sisters of the Holy Flame would patch her up again.

She looked down at her artificial foot and sighed. Yes, they had patched her up again, with a replacement part that had already served as a prosthesis for who knows how many other soldiers.

She had now taken off her uniform pants and laid them on the small table that served as a dining, work, and storage area, as there was little storage space in the spartan cell. As she slowly sat up, her eyes gradually wandered up her body, observing the marks left by a life of constant conflict.

Scars, bruises, scratches, bumps, and small, unhealed wounds covered her slim but muscular body. She was no longer even aware of the dull pain that accompanied her every movement; it had become so normal for her that she would probably notice its absence even more. She glanced at one of the small shelves built into the wall and the pill boxes standing there: combat drugs, stimulants, which were not mandatory but were recommended by the officers and commissars.

“Against fear and for greater performance …”

she reminded herself, thinking of the penal battalions that always fought on the front lines and were forcibly administered these drugs.

Life in the Guard was no picnic, not at all.

Her gaze fell back on her body, back to her scars. Where the bionics had fused with her flesh, the skin was red, swollen, and inflamed. Again, she ran a finger along the sore line and somehow enjoyed the stinging pain as she thought about how lucky she had been so far.

She was a simple soldier, a sergeant, a veteran of the Guard, but still “just” a simple soldier. She could indeed be glad that they hadn't lobotomized her the first time around and turned her into a damn door opener. Apparently, the God-Emperor had been kind to her, and it had been deemed a better use of resources to give her not just one, but two prostheses.

Her leg prosthesis was quite simple, basically a better wooden leg. Good enough for service, but nothing special.

“Two weeks already …”

she muttered, clenching her artificial hand several times. At this point, she had probably survived longer than any of the others who had been recruited with her.

With a deep sigh, she leaned back and enjoyed the coldness of the wall against her back for a moment before her gaze fell on the clock. She should make use of the time she had left.

She felt dirty. No, dirty wasn't the right word for the state she was in. She was filthy. Yes, filthy was more like it. The fighting had been short but intense, and she hadn't had a chance to clean herself up yet. Hygiene was something that was almost always neglected in the field, but not because they didn't know any better. All the soldiers, all the officers, and even the commissars were well aware that basic hygiene was important not only from a health perspective but also from a moral one. It was just that the average life expectancy of a recruit was too short for poor hygiene to become a problem.

This was only the case when, contrary to expectations, the soldiers survived longer than the administration had anticipated, and even then, the problem was usually solved by rotating those troops to the rear and replacing them with fresh recruits. This usually happened every three to four days, but this time the fighting had not lasted long enough and after the first three days it was clear that the enemy would be defeated in the next few days. So the troops were left at the front, slogans of encouragement were played over the loudspeakers, and the fresh troops were saved for another battle.

In short, it was time for a shower. The first bit of normality since she had set foot on the planet.

And so the soldier straightened up again and looked over at the small wet room, which was conveniently part of her small quarters. It could hardly be called a bathroom; rather, it was a shower tray recessed into the floor, which could be separated from the rest of the cell by a folding wall–after all, you didn't want to flood the whole place.

It wasn't much, really, but it was significantly more than what she had available in the field or in the crew quarters on the other side of the ship, and so it became a rare luxury. The thought of a hot shower awakened long-lost spirits in her, and she finally rose from her bunk with a groan and some difficulty. Slowly swaying, she came to a stand and pulled the thin, stained undershirt and shorts off her body, only to find that they now felt almost like a second skin. Although she was alone and could be absolutely sure that no one was watching her, she felt strangely naked without the thin fabric covering her pale skin. She didn't know exactly why. It wasn't as if her comrades hadn't seen her countless times in the communal showers, but this time it felt different.

It didn't help; she would just ignore the feeling. Shaking her head, she looked at the handful of synthetic fabric in her hands and grimaced in disgust before the sergeant threw the two formerly white garments into a corner.

The cool, recycled air in the cell brushed against her bare, sweaty skin, making her shiver and at the same time driving her to take the two steps into her bathroom. On the way there, she passed the small mirror embedded in the folding wall and glanced at the reflection staring back at her from the mirror.

The trainers and the indoctrination had done a good job, because at first she didn't see the woman in the mirror, but the soldier whose body had seen more conflict in the short time she had been a member of the Imperial Army than was good for a human being. She saw the scars, each one a medal, proof of a battle survived. She saw the muscles, trained and steeled in the fire of a war they could never win, only survive. She saw the replacement parts, the prostheses, proof that she was even more valuable to the Munitorum as a soldier than as a servitor.

