I saw the enemy ambusher’s fingers tighten around the grenade’s safety pin.
Time seemed to stop. If that grenade went off here, or if the enraged bastard screamed and drew gunfire, our position would be exposed to the enemy sniper hiding in the collapsed observation tower. In that instant, the wreck of this Chimera armored vehicle would become the grave of every man in Second Squad.
I could not make a sound. I could not fire my lasgun.
On reflex, I thrust the muzzle of my lasgun forward and threw myself at him.
"Urgh—!"
The heavy lasgun’s stock smashed brutally into the enemy ambusher’s jaw. The sickening sensation of bone crumbling traveled up through my fingertips. His head snapped at an unnatural angle, and just as a muffled scream was about to escape him, Talia sprang from behind me like a shadow and seized him by the nape.
"Mm! Mmph—!"
With her slim but firm arm, Talia clamped his mouth and nose shut. With her other hand, she drove the bayonet smeared with gunpowder deep into the back of his neck.
Thrust—!
The sound of cold steel tearing through flesh and punching clean through.
The enemy’s eyes rolled white as his limbs convulsed. The grenade in his hand slipped silently onto the muddy floor. The safety pin had, by a hair’s breadth, remained in place.
Lazar snatched up the fallen grenade with ghostly speed. As the man’s body spasmed and his feet threatened to kick against the metal floor, Brix planted a heavy boot on both his legs, completely smothering the noise.
Twitch, twitch...
After several seconds of grotesque convulsions, all strength finally drained from the enemy ambusher’s body.
The stench of rotten sulphur and blood filled the interior of the armored vehicle wreck. Talia exhaled as she casually wiped her blood-soaked bayonet on the dead man’s ragged uniform. There was not the slightest flicker of disturbance in the eyes visible beyond her gas mask lenses at having killed another human being.
"Well done, rookie."
Sergeant Yakov gave my shoulder a light tap and muttered quietly.
My hands trembled as they gripped the lasgun’s barrel. It was an immediate, visceral sensation I had never known while maintaining machine parts in the hive-city factories: a human life being destroyed like scrap metal in mere seconds. But there was not even time to be afraid.
"We take out the sniper."
Sergeant Yakov pointed through a hole in the armored vehicle’s hull.
"We finish this before he notices his ambusher has been taken out. Lazar, prepare to fire."
Lazar silently nodded and braced his lasgun in a gap in the wreckage. But the ruins of the observation tower where the sniper hid were swallowed by pitch darkness; an ordinary eye could scarcely make out even their outline.
"Rookie, find him with those eyes of yours."
Lazar shoved a hand against my chest.
"Use the skill you had finding machine faults in the hive-world factories. Find a reflection in that darkness. He’ll have his high-magnification sniper scope powered on while he watches us. There’ll be the faintest heat-beam glow or a reflection from the scope."
I held my breath and pressed my gaze close to my gas mask’s sight lens.
I recalled the dark maintenance bays of the factory district, where I had searched for minute gas leaks or cracks in gears. Every nerve in my vision converged on a single point. Amid the rainwater, mud, and pitch-black dark, I hunted for nothing but traces of the enemy.
One second, two seconds, three...
In a gap near the top of the collapsed observation tower, where there had been nothing but darkness, a faint bluish glint flashed for an instant. It was an infinitesimal artificial light leaking from the heat-beam receiver of a sniper scope.
"Seven o’clock, upper section of the observation tower...!"
As I hurriedly tried to point out the location, Lazar roughly grabbed the back of my neck and forced me down.
"You bloody idiot! Don’t point!"
Lazar’s icy whisper pierced through my gas mask.
"A sniper scope misses nothing that moves, not even a lump of meat. That one movement of your finger nearly got all our heads blown off!"
Cold sweat instantly soaked my entire body. In this mud pit, one small act of arrogance was a death warrant.
"S-sorry... But it’s around the bent steel frame halfway up the tower. Something is strange."
I steadied my ragged breathing and muttered in a low voice.
"When checking high-pressure gas lines in the factory district, an overheated thermal sensor leaves an extremely faint violet afterimage at night. There’s a patch of darkness shimmering like an afterimage halfway up that tower. Not light—a spot that looks like a hole darker than the darkness around it."
Lazar listened and pressed his eye to his sight. Naturally, there was no ordinary reflection to see; the sniper had covered the front of his scope with netting or a shroud to block any glint.
But the minute heat generated by the thermal optics was making the surrounding mist ripple slightly.
"Oh..."
Lazar breathed out a low note of admiration.
"You didn’t see light. You saw the fog warping from the heat? Just like a factory rat—trained your eyes on useless little details."
