Hecatoncheires
un jour je serai de retour près de toi
Original poster
DONATING MEMBER
FOLKLORE MEMBER
The guns fall silent.
I stare across the treeline now strewn with the corpses of the enemy squad; they look small now, shrunken in death, twisted faces and scorch-marks where they were clipped by lasfire, or else chunks of armour and flesh blasted away by Vesperin's heavy stubber. In the immediate aftermath of the firefight's din, the silence that hangs of this stretch of forest is all-encompassing. Every sound can be heard, from the thumping of my heart in my chest to Private Aiar's breathing nearby.
Rising back to my feet, I lower my lasgun back into a ready position.
“All clear, hold fire,” I communicate to my team via mirco-bead, advancing forwards slowly towards the bodies of the fallen. The enhanced lighting of my visor has picked up something slung across the chest of one of the secessionists, something that gives me the beginnings of a plan if it turns out to be what I think it is.
The body is an older man, weathered and scarred face. Career soldier, probably been at this a long time. For a moment my mind ponders what battles he's seen, the friends he's lost, the death traps he's somehow managed to walk away from... all for him to wind up here, dead in the underbrush with a hole in his chest from one of our lasguns. Quickly I shake such thoughts out of my head and pull at the bandoleer he wears, tugging it free.
Three Krak Grenades hang in pouches on it, cylindrical metal devices still bearing the insignia of the Imperium. “Janna? Think I may have just found what we're gonna be improvising with.” I'm about to sling the bandoleer over my chest, but suddenly I find myself staring down into the dead man's gaze, into his face that remains locked mid-shout. An order? A cry for help? Perhaps a call for a retreat?
With a sigh, I reach down and close his eyes one final time.
Only in death does duty end.
“Team, form up on me,” I order via mirco-bead, “check your equipment, make sure your weapons are reloaded, grab any spare ammo you can find from the dead and then get ready to move out. We've no time to waste.”
I stare across the treeline now strewn with the corpses of the enemy squad; they look small now, shrunken in death, twisted faces and scorch-marks where they were clipped by lasfire, or else chunks of armour and flesh blasted away by Vesperin's heavy stubber. In the immediate aftermath of the firefight's din, the silence that hangs of this stretch of forest is all-encompassing. Every sound can be heard, from the thumping of my heart in my chest to Private Aiar's breathing nearby.
Rising back to my feet, I lower my lasgun back into a ready position.
“All clear, hold fire,” I communicate to my team via mirco-bead, advancing forwards slowly towards the bodies of the fallen. The enhanced lighting of my visor has picked up something slung across the chest of one of the secessionists, something that gives me the beginnings of a plan if it turns out to be what I think it is.
The body is an older man, weathered and scarred face. Career soldier, probably been at this a long time. For a moment my mind ponders what battles he's seen, the friends he's lost, the death traps he's somehow managed to walk away from... all for him to wind up here, dead in the underbrush with a hole in his chest from one of our lasguns. Quickly I shake such thoughts out of my head and pull at the bandoleer he wears, tugging it free.
Three Krak Grenades hang in pouches on it, cylindrical metal devices still bearing the insignia of the Imperium. “Janna? Think I may have just found what we're gonna be improvising with.” I'm about to sling the bandoleer over my chest, but suddenly I find myself staring down into the dead man's gaze, into his face that remains locked mid-shout. An order? A cry for help? Perhaps a call for a retreat?
With a sigh, I reach down and close his eyes one final time.
Only in death does duty end.
“Team, form up on me,” I order via mirco-bead, “check your equipment, make sure your weapons are reloaded, grab any spare ammo you can find from the dead and then get ready to move out. We've no time to waste.”