The Vanquishers stuck on Hill 937 expected a second wave to directly follow the first. Nothing occurred. The enemy had retreated back into the fog like shadows receding from the light. The men were once more forced to play the waiting game. This time they remained in their second line of defense. There was no point going down to the base of 937 now.

The trenches they had made down there weren’t as good as the ones they had taken from the cultists; it was also a lot safer to remain with the heavy stubbers and force the enemy to climb up the now very muddy and slippery terrain. Rain continued to pelt down on them, as the fog became thicker, enveloping them like a blanket. Waino aimed his gun forward, resting the barrel on the edge of his trench. He heard plops of mud behind him. Verro had returned from checking up on his platoon, verifying none of his Guardsmen had fallen asleep in the lull. In a few minutes he would get up to do the same, the two deciding to alternate.

Verro got into the hole, sighing. The second lieutenant appeared bedraggled. He was soaking wet and his body was covered in so much mud it looked like he was trying to blend into the earth.

“Half of my men are casualties.”

Waino sneezed.

“How many dead?” he asked.

“12. I got another 10 wounded in some shape or form. Some are bad, others can still fight. The worst ones won’t make it out of here if we don’t get them to a medicae.”

“We’ll get them out,” Waino assured.

“I doubt it. I just talked to the skipper. Still no comms. Even if they’re sending reinforcements, I doubt they’d get here in time. That’s how war works. Nothing goes right. You don’t get enough people for the job. You don’t get your supplies when you’re supposed to. Your orders don’t make sense, your people get shot, and sometimes your friend steps on a landmine!”

Verro squeezed his las-rifle in anger, making the weapon shake. He wished the enemy would attack already. He needed to shoot somebody.

“Even if that’s how it works, it still hurts,” Waino said.

“Yeah,” Verro concurred. “There it is.”

A noise got their attention, piercing over the rainfall. It was a chop chop noise cutting through the air. The men looked up, trying to see past the fog.

“Is that what I think it is?” Jenkins asked from a nearby hole.

“Unless these freaks got aircraft, it better be,” Rogers said.

The mud around them began to push back in waves. A valkyrie assault carrier appeared through the fog, its engines roaring. The men cheered.

“Alright baby there we go!” Rogers said.

Their hopes were dashed when a rocket came out of the fog. It struck the aircraft on its right side, forcing the vehicle to jerk to the side. It began to rise higher to escape but two more rockets emerged from the fog, hitting its starboard wing. The vehicle twisted in the air, its sirens blaring.

It went back into the fog away from 937. A moment later, they all heard an explosion that caused the ground to shake.

Next thing they knew, lasers and needles were flying overhead. The next wave had begun.

“You gotta be kidding me!” Rogers yelled, firing his weapon.

Unable to see the enemy, the men shot into the fog. Waino tried to aim, taking single shots. At what? He had no idea. Mud sprayed up from the las-fire that came close. It fell onto the men, obscuring their visions. They began to hear baying from down 937. It got louder and louder. Figures emerged. There were more of them than before, still wearing those wicked smiling masks. But something was different this time. Their masks were purple and they didn’t move like the ones from before.

The prior ones attacked with reckless abandon, overcome by their ecstasy. These cultists were coordinated. They laid down covering fire for each other, shouted orders, and most importantly, were better shots. Men fell one after another. The Vanquishers’ heavy stubbers opened fire, blasting away the cultists that tried to rush up the hill.

The enemy ducked, taking cover behind rocks and going prone in the mud. Rogers threw a grenade down the hill, killing three. Unfortunately, a needle hit one of the gunners in the shoulder. He cried out in pain, letting go of the gun. His arm went slack and he vomited before convulsing on the ground like he was having a seizure.

“Medic!” the trooper next to him called before las-fire hit him in the body, killing him as well.

The gun’s position was two holes away from Waino.

“Cover me! I’m getting on the gun!” he yelled.

“It’s too dangerous!” Verro shouted back.

“We got you babycom!” Rogers yelled, completely ignoring his platoon leader.

“Yeah!” Jenkins added.

The two of them got out of their hole, jumping down into theirs.

