C. Goto - Dawn of War

“I do not care for all this sneaking about,” continued Isador, as though that might explain everything.

“I know, old friend. You have always preferred the direct approach,” replied Gabriel, trying to lift the mood.

“What about the Tartarans? Why not send them after the orks, instead of treating them like glorified baby-sitters? Better still, why not take the entire regiment and meet the main ork force head-on? It could not possibly stand before us.” Isador’s voice was full of sudden venom.

“We have fought the orks a hundred times, Isador. And you told me yourself, they thrive on war. Nothing would please them more than a direct assault on their warboss. They would fight with greater passion than we have yet seen. Our casualties would be unacceptably high,” said Gabriel, explaining what Isador already knew.

“But what are the Imperial Guard for, if not to die for the Emperor?” He almost spat the words into the dirt. “At the very least, we should have brought a few squads with us on this hunt-we would not want to be remembered for our carelessness, would we?”

The words were laced with disgust, and Gabriel was momentarily stunned by Isador’s speech. There was more to this than a revulsion towards the cowardliness of some of the Tartarans. The Librarian was holding something back about Gabriel himself, as though not quite daring to challenge the judgement of his old friend.

“We, Isador? We, or me?” Gabriel was staring straight into the eyes of the Librarian, fierce with repressed pain. Isador stared back, meeting the captain’s bright eyes and immediately seeing his mistake. With a quiet sigh, he responded.

“I am sorry, Gabriel. I am not quite myself today,” said Isador, looking around into the forest as if expecting to see someone watching them. “I am not accusing you of anything, captain. And when I said ‘we’, I meant it-we are the Blood Ravens, battle-brothers until the end.”

“Perhaps you are right, old friend. Perhaps I have grown careless. We are battle-brothers, Isador, but I am the captain. Responsibility is mine,” said Gabriel, dropping his gaze from Isador’s face and shaking his head faintly. “I also have not been myself lately.”

“I have seen how you have changed since Cyrene, Gabriel. But there was nothing that you could have done to save it. You did what had to be done.” Isador’s tone was gentle again.

“Do not mention that place again, Isador!” One or two of the other squad members turned their heads as Gabriel raised his voice. He brought himself under control quickly and continued. “Cyrene was my homeworld… it was my responsibility,” he said, his voice dropping to a barely audible whisper.

“Captain.” It was Corallis, stooped under the cover of giant fern fronds just in front of them. Gabriel looked up and wondered how long the sergeant had been there. By his side, Isador was doing the same thing. They shared a quick glance and then Gabriel answered.

“What news, sergeant?”

“The orks have established a camp at an old pumping station in the forest. There is good cover around the perimeter, and they are unprepared for our assault.”

“Excellent,” said Gabriel, relieved and enthusiastic at the thought of combat at last. Nothing cleared his mind better than a righteous cleansing. “Then let us show these orks how Blood Ravens bring death to the enemies of the Emperor.”

The spaceport was shrouded in darkness as the thick black clouds rolled across the sky, obscuring the stars and filtering the moonlight into a dirty grey. A thin drizzle of rain fell continuously, coating everything in a slick, oily ichor as the smoky clouds spat their residue to the ground. campfires were scattered reassuringly over the deck, with groups of Guardsmen huddled around them for warmth and companionship. Others were hard at work on the port’s fortifications, tugging the ruins of Sentinels and Leman Russ tanks into banks around the perimeter that faced out into the wilderness. Auto-cannon, heavy bolter and lascannon emplacements were being dug into the barricades at regular intervals, facing out across the plain. That is where the orks would come from, if Captain Angelos had been right about their renewed offensive.

Colonel Brom stood on the tracks of a Leman Russ that had been slid into the barricade on its side. He was scanning the horizon for signs of movement, but there was nothing except the faint orange glow of distant fires. That’s where the warboss must be, he thought. Captain Angelos was right after all. They’re regrouping, out of range of our gun emplacements. But somehow the hazy glow was reassuring; if the orks were playing by their campfires, then they were not about to launch their second attack tonight.

The dull, misted moonlight bathed the afternoon’s battlefield in monochrome, and Brom slouched down onto the side of the tank to sit and consider it. He sighed deeply and shook his head, patting each of his pockets in turn in a quest for a lho-stick. Finding one in his left breast pocket, he tapped it methodically against the armour of the Leman Russ and then flicked it into life.

Taking a long draw and letting the smoke blossom into his lungs, Brom tried to get the events of the day into some kind of perspective.

Behind him, he could hear the industry of his Tartarans. Most of them had recovered from the shocks of the day already, and they were struggling to prepare for tomorrow. There were whispers of excitement about the arrival of the Space Marines and occasional shouts of awe as stories were shared about the incredible feats they had accomplished on the battlefields of a thousand planets. Rumours and legends flooded the camp like a contagious disease, inflecting everyone with a new vigour and a thrill of excitement.

Not everyone. Brom sat on his own, staring out across the silvering corpses of his Guardsmen as they lay unrecovered where they fell, intermingled with the ork-dead, their blood mixing in the soaked earth. Hundreds of them. Almost half the Fifth and more than half the Seventh had been killed in one afternoon. And these were his men. Good men with whom he had fought on numberless occasions in the past.

And the Blood Ravens had called them cowards.

Taking another draw on his lho-stick, Brom blew a wispy thread of cloud out into the night air. It was a good weed-locally grown in the rich, fertile soil of Tartarus. For a moment, he thought that he could taste the blood-drenched soil seeping into the smoke, but he shut out the thought in a wave of nausea.

Cowards. The word stuck in his mind and cycled through his thoughts like a hot coal, scorching at his soul. Something had happened. Some of his men had turned and run. He had dealt with many of them himself-executing men who had saved his own life countless times. The guilt gnawed at his conscience, making his head hurt from within.

Glancing up and down the line of the barricade, Brom could see little pockets of men sitting in silence. They had obviously moved away from their comrades to be alone with their thoughts, gazing out over the carnage of the day. Not for them the naive excitement about the Space Marines. Tiny little embers of fire marked them out as smokers, speckling the imposing weight of the barricade with the touches of fireflies.

Brom didn’t have the heart to bust them for skipping work. The fortifications were going up quickly, as the most enthusiastic of the men laboured under a haze of optimism. He was happy to let his men deal with the events of the day in their own ways-the last thing they needed now was their commanding officer to yell at them about treachery and cowardice. Everyone knew what had happened. Some were trying to forget, to make the approaching battle less horrifying. Others had fallen into themselves, searching for their last scraps of resolve. But some, suspected Brom, would simply find the terrible truth-they were cowards after all.