Narrative Campaign Day 3: Prelude

Narrative campaign day 3 is tomorrow and it's doubles, so here is a prelude to get you started....

Excerpt from the personal log of Captain Keller. Commanding Officer, B Company, 377th Krieg Siege Regiment deployed on Torak.

The vox link had been transmitting a constant drone for the entirety of the second day of fighting.

The drone of the vox mixed with the drone of the flies swarming across the remains of the hive workers throwing themselves at the makeshift barricades we erected across the streets.

Lasrounds have minimal effect, apparently the walking, diseased remnants of imperial citizens were rendered additional vitality by the dark powers that animated them.

And so my soldiers spent the entire day fighting across the barricades, never giving an inch, never gaining a step.

And so it was that the Astropaths lived to see another sunrise.

I'd stopped noticing the buzzing long before then.

Captain Keller and aide, outside the shrine to Saint Valeria on the second day of the Battle of Gurija Hive

On the third day, the Valkyrie landed, it's downwash breaking the hastily erected, but long held barriers. My flamer teams out clearing bodies scrambled for cover as the aircraft landed.

A brute of a man in ornate armour stepped off the back rank, striding straight to me. His voice spoke with a tone thick with authority, power and the demand to be heard and obeyed.

"Captain" the brute said, flashing an Inquisitorial rosette.

An Inquistorial Brute apparently.

I bet the Lord Commissar would have enjoyed this, but she was off touring the line. Lucky her.

"I am Inquisitor Gnaeus Aldo. You now fall under my command. We must hold this ground, this place shall be the linchpin on which the defense of this hive rests.

The remnants of the Cadian 33rd will be with us shortly, as will the honoured brothers of the Deathwatch. 

Other allies will come, but I fear they will not arrive before the enemy does.

I trust Arcus of House Hawkshroud is still with you, and it's spirit is filled with the Emperor's fury?"

As if in answer, Arcus' cannons erupted into life from further down the line. Arcus was conserving it's ammunition, so what it had fired at had clearly warranted the extra attention. The fact that Arcus had ceased fire indicated that whatever it was, it was no longer a threat.

"And your men? How many remain?"

Whatever answer I gave, it wasn't enough. The Inquisitor stomped off, evidently in the direction of Arcus' cannon fire, and the Lord Commissar. His shiny, clean armoured form a stark contrast to the drab, dishevelled and dirty soldiers he passed. Their eyes, hidden behind their orange lenses and thick masks barely marked his passing with any note.

I know now that moment in which I considered how many servitors were required to clean the dust of his shining armour was the last moment of peace I would get that day....