“Hi sir,” Jenkins said to Verro.

They ducked their heads as las-fire cracked overhead. Verro sighed.

“Alright, fine!”

Verro and Rogers rose, unleashing las-shots. They took down a squad of incoming cultists while Waino and Jenkins left the hole. They sprinted, struggling as their feet sunk into the mud. It was a short distance, no more than a few dozen meters but it felt like it took an eternity. The two of them ran behind the defensive line. The Vanquishers in them continued to shoot but the casualties continued to mount. Groaning and cursing, they took damage but continued to fight. Waino leapt into the hole of the heavy stubber and seized it. The scholam training determined his movements. He effortlessly began to load the weapon. Jenkins landed next to him, assisting him. He pulled the bolt to the rear and began to fire. The noise was deafening as bullets streamed out.

The cultists he hit were cut in two. Blood spurted out of their wounds, turning the brown mud red. They leapt for cover, hiding behind the rocks. Waino fired into it, chipping them away. The Vanquishers took advantage. They shot them down before they could scramble to safety. All the while, baying continued. Hill 937 was completely surrounded. The Vanquishers didn’t know it, but the enemy had moved camp at the base of 937. The noose could not have been tighter. Verro and Rogers joined Waino after he had run out of ammo.

“Babycom is the next Ciaphas Cain. I’m calling it now,” Jenkins said, loading a fresh power pack into his lasgun.

“I can see it,” Rogers added.

“You got yourself a fanclub,” Verro said, ending a cultist that tried rushing their position with two shots to the body.

“I guess,” Waino said.

He was about to take aim at his next target when he felt the ground beneath his feet give way. For a second it felt like he was floating. Then he began to fall and all was dark.

***

The 20th Vanquisher regiment was out in full force, all armed to the teeth. They brought flamers, hellguns, and rockets. They were dispatched via Valkyries, having to trek their way the rest of the way and into the fog to reach 937. Bravo’s sister companies Alpha and Charlie immediately hit heavy resistance. The jungle came alive with enemy fire. They called in air support to bomb the jungle but the aircraft were inaccurate, almost as if something was messing with their sensors. They had to move in close to deal with the cultists, taking heavy casualties along the way. What had started as a skirmish had escalated into a true large-scale battle.

***

Banshee was cursed. Chaps was sure about that. He knew as soon as he set foot on the planet and looked at the sky. His stomach churned when he looked at the dark. It was not like Faeburn. His home planet was touched by the grace of the God-Emperor. It was blessed. Not here. The clouds here were twisted and maligned. He couldn’t put his finger on it but there was something wrong with them. Evil reigned and its forces were converging on them. It was enough to make a weak man waver.

Not the Imperial Guard, Chaps thought. He fired his weapon, blasting a cultist’s head off with a well placed las-shot. The battlefield was a mess of rain, mud, and laser shots, all flying and splashing through the fog. Chaps was almost lost in the storm of battle. Men shouted and cried around him. A mixture of orders and pleas entered his ears. He kept firing. Through it all, he sang hymns. Chatterbox and Vanc were beside him firing from their makeshift trench. So much rain had fallen into their trench it went up to their ankles.

“There’snoendtothem!” Chatterbox yelled as a laser zipped past his head.

“Come on you bastards. Come on,” Vanc growled, killing two more cultists.

He kept pulling the trigger until nothing came out.

“Reloading!” he announced.

Vanc tried to grab a new power pack only to discover his pouches were empty. He cursed.

“Box you got spares?” he asked.

Chatterbox searched for another power pack but he also came up empty.

Chaps gave his last two to them. They loaded them in. Nearby, fellow troopers were making similar complaints about the lack of ammunition.

They had abandoned most of it in order to get to 937 on time, out of fear that the enemy would have fled if they took too long. The irony was not lost on them.

“Fix bayonets!” Sergeant Fairburn shouted, running down the defensive line.

“OhhellsargeIgottafightthesefreakswithmybarehands?” Chatterbox asked.

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“Yeah stab them all until you can’t anymore,” he said, stopping behind their trench.

