[Imperial Guard 03] - Rebel Winter

by Steve Parker - (ebook by Undead)

  It was unfortunate that his appearance had also appealed to the Lord General’s son. He’d been a charming boy with great potential as an officer, but he’d misinterpreted Karif’s friendship as something… deeper. Karif hadn’t expected his rejection to lead to the boy’s suicide.

  Clearly, Captain Sebastev would never suffer such difficulties. The man was almost beast-like. Then again, Karif supposed as he watched Sebastev remove his carapace armour, his breeding hadn’t given him much to work with. Compounding the captain’s limited height, he was so disproportionately thick with muscle that, had he been painted green and set loose on the snowfield, his own men could have mistaken him for an ork… albeit a very short one.

  The captain’s black moustache was unkempt, clearly in need of waxing, and his hair was little more than coarse stubble. His leathery face was split by an ugly diagonal scar that ran from his forehead, across his left eye, all the way down to his jaw-line, tugging one side of his mouth into a permanent snarl. All in all, Karif decided, without the accoutrements of his position, the commanding officer of Fifth Company would be all but indistinguishable from an underhive thug.

  Being a field commissioned officer, rather than an academy man, thought Karif, he may well have come from the underhives. But I’m hardly catching him at his best. He must have some worthy qualities. By all accounts, his fellow officers in the Sixty-Eighth Infantry Regiment rate him very highly. Time will tell.

  “Have you anything to drink, captain?” Karif asked hopefully, thinking a little alcohol might take some of the chill off. The room’s thermal coils seemed inadequate to the task. “Amasec, perhaps? I’ll even take caffeine if there’s any going.”

  “Rahzvod,” said Sebastev, indicating a cabinet behind the commissar with a nod of his head. He didn’t get up.

  Whatever his qualities are, thought Karif, he needs a damned good lesson in manners. A skunkwolf would be a more gracious host.

  “Perhaps later,” said Karif, masking his irritation. “First, let me congratulate you on today’s victory. It was most exhilarating to get my hands dirty after such a long trip through the Empyrean. A fine introduction to serving with your company, yes?”

  Sebastev growled and shook his head. “Nineteen dead on my section of the trench, commissar. An unacceptable loss, and one that hardly warrants your congratulations.”

  Nineteen men didn’t sound like a lot to Karif. In fact, given the ferocity of the fighting he’d seen earlier, it sounded incredibly low. He’d served in conflicts where the daily tolls ran into the thousands. But it was clear from his tone that the captain was genuinely angry about the day’s losses. Did he blame himself?

  “I’m surprised by your reaction, captain,” said Karif. “I’d have thought the tally would please you. An ork assault of that size repelled with Guard losses in only double figures? You should be expecting a decoration.”

  Sebastev laughed, if the short, sharp bark that issued from his mouth could truly be called a laugh. “I’ll be dead before that ever happens, commissar,” he said, “and so will you, most likely. It’s clear you’ve no idea how bad things are out here. Weren’t you briefed on the way in?”

  Karif frowned. “Perhaps you’d better enlighten me, captain, since you clearly feel the officers at Seddisvarr haven’t done an adequate job.”

  “Bloody right they haven’t,” said Sebastev. “What does anyone at Twelfth Army Command know about the realities of the Eastern Front? Damned little, that’s what. Whichever bigwig you angered knew what they were doing when they posted you out here. You’re right in the middle of it, commissar. We’re outnumbered, ill-equipped, and so badly supported you’ll wonder if the Munitorum isn’t just a figment of your imagination. It’s only my faith in the Emperor and in the strength of my men that gives me any hope.”

  “I haven’t angered anyone that I know of,” Karif lied, “except perhaps you. I was sent here because your company needed a replacement commissar, and it galls me to hear such words from an officer of the Imperial Guard. I’ve little tolerance for fatalism, captain. In fact, I’m a strong believer in the might of the common man. With good leadership and morale, there’s nothing the Guard can’t achieve. Be careful not to let me hear you speak thus in front of your men. I’m sure I don’t have to remind you of my commissarial remit.”

