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Inferno! A Warhammer 40,000 Collection – Extract

A Black Library Publication

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REGULA’S STORY

‘His name was Bernard Wellsmith. He was my sergeant, but how he ever came to that position was always a topic of debate between me and the rest of our squad. Some leaders think of themselves before their subordinates. With others, it’s the other way around. Bernard, however, only thought of himself. The rest of us were just stones to step on as he crossed towards whatever goal he’d fixed in his mind. Thinking back on it now, I don’t believe he ever called me by the correct name.

‘I was in two battles with him, and in both cases he recklessly chased the opportunity to make himself look good. The first time had us guarding a small pass, while the majority of our forces held off an army of heretics less than a mile away.

‘“If they retreat this way,” we were told, “you’ll be the ones to stop them. Blow the pass and crush them as they run through.”

‘That wasn’t good enough for Bernard.

‘We hadn’t been at our post more than half an hour when he turned and said to us, “Friends,” (he was always calling us that) “the fight calls to us. Follow me to victory.”

‘“Sergeant,” I said. “Our orders are to stay here.”

‘“I give you your orders. Now, I’ve got a chill in my bones only the heat of battle can warm. Come. For the Emperor!” With that, he charged towards the clashing forces, raising his gun in the air and softly practising his war cry.

‘Now, this left our squad in a conundrum. We all knew Bernard Wellsmith was a fool, and most of them thought he should be allowed to follow a fool’s fatal endeavour. If he survived the battle, he’d be brought before a commissar and would eat a bolt-round for disobeying specific instructions. The squad would guard the pass as ordered and we’d have a new superior officer before morning.

‘But I suggested that we follow Wellsmith. While I thought it inevitable our sergeant would fall under a commissar’s final scrutiny, I considered that we also would be brought to the firing line if we didn’t operate within the chain of command. More importantly, a dolt like our sergeant, unchecked, would likely get others killed on his march to fame and glory.

‘That didn’t sit well with any of us. With most of the squad grumbling, we pursued Sergeant Wellsmith.

‘By the time we caught up to him, he stood in the thick of it, shooting his gun this way and that. The man was such a terrible shot, and he refused to aim his weapon properly. Instead, he roared and squeezed his trigger, allowing his shots to fly where they would.

‘In the confusion of war, it was difficult to say for sure, but I’m almost certain his misguided shots killed several of our brothers and sisters that day, and I doubt he ever realised. They were unlucky. Sergeant Wellsmith, however, seemed to have fate’s grace upon him.

‘You’ve heard that fools, because they can’t be made wise, are made lucky? Bernard Wellsmith was the embodiment of that phrase. Bullets passed him by, flames diverted direction as if a whirlwind surrounded him. I saw a heretic launch a rocket at the man from less than forty feet away. Bernard turned at just the right moment, and all that touched him was the rocket’s dark smoke across his shoulder. The Guardsmen behind were not so fortunate. Their parts scattered into the air, coating the battleground, and those standing or lying on it, in dark-red gore.

‘Three in our squad were cut down as we made our way further in. Bernard wouldn’t stay in one place, and this frustrated us more than having to fight our way to him. A fellow Guardsman, Bromidge was her name, made it to the sergeant before the rest of us. She must have been angry. We all were. She leapt at Bernard and shoved him to the ground. What she didn’t realise was that a rather large heretic had been standing over Bernard, swinging down a spiked hammer. The blow, intended for our sergeant, broke Bromidge’s back in two, folding her like wet cloth. You may not believe me, but I tell you, I heard her spine snap as if someone had cracked a twig beside my ear. I can hear it now.

‘The rest of us grabbed Bernard and ran.

‘You might think the tale ends here, that Bernard was executed and the rest of us moved on. But his luck, it seems, carried over from the battlefield to bureaucracy. The sergeant and his commissar had some family connection, and we remained stuck under the shadow of Sergeant Bernard Wellsmith. More unlucky Guardsmen were harvested and added to our squad to replace those we’d lost. From then on, Wellsmith had us perform pointless training drills and endless nights of study. We were made to read about tactics, known weaknesses of different xenos, the history of previous battles. The heretics hadn’t yet been purged from the planet and, until we faced them again, we were to spend our time productively. Our hatred for him grew more and more, as we hoped he’d be placed in charge of a different squad. I, however, wouldn’t be satisfied until he’d been transferred to a different world.