“We’re not making it out of this are we?” Vanc asked.

Sergeant Fairburn stared ahead, putting his bayonet on his lasrifle.

“No but we’ll die well, taking out as many of them as we can. That’s the standard. It’s what sir would’ve wanted.”

Vanc nodded.

“Rest in peace sir,” he said, fixing his bayonet.

“Itiswhatitis,” Chatterbox said, doing the same.

Chaps closed his eyes, ignoring the baying from the enemy, the screams of dying Guardsmen, the las-fire crackling overhead, even his own breathing.

“Chaos, we’re going to tear your kingdom down. Oh lord. You’ve been building your kingdom, all over this land. Chaos, we’re going to tear your kingdom down. Oh lord.”

He said the line over and over. Vanc joined in, followed by Chatterbox and Fairburn. Soon the whole platoon was singing along, all the while firing at the approaching shadows, their voices rising to counter their sickly baying. The Vanquishers on Hill 937 steeled their faith, accepting their fates.

***

Waino landed on something hard. A sharp pain shot through his back and right arm, like he had gotten hit by a landcar. His breath came and went sharply. He groaned.

“Hey babycom is that you?” a voice said.

Waino had been in complete darkness, his head swimming when a light appeared above him. He squinted his eyes. It was a lamp pack, its beam shining on him. Two faces appeared, staring at him. They smiled.

“Babycom you’re alive!” Jenkins said.

“Too early for you to die huh?” Rogers added.

“W-where are we?” Waino asked.

“Inside 937,” a new voice answered.

“Verro?”

“Yeah. The ground gave way. Probably due to the battle loosening the soil. All those explosions weakened the foundation.”

Waino saw a hole pass Rogers and Jenkins high above them. It had to be a thousand yards up. They had tumbled their way down, hitting rocks and crags. Faintly they could hear the sound of battle; men screaming and dying, explosions, the cracks of las-fire.

“Help him up,” Verro ordered.

“Yes sir,” they said, helping Waino up.

Waino winced in pain. All he remembered was falling, then blackness. He touched the side of his head, realizing blood trickled down. He had hit his head during the fall. It began to throb.

“How do we get out of here?” he asked, trying to ignore the pain.

He looked at the three men with him. They only shared one lamp pack between them and were just as beat up as he felt. Their bodies were covered in bruises and cuts in addition to the mud and dirt that had coated them before they fell. They were out of the rain but were still soaking wet. Their clothes stuck to their bodies like they had just gotten out of a pool.

“There has to be a way out,” Verro said. “We just woke up so we haven’t had the chance to explore. Everybody got their weapons?”

“Got my rifle sir,” Rogers said.

“Got mine,” Jenkins confirmed.

Waino looked at the ground, finding his weapon and cap in the corner. He picked his cap up. Rogers shined the lamp pack on it. It was caked in mud and dried blood. He put it on.

“Sure it’s worth wearing?” Jenkins asked.

“It’s an essential item of my uniform,” he replied.

“I don’t think you’d pass a uniform inspection,” Rogers noted.

“Noted.”

“Let’s go,” Verro said.

Rogers led the way. They were in a tunnel, the walls consisting of earth and thick roots that sprawled through them like tendrils. They took turns, finding even more long tunnels. They were not natural. No animal lived on Banshee with the capability to make tunnels so wide and numerous. The enemy had burrowed inside Hill 937 like rats. Thirty minutes passed and they were just as lost. They tried to follow the sounds of battle, hoping they’d find another hole to crawl out of but the sounds got neither quieter or louder.

“What the hell is this?” Rogers asked, aiming the lamp pack at the wall.

They had arrived at a crossing in the tunnel system. They could head either right or left. On the wall before them were purple runes along with profane messages and symbols. The sight made the men want to retch.

“Nasty,” Jenkins said.

Verro raised his gun, pointing down the left path.

“I hear footsteps,” he said.

They all turned, aiming their weapons. Down the tunnel, about 500 yards away stood a man. Even from a distance, they could tell the man was massive. He looked almost as tall as an astartes. Rogers aimed the lamp pack at him, revealing a man stripped to the waist covered in scars, his trousers black and torn.