  Sebastev simply stared back at Karif, unflinching, until finally he said, “Fear won’t work for you out here, commissar. I tell you this because you’re clearly a man used to being feared. But don’t mistake a lack of fear for a lack of respect. I’ll admit I wasn’t pleased at the thought of a new man coming in. Your predecessor, Commissar Ixxius was a great soldier and friend. We won’t see his like again. If he proved anything, it was that the right man can make a great difference. There is a place for you here among the Firstborn, if you’re such a man. It’ll take time, perhaps, but once you’ve earned the respect of my fighters, you’ll see what a force they can be. Maybe this conflict could use a fresh pair of eyes to assess it.”

  Sebastev stood up, crossed to the cabinet in his bare feet and poured two shots of clear liquid into a pair of dirty glasses. “Rahzvod,” he said for the second time, placing one glass down on the table next to Karif.

  I confess I’ve never approved of the idea of field commissioned officers, thought Karif, and this one justifies all my prejudices: ill-mannered and contentious, unmindful of his appearance and the protocols of Imperial society, and yet, the man’s lack of sophistry is refreshing. He’s ugly, brutal and direct, it’s true, but if men like me are the surgical scalpels of the Imperial Guard, perhaps men like Sebastev are the sledgehammers. The Emperor has a use for both, I suppose.

  He raised his glass to his lips and said, “For the Emperor.” The liquid ran down his throat, searing the walls of his gullet. He almost spluttered, but caught himself. His cheeks grew hot and he knew they must be flushing.

  “For the Emperor and Vostroya,” replied Sebastev, raising his own glass into the air before knocking back the bitter liquid. He sighed happily, as if he’d been waiting all day for that drink.

  In the momentary silence, Karif took another look around the little room.

  Ill-mannered or not, Sebastev was clearly a pious man: aquilas on every wall, an image of His Divine Majesty set into an alcove there, several holy texts stacked by his bunk, and even a small altar to the female saint they loved so much. That, at least, was gratifying to see.

  Sebastev, looking up from his empty glass, followed the commissar’s gaze towards the little altar and said, “Are you familiar with the Grey Lady, commissar?”

  Karif nodded and said, “I read the Treatis Elatii once, the story of her ancient crusades. But that was many years ago.”

  “Still,” said Sebastev, “that’s something in your favour. Commissar Ixxius could quote the text from memory. It made a great difference to the men during hard times. I’m afraid Father Olov, much as we revere the man, is a far better fighter than he is a preacher of the Holy Word. If you’ve any skill in oration at all…”

  “Yes, well, I’ll keep that in mind, captain, but I didn’t come here to replace the regiment’s priest. Battlefield oration is—”

  Karif was interrupted by a loud knock at the door.

  “Come in,” barked Sebastev.

  The cold seal hissed and the door cracked open with a sucking sound. Bitterly cold air rushed into the room, causing Karif to pull his coat tighter around him. The promethium lamp on the ceiling swung in the gust, sending the room’s shadows into a dance. A Vostroyan with lieutenant’s stripes at his collar and cuffs stepped in and quickly sealed the door.

  The newcomer had to stoop under the ceiling, and not merely because of his fur hat. The man was almost as tall as Karif. Like many Vostroyans, he was well built. The gravity on Vostroya was slightly higher than on Karif’s homeworld.

  Throne preserve us, thought Karif as he watched the man stoop, did they fashion these dugouts for children? My own accommodation had better not be like
this. I won’t spend this campaign bent double like an old ape.

  Even as the thought crossed his mind, Karif had a sinking feeling that his fears on the matter would be realised. Cutting trenches into permafrost was hard enough, but Twelfth Army engineers would have taken as many shortcuts as they could while working in the bitter cold.

  “Sorry to intrude, gentlemen,” said the lieutenant. He gave a sharp salute before removing his hat and scarf.

  Now here’s a proper officer, thought Karif. The contrast between the lieutenant and Captain Sebastev was stark. He had a handsome face, a well-groomed moustache, and good, noble bearing. He was an academy man, for certain. How could he stand to serve under this glorified grunt?

  Sebastev didn’t stand, but he gestured from his bunk and said, “This is my adjutant and comms-officer, Lieutenant Oleg Kuritsin. Rits, this is Commissar Daridh Ahl Karif from… Sorry, commissar, I didn’t catch where you were from.”