Only then did she see the woman whose slender, wiry body no longer possessed much femininity. Whose body, constantly on the verge of malnutrition, had used up almost all its fat reserves, robbing her of the few curves she had previously possessed. Her formerly curly, shoulder-length hair, which had been shaved off to a few millimeters for hygienic and tactical reasons; and her spirit, which cried out behind the bars of indoctrination not for battle and death, but for tenderness and love. This woman had become a stranger to her, she realized.

She wrapped her slender arms around her upper body, pressed her small breasts together, and sighed deeply as she tried to remember the last time she had been intimate with anyone.

“It's been a long time … too long.”

was her devastating realization, which she whispered almost tonelessly into the silence of her cell. Not that it helped in any way, but it had to be said.

She let her arms fall and stepped into the shower, perhaps also to escape the reproach of her counterpart. Standing under the fixed shower head, the soldier turned on the water without hesitation, and the first gush that came out of the pipe was ice cold. She didn't even flinch, accustomed to cold showers, as there was usually no hot water in the crew quarters, and in the field, you were lucky if you got a bucket and a rag for a makeshift wash.

She stood motionless under the cascading water, which slowly warmed up until it reached a temperature that made her skin blush. The burning pain that replaced the biting cold was more than welcome. She waited until she couldn't stand it anymore before slowly turning the temperature down to a level she considered comfortable.

Inside, however, she had to resist the urge to lift her head and open her mouth, as she had always done on her home world when it rained, because the water was – technically speaking – clean, but it was anything but fresh. The swill that came out of the tap here had been filtered so many times, chemically and mechanically purified so many times, that only the Emperor knew what it had been through on its journey.

The Navy, masters of this ship after all, openly advised against drinking this water or even using it to brush your teeth.

And yet it felt so incredibly good to feel the hot water running over her exposed, battered body, slowly washing away the sweat and dirt at first, and then gradually beginning to flush the tension from her muscles.

As the artificial rain warmed her body, she took a deep breath and closed her eyes. She dreamed herself away to a better place, away from all the fighting, death, and suffering that constantly surrounded her. In her mind, she traveled to a warm, bright, friendly place where the water pelting down on her head was clean and fresh. Where the air was actually fresh and didn't smell of disinfectants and ozone.

A place where perhaps that nice officer was standing behind her, offering to wash her back with his dark, warm voice.

Without a moment's hesitation, she accepted the offer and waited almost eagerly for his big, strong hands to touch her. She heard him rub his palms together and the scent of soap rose to her nose. It smelled like fresh flowers, real flowers, not that chemical slop that was more like a thinner and didn't clean. No, this was real soap that the officer was spreading on his hands.

It was a Carthaginian experience when he finally placed his hands on her back and began to spread the silky soft foam. He took his time, gently rubbing the soap into her skin, creating a protective soap bubble that shielded her from the outside world. His hands continued to wander over her back, massaging tense muscles, releasing cramps, and caressing away pains that had manifested themselves there far too long.

The soldier hummed her approval and wrapped her arms tightly around herself as the officer slowly approached her and finally stood very close behind her. His hot breath caressed her neck and his strong, warm body supported her back as tender hands slowly found their way across her sides to her flat stomach. She visibly enjoyed the touch and gasped softly as his strong fingers stroked her scars and carefully explored the area. It felt wonderful, even though she wished he would be a little bolder than just limiting himself to her stomach. Unfortunately, they didn't have much time, and this limited allowance had to be used wisely.

So it was she who took his hands and slowly, very slowly, guided them upward. He offered no resistance, but willingly let her lead him to her cute breasts. Gently, almost hesitantly, she placed his paws on her small, soft mounds and waited.

She didn't have to wait long, as the officer almost immediately began to caress her breasts, gently kneading them and not forgetting to include her small, sensitive nipples in his caresses. The soldier shuddered and arched her back as she let out a soft moan between her teeth. The more he concentrated on her nipples, rolling and pinching those little buttons between his fingers, the harder she bit her lip. The exquisite pain that shot through her breasts and spine up into her brain mingled with the pain in her lip and further fueled her desire.

For just a moment, she was torn from her fantasy when her prosthesis, whose fine motor skills still didn't quite match what she imagined, pinched her right nipple hard.

“Aack …”

She suppressed the cry and squeezed her eyes shut. Her breath came in shaky, heavy gasps as she tried to find her way back to her lover, who was waiting for her, wanting her.

She licked her lips, tasted her own blood, and gasped again.

“Deeper …”

she demanded in a hoarse whisper, and the officer behind her obeyed, albeit hesitantly. His hands left her breasts and slowly slid down over her wet, hot skin, following her scars, souvenirs from previous battles, down over her stomach… But then they hesitated, faltered, and finally stopped just below her stomach.

Her muscles trembled under his strong fingers, and she had to pull herself together not to ask him loudly to continue his journey. Driven by impatience, lust, and fear, she didn't want to wait any longer. What if someone disturbed them now? So she placed her hands back on his and gently guided them further south, toward her secret valley.