The man was covered in cuts, but unlike the Vanquishers, they were done in a deliberate, almost artistic pattern. Hundreds of circular cuts covered his body. His physique was shocking. He was extremely muscular, the veins almost popping out of his body. He wore a mask like the others but this one was blue. No matter what color the masks were, they always depicted an insidious smile. The man began to run at them, sprinting like a high level athlete.

“By the Golden Throne he’s big!” Rogers noted.

“Fire!” Verro shouted.

They only managed to fire a few las-shots before the large man had closed the distance between them in a flash. Using his momentum, he hit Verro with a shoulder bash. The officer was thrown back, rolling and skidding as his rifle flew out of his hands. The large cultist stood between Jenkins, Rogers, and Waino, the three of them still having their lasguns pointed down the tunnel where man was a moment ago. Waino was the first to turn, trying to shoot the cultist in the chest but the man grabbed the barrel with one hand and struck him in the stomach with the other.

The air was knocked out of Waino. The blow blew him away. He landed on the ground, clutching his stomach.

“Oh shit!” Rogers exclaimed.

He jumped back, narrowly missing a hook thrown by the cultists. Jenkins leaped to the other side, getting a good bearing on the cultists. He fired. A spray of las-shot hit the cultist in the shoulder.

“I like it!” the daemon worshiper exclaimed.

He closed in on Jenkins, hitting him with a kick. Jenkins was forced to the wall, his weapon pinned to his chest. He cried out in pain as he felt ribs crack.

“Bastard!” Rogers said, firing a salvo.

Two shots hit the cultist, leaving scorch marks on his skin. He turned his attention to Rogers. He leapt at him, taking more las-shots to the body but was undeterred. He grabbed Rogers’s face with his large palm, raising him off the ground with little effort.

“I’m so happy I get to teach you the beauty of pain!” he said gleefully before slamming Roger’s head into the ground.

Waino managed to get up. He ran to his las-rifle, picking it up and shooting at the cultist. Verro had managed to get up too, doing the same. They pelted the cultist with lasers. Jenkins, on the ground and gasping for breath, shot at him from his right side as he laid on the ground. From three directions the cultist was harried with lasers. Despite this, the man still moved.

“Yes! More!” he exclaimed, rushing to Waino.

His fist crashed into Waino’s shoulder, colliding him with the nearest wall. He turned back to face Verro, running at him. Verro backpedaled, continuing to fire. He shot off a few fingers but that only made the cultist elbow him in the face instead. Verro fell to the ground, his nose broken. Dozens of cauterized wounds were now on the cultist’s body. He chuckled, looking at his wounds.

“This hurts. But it is not true pain. I will take you to the others, where we can all scream together.”

He turned around, spotting Jenkins. The trooper was squeezing the trigger of his lasgun but he had run out of ammo so all there was a click. Jenkins cursed. He couldn’t move. Every breath pained him.

“Oh no no no, las-weapons hurt but they do not hurt enough. You can inflict so much more pain with your hands,” the cultist said.

He stood over Jenkins, brandishing his hands. The fingers on his right hand had been shot off. He reached down when shouting echoed throughout the tunnel.

“Die your big ass Slaneeshi freak!”

Rogers, his head coated in blood and the back of his skull partially exposed, stepped up to the large cultist, armed with his combat knife. He drove it into the man’s neck. The cultist gagged. Overcome with anger, he countered with a blow to the body, knocking Rogers far down the tunnel. Waino, ignoring the throbbing pain in his head and arms, reached for the knife on his belt and took it out. He rushed the large man. He plunged the knife into the cultist’s head. At the same time, Verro had risen. He ran and got behind the man. Verro kicked at the back of his legs, bringing the man to his knees and took out his own large combat knife.

Together, Verroy and Waino stabbed the man’s head, neck and throat repeatedly, trying to aim for anything vital to stop the monster. The man tried to rise but Waino and Verro jumped on top of him, forcing him completely to the ground. Waino and Verro, in a single movement, embedded their knives into the back of the man’s skull, hitting the brain. He stopped moving. Verro and Waino remained on top of him for a moment to ensure he was dead. Once they were satisfied, they rose, breathing hard. Verro fixed his broken nose then looked down at Jenkins, examining his wounds.