  “I never said, captain,” replied Karif.

  “Tallarn?” guessed Lieutenant Kuritsin with a smile.

  Karif wasn’t quite fast enough to hide a flash of irritation.

  Why does everyone I meet assume that, he thought angrily? Do all men with black hair and a deep tan have to come from that wretched place?

  “Delta Radhima actually,” he said, recovering his composure and standing, or rather stooping, to shake the lieutenant’s hand, “but I attended the Schola Excubitos on Terrax.”

  Let’s see what that does for them, he thought.

  He watched the name register with the lieutenant, though Captain Sebastev’s grim features didn’t change at all. The schola on Terrax was infamous for producing some of the strictest, most militant commissars in the history of the Imperium. Karif didn’t care to mention that he’d been considered one of the more liberal graduates.

  “Forgive my ignorance, commissar,” said Kuritsin with a short bow. “I hadn’t heard of Delta Rhadima until this moment. In any case, welcome to Fifth Company.”

  “Something to tell me, Rits?” interrupted Sebastev.

  “An urgent message from Colonel Kabanov’s office, sir. The colonel’s calling an assembly in the war room. He’ll be arriving at nineteen hundred hours.”

  “The war room?” asked Sebastev. “Our war room?”

  “Yes, sir,” said Kuritsin, “at nineteen hundred hours.”

  “Is that unusual, captain?” asked Karif.

  “Yes,” said Sebastev.

  Lieutenant Kuritsin explained. “Colonel Kabanov usually holds his briefings at the regimental headquarters, commissar. With the scale of today’s attack, he may feel he can’t pull his company commanders away from the front. In any case, he’s chosen our war room, and that means something has happened.”

  “Are there any reasons for optimism, gentlemen?” asked Karif. “Before you arrived, lieutenant, the captain was telling me all sorts of things about poor supplies and the like. The latest reinforcements, at least, must be welcome news.”

  “Reinforcements?” asked Sebastev.

  “Sorry, sir,” said Kuritsin. “I forgot to tell you. Some shinies came in with the commissar.”

  “Shinies?” asked Karif.

  “Aye,” said Sebastev, “new conscripts, fresh off the assembly line: shinies. How many did we score, Rits?”

  “The regiment as a whole, sir? Or Fifth Company?”

  “Fifth Company, of course.”

  Kuritsin glanced at the floor as he said, “He’s waiting outside, sir.”

  Karif suppressed a grin at the look on the captain’s face.

  “He?” spluttered Sebastev. “You mean—?”

  Kuritsin turned, opened the door, and called out into the icy air.

  Answering the lieutenant’s call, a Vostroyan of unusually slim build stepped into the dugout, clumps of snow falling to the floor from the top of his hat and armoured shoulders. The lieutenant sealed the door behind the newcomer and ordered him to remove his scarf.

  The trooper’s face was blue-eyed, red-cheeked and innocent. There was more of the choirboy about him than the battle-ready Guardsman. He looked barely halfway through his adolescence, though he’d have to be at least eighteen years old to be posted to a regiment. His face bore none of the scars from basic training that most new conscripts were so proud of.

  Karif recognised the boy immediately. They’d ridden together with a handful of others in the back of a Chimera from the town to the trenches, though he couldn’t remember his name.

  Captain Sebastev was staring at the youngster with a mixture of disgust and disbelief.

  “What the khek is this?” he growled. “The new company mascot? This one’s never old enough for duty. What’s your name, trooper? And where’s your damned moustache?”

  Clearly feeling sorry for the nervous boy, Lieutenant Kuritsin answered on his behalf. “This is Danil Stavin, sir. His papers say he’s eighteen. He came down on the last boat with the commissar and about three hundred others. The Sixty-Eighth was assigned about forty in all. We got this one.”

  “Well then,” said Captain Sebastev, “he must be some kind of Space Marine, by the Throne. Is that right, Stalin? Are you a Space Marine?”

  “It’s Stavin, sir. With a ‘v’, sir,” said the boy. His voice was little more than a nervous whisper.

  The “boat” Lieutenant Kuritsin had referred to was the Imperial Naval cruiser Helmund’s Honour. Rather than raise new foundings like most Imperial Guard regiments, the Vostroyan Firstborn was reinforced in the field, a peculiarity that was, according to some, the result of an ancient debt about which no one living seemed to know a great deal. If they did know, they weren’t talking.