Lazar made an almost imperceptible adjustment to his lasgun’s muzzle, aiming at the darkness halfway up the tower where the mist wavered.
"That’s enough. Position confirmed."
Lazar’s finger settled quietly on the lasgun’s trigger.
Amid the acrid exhaust fumes and bloody stench inside the Chimera wreck, a silence fell so complete that not even breathing could be heard. Lazar lightly adjusted the muscles in the arm holding his rifle and stopped breathing altogether.
Whiiiine...
The lasgun’s output rose to its maximum, its mechanical high-pitched hum barely audible. Just before he fired into the sniper’s nest, Lazar murmured quietly.
"Close your eyes, rookie. The red beam will leave an afterimage."
The instant I covered my eyes, Lazar pulled the trigger.
Fwoooom—!
A single fierce crimson beam tore through the darkness in a straight line across the night sky. The cold mud-rain and thick fog of No Man’s Land vaporized instantly in the lasgun beam’s intense heat, throwing up white steam.
Then, three hundred meters ahead, sparks burst from the top of the collapsed observation tower along with a dull explosion.
KABOOM—!
Lazar’s precise shot appeared to have punched straight through the sniper’s scope. Fragments burst from the gaps in the tower, and a small energy cell fitted inside the optic exploded in sulphurous flames.
Hissss...
Black smoke rose overhead, and through the tower’s framework came the dull sound of something heavy falling.
Thud!
"Target silenced. Sniper eliminated."
Lazar lowered his gun and spoke in a low voice. His face remained utterly impassive, the blankness of a veteran.
"Good work, Lazar. We move. That shot will draw their artillery or another patrol in this direction. Back to the trench!"
At Sergeant Yakov’s short, firm command, Second Squad immediately left the Chimera wreck. We left the enemy ambusher’s corpse behind in the darkness of the vehicle.
The return was far harsher than the way out. The enemy position, apparently having realized their sniper had been taken down, began spraying random lasgun fire across the field. Blue and red beams sliced through the air over No Man’s Land, blasting mud apart on every side.
"Heads down! Crawl!"
We buried our faces in the mud and clawed our way toward our own trench, digging through the muck until our elbows twisted and our fingernails felt ready to tear off. Every time a lasgun beam passed behind us, searing heat swept over our backs as though it would scorch the flesh away.
At last, the earthen wall below our own trench line came into view.
"Second Squad returning! Don’t fire! Friendlies!"
Sergeant Yakov shouted toward the trench lip. The sentries’ hands reached down from above, and we were hauled up before dropping one after another onto the trench floor.
Thud, thud.
When I collapsed onto the hard wooden duckboards, the tension drained from my entire body and my limbs began shaking like leaves. As I dragged breath through my gas mask filter and barely collected myself, a pair of dull black military boots entered my view.
I slowly raised my head. Commissar Vorkov stood over us, holstering a silver bolt pistol. Behind him stood Lieutenant Varen, still immaculate in his ash-grey officer’s coat.
Vorkov’s cold eyes passed over our faces one by one—faces caked in rainwater, mud, and blood.
"Report, Sergeant Yakov."
There was not a tremor of emotion in Vorkov’s voice.
"Enemy sniper reconnoitered and eliminated. His observation point was the upper level of the collapsed observation tower. In addition, we silently neutralized one enemy forward scout lying in ambush in the Chimera wreck."
Sergeant Yakov reported with disciplined posture as he steadied his rough breathing.
Vorkov looked for a moment toward the collapsed observation tower where the sniper had been killed, then turned his gaze back to us. We could not have expected praise or commendation in the first place.
"Good. With the sniper removed, B Company’s restoration of the defensive line will proceed more easily as soon as daylight breaks."
Vorkov continued in an icy tone.
"But do not mistake this, Guardsmen. You survived tonight only because you still possess value to offer the Emperor."
He took a handkerchief from inside his coat, wiped the faint rainwater from his gloves, and turned away.
"When daylight comes, their second assault will begin. If anyone abandons the trench and retreats, my bolt round—not an enemy bullet—will lodge in that person’s head. Return to your positions and prepare for battle."
The Commissar’s cold back disappeared down the dark trench corridor.
04:15.
At the edge of the pitch-black night sky, a blood-scented grey dawn was slowly breaking. Any relief at having returned alive was nowhere to be found. A more horrific full-scale battle in daylight awaited us.
With shaking hands, I wiped the mud from my lasgun’s power unit and leaned my exhausted body against the trench wall.
Beside me, Lazar quietly muttered as he opened a dented tin of rations that looked as battered as an old friend.
"Welcome to No Man’s Land, rookie. It’s only been one day."
Comments (0)
Please log in to leave a comment. Login or Register