“I-I’m good sir. I just need a moment,” Jenkins wheezed.

Clutching his left shoulder, Waino walked to Rogers. What he saw made him stop. Rogers didn’t move. He was as still as a rock. Verro, helping Jenkins stand, trundled to Waino.

The cadet looked at them.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

Verro cursed while Jenkins simply stared.

“I’m good sir. I can move,” Jenkins said after a moment.

“Everyone get their weapons and pick up the lamp pack. We still need to get out of here.”

Verro turned to go pick up his las-rifle, leaving Waino with Jenkins.

“He was my brother, sir,” Jenkins said.

“By blood?” Waino asked.

“No. But he was my brother.”

Jenkins turned and went to pick up his equipment. Waino went back and picked up his weapon and carried the lamp pack. The three of them continued on, further into the tunnels while the rest of the Vanquishers fought for their lives.

They encountered more runes and symbols along the walls. The deeper they went, the harder it became to breathe and it was not due solely to their injuries. The air itself felt lighter.

“We’re wasting time,” Verro grumbled to himself, frustrated by their lack of progress.

“No. This could be good,” Waino realized.

“What?”

“They built this all for a reason.”

“Yeah to move without detection. It’s a common insurgency tactic.”

“I don’t think it’s just that. I think they’re hiding something down here. Something important.”

“Their base? Then we did get what we came for.”

“I think it’s even more than that.”

Verro grunted. Maybe Waino was right. Maybe he wasn’t. He didn’t really care either way. He just wanted to get back topside to join his men. Jenkins said nothing. He moved silently, his eyes glassy. The ground began to rumble. Pebbles fell from the ceiling.

“What was that?” Verro wondered.

“I think-” Waino began when the wall behind him erupted, as if a bomb exploded.

The three of them started, turning quickly round with weapons raised. Another of the blue masked cultists emerged from a hole that connected to another tunnel.

“I knew I heard something,” the man said.

Inwardly, Waino was terrified. They wouldn’t be able to defeat another of the large cultists, not in their current states. The man was about to charge at them when a las-shot whizzed down the tunnel, hitting the man in the eye. It was enough to make him stop in place. Waino heard a chainsword revving up behind him. Before Waino could turn, Captain Carnell ran past them, laspistol in one hand and chainsword in the other. He went before the large cultist, smiling up at him.

“I would say fight someone your own size but there aren’t any ogryns around. You’ll have to settle for me.”

With a grunt, the cultist punched down but Carnell easily sidestepped and slashed the man along the arm with his whirring chainsword. The cultist laughed, throwing a hook with the other arm but the skipper ducked under it and sliced the cultist across the stomach. Guts began to spill onto the floor but the cultist didn’t seem to mind. He threw more and more punches but Carnell jumped and dodged past each one.

More footsteps and shouts came from behind Waino. He glanced back. Over a dozen Vanquishers were running to them carrying lamp packs. They stopped beside them. A medic kneeled and started to take out his supplies upon seeing how wounded Verro, Waino, and Jenkins were.

“Where’d you all come from?” Verro asked.

“The ground gave way sir. Next thing we knew, we were here,” one of the troopers said.

“I’m glad the CO fell with us. I think we would’ve been dead by now otherwise,” another stated.

Carnell had hacked off the cultist’s forearm with a single swing of his chainsword. The cultist tried to attack with his remaining arm but the skipper hacked at his thigh, forcing him onto one knee. He raised his chainsword above then brought it down hard on the cultist’s neck, severing it from the body. Carnell turned his chainsword off and looked back at them.

“It’s a pleasure to see you boys alive,” he said.

“Sir the pleasure’s all mine,” Verro replied.

Waino nodded in agreement.

“We’ve got ourselves into quite the predicament. Let’s be on our way shall we?” Carnell said.

With Captain Carnell taking the lead, the Vanquishers continued on their journey, not realizing they were heading ever closer to the center of Hill 937.