  The newest levies from Vostroya had already settled into the passenger holds when Karif stepped aboard the ship at Port Maw. In the months it took the ship to navigate the warp, Karif had watched the young Vostroyans train, readying themselves for action in the Second Kholdas War. Since Danik’s World was considered little more than a backwater with minimal tactical importance to the war effort, those unlucky enough to be earmarked for the Twelfth Army had suffered the taunts of the others. The real glory was on the cluster’s spinward side, where those on the Kholdas Line fought to hold back the massive ork armada from the Ghoul Stars.

  On the journey out to the Eastern Front, Karif had enjoyed impressing the new conscripts with tales of his battlefield exploits. He told them of his experiences facing the inexplicable eldar. His stories of the terrifying tyranids had drawn gasps of awe from the young men. Karif’s ego had been well fed. What did it matter that he’d embellished a little? Karif grinned at the boy as he remembered, and was rewarded with a broad smile in return.

  “What are you so happy about, trooper?” growled Sebastev. “The deep winter’ll soon knock that smile off your face.”

  Stavin’s cheeks glowed and he dropped his eyes to the floor.

  “Rits,” said Sebastev, “who took the most hits today?”

  “That would be Fourth Platoon, sir, though not by much.”

  “Right. Stavin, I’m assigning you to Fourth Platoon. Your commanding officer is Lieutenant Nicholo. Understood?”

  Kuritsin suddenly looked uncomfortable. “Actually, sir, Lieutenant Nicholo took an ork blade in the shoulder today during the second wave. He’s at the field hospital.”

  Sebastev loosed a string of curses, the likes of which Karif had never heard. Some of the images they conjured were deeply unpleasant. “How bad is it?”

  “He lost an arm, sir, his left. Full augmentation from the shoulder down, so I’m told.”

  The captain was quiet for a moment, visibly disturbed by the news. Then he caught Karif assessing him. His face quickly reverted to its previous snarl. “Nicholo’s a solid man. He’s in good hands. Our medics are the very best in the Twelfth Army, commissar.” He turned his eyes to the boy. “Right then, Stavin, you’ll report to Sergeant Breshek in the meantime. He’ll get you sorted out.”

  It’s a fact, thought Karif as he l
ooked at the young trooper, that most new arrivals to the battlefield don’t survive their first skirmish. Those that do survive tend to be born fighters, bullies, killers, sociopaths. There are occasionally others, the quick studies. Some of them make it. They learn the hard way. This one doesn’t look like a fighter. Is he a quick study, I wonder?

  “Excuse me, captain,” said Karif, “I’d like to present a proposal of sorts regarding Trooper Stavin here.”

  “Very well,” said the captain. “Out with it.”

  “You appreciate that newly assigned commissars often experience a regrettable amount of culture clash. It makes things difficult for all concerned. So, in order to help me adjust to Vostroyan ways, I’d like to request an adjutant. Since Trooper Stavin is, in your own words, a shiny—”

  “I see where you’re going with this, commissar,” said Captain Sebastev. “I certainly can’t assign a more experienced man to spit-polish your boots for you. Very well. Trooper Stavin, you’ll serve as the commissar’s adjutant. Do as he says except when I tell you otherwise. A commissar’s adjutant you may be, but I’m in charge. Make sure you don’t forget it.”

  Stavin saluted the captain and said, “Yes, sir. I won’t forget.”

  “Good.” Sebastev faced his own adjutant and said, “Rits, take the commissar and his new aide to their dugout. D-fourteen is free, isn’t it? Get them settled in. And make sure the relevant people know about the briefing in the war room later. Tell them Colonel Kabanov won’t stand for any tardiness, clear?”

  “Like good rahzvod, sir,” said the lieutenant with a sharp salute.

  The commissar rose from his chair, forced to stoop again, and placed his cap on his head. He lifted his cloak from its peg, fastened it over his shoulders, and joined Kuritsin and Stavin at the door.

  “Make sure you’re at the briefing, commissar,” said Sebastev. “You can be sure the colonel has something damned important to say.”