When his fingers finally descended into the valley, that forbidden land whose jungle was so impenetrable that no adventurer had dared to venture there for far too long, her breath caught in her throat. Her body arched in anticipation of this courageous expedition and her muscles tensed.

A long-missed heat rose within her and made her shiver. Her skin tingled as if it were electrified, and she had goose bumps all over her body.

While her mind clung to the image she had conjured up in her head, her intellect dryly noted that the only good thing about her bionics' lack of sensitivity was that she could really convince herself that it wasn't her fingers touching her indecently in the shower, but really those of the officer, but she immediately silenced that voice. Not now.

Her brain screamed for oxygen, but the soldier continued to hold her breath, refusing to breathe and provide her body with the lifeblood it needed.

“Not yet. Just a little bit more,”

she thought, enjoying the ice-cold shiver that ran up her spine as the first finger reached its target and gently stroked that little nerve node.

It was like electricity, burning hot and cutting cold at the same time, coursing through her body and forcing her to breathe as the pleasure sought an outlet.

“Hnnnnngh …”

Again, she bit her lip in an attempt not to be too loud as her… his second hand rested on her right breast again and grabbed it boldly. She squeezed, pinched, and pulled at the delicate tissue, adding this pain to the sensation.

Now she could no longer hold back her desire, and her gasps burst from her screaming lungs and echoed off the bare, cold walls of her cell, where condensation was already gathering. Her knees trembled and her back arched as the soldier desperately clung to the image of the officer that appeared before her inner eye.

Another finger found its target, and between them they rolled and rubbed the small button that was so sensitive that she wanted to scream it out into the ether; but she held back, had to, contenting herself instead with a pressed moan that left her mouth hoarse.

She leaned her head against the wall of the bathroom in the hope of more stability, while her hands worked faster and more intensely. Her breathing quickened and each gasping breath was now accompanied by a moist, lustful sound.

She wanted to give herself over to this, completely, but something gnawed at her subconscious. It was as if her conscience wanted to remind her that the leadership did not approve of this behavior, this immoral activity.

“It's distracting… and a distracted mind is like a fortress with open gates!”

She cursed loudly.

“Poukram!”

Her voice trembled as she uttered the ancient curse and opened her eyes wide. What was the damned chaplain doing in her head?

“Hnnnnnrrr …”

she growled. She was close to the edge, her legs trembling with tension and her hand clenching around her chest.

“… just … just a little more …”

the soldier whimpered as she tried to maintain her fantasy construct, but the image of the fat preacher standing in his pulpit, enveloped in incense smoke, philosophizing about the power of faith in the God-Emperor, would not leave her mind.

“Poukram! Poukram again!”

she cursed with a trembling voice. It was over. The moment had passed, but when she raised her bionic hand to her eyes, for a fleeting moment it was as if she could see the officer's hand in front of her again.

Beautiful for the first time, she thought. The illusion lasted only for the blink of an eye, then it was gone, and with it the lust and desire.

She was still standing in the shower and the water continued to splash over her body, but instead of warming her up and making her feel better, it suddenly just got on her nerves. The lust and desire that had been racing through her veins just moments before had given way to a cold anger that was now gripping her heart.

With clenched fists, she slowly straightened up and stared at the dark gray plastic steel wall, at the water droplets that rolled off it and ran down. A new desire filled her, the desire to slam her artificial hand against the wall with all her might. All her anger at the system, her frustration, her loneliness, her shame at having indulged in this fantasy, and her torment at having beaten it into this partition wall, but she didn't do it. It wouldn't change anything, except that she would either damage the partition wall or, more likely, her prosthesis, and she wanted to spare herself that trouble.

With a sigh that expressed her disappointment and defeat, she reached for the faucet and turned off the shower. It took a moment for the water to subside and the remaining water to begin dripping from her body. Finally, she wrapped her arms around her body and slowly turned to the rest of her small quarters, which were almost completely filled with steam after this almost sacrilegious waste of hot water – at least that's what her superiors would call it. Her gaze fell on the clock, whose pale green digits were relentlessly counting down the time until the next roll call.

Her lips pressed together, she lowered her head again. The next roll call was in five hours, which meant there was barely enough time to get the most necessary amount of sleep.

The soldier stepped out of the shower grumpily, dragged herself the few steps to her bunk, and, wet as she was, let herself fall onto the narrow, hard mattress. She didn't bother to dry off or get dressed, nor did she even crawl under the thin blanket; sleep was more important now.

And so she closed her eyes and drifted off into the world of dreams. Because if there was one thing a guard in the Imperial Army could do, it was sleep anytime, anywhere.

End

Concept and Idea by

El Poyo Diabolo

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El Poyo Diabolo

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El Poyo Diabolo

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El Poyo Diabolo

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