‘Our hopes were dashed the day our squad faced the heretics’ leader.

‘This time we weren’t given some lonely pass to guard. We were sent right into the battle, and our sole mission was to demolish a bridge before the heretics had a chance to cross. Things… did not go as planned.

‘While we were setting the charges, the enemy had begun their advancement on the bridge, and several other squads had no choice but to meet them head-on. Bernard once again felt the call to pursue direct combat. I was to stay behind while the rest of the squad followed him onto the bridge.

‘“You have the detonator,” I told him.

‘“Oh!” He stopped in his tracks and handed it over. “Now you have it.”

‘Nothing I could have said would have stopped him from running onto that bridge, and to say it plainly, I had no desire whatsoever to stop him. I’d learned my lesson from the previous battle. Guardsmen were going to die that day, but I wouldn’t allow our squad to be among them, not because of Bernard Wellsmith.

‘Wellsmith didn’t hear me call the others back, nor did he see me lead them away from the bridge, shouting at any Guardsman I passed, imploring them to retreat unless they wanted to be vaporised. Word spread quickly and soon the Imperial forces ran from the bridge, but not Bernard. He charged ahead, a strange sort of joy in his steps. Luck would again be on his side.

‘The warlord was a huge man, armour red as blood, two enormous prongs jutting from his helmet. He carried a pistol in one hand and a fearsome axe in the other. Chains jangled from his left hand as he turned towards two Guardsmen who hadn’t been able to flee. As he sliced them in half, it gave Bernard the perfect opening for a kill shot, and our sergeant knew it. This was the glory he’d sought. Killing this leader of bloodthirsty heretics would write his name upon the scroll of eternity.

‘As loud as his lungs would allow him, Bernard screamed, “For the Emperor!”

‘My sergeant raised his weapon. And that’s when I detonated the charges we’d placed on the bridge.

‘I’d grown accustomed to the sound of explosions, but that had to have been the loudest sound in the entire galaxy. The blast, the fire, the tons of steel and rock that rained from the sky, they erased the warlord, his soldiers, and Bernard Wellsmith from this life.

‘Luck, it seems, can be killed just as easily as any man. I did as I was ordered, and I am not ashamed to say it.’

Amulius scrambled to his feet. ‘You should be ashamed! Your sergeant. How could you?’

Regula remained seated, looking at the old man with eyes too filled with exhaustion to have room for fear. At the door, something scraped at the metal. Screeching followed and several heavy bodies pummelled each side of the barracks. ‘Are you going to use that gun or just stand there stroking it?’

‘And you’re a breacher?’ Amulius’ left cheek twitched. ‘You could detonate the charges. You can end this hell we’ve found ourselves in. Why didn’t you tell me?’

‘Excuse me,’ Consus said. His face had grown paler. His words were airy, almost a whisper. ‘But I believe… we still have a game to play. That was the agreement.’

‘Game?’ Amulius flicked sweat from his face and pointed at Regula with a wet finger. ‘That story was a confession of treason. She’s forfeited.’

‘If you think her story wasn’t worthy… that would be one thing,’ said Consus. ‘But you said the story had to be true and witnessed first-hand. Is it because you didn’t like… the content? Or are you afraid she’ll win?’

‘I’m not afraid,’ Amulius snapped.

‘Then the game goes on,’ Consus said. ‘Besides, I haven’t had… my turn yet. You want to die in a fireball like Regula’s sergeant? You’ve got… to tell the best tale. Right?’

Regula popped her knuckles. ‘It wasn’t treason. I was ordered to destroy the bridge and I obeyed. But I’m dead anyway, so what does it matter?’

Amulius lowered his gun and, after a few seconds glaring at Regula, nodded and sat on the ground, although a bit further from the other two this time.

Consus coughed wet against his fist, but it came away clean when he lowered it. ‘I… suppose I should… go next. Not sure how much time I have.’

‘The floor is yours,’ said Regula. Muffled by the roof, a tyranid roared just above their heads.

‘Then I’ll take up as much of it as I can, if you don’t mind.’ Consus lay on his back, taking a deep but staggered breath. ‘I don’t have the will to sit up any longer.’

Amulius and Regula shifted away to avoid the man’s bloody stump.

‘Well,’ said Consus, ‘my story is not a tale of one death… but many, all suffered by the same unfortunate man. I’d like to say he helped me… to never fear death, not ever again, and for several years I didn’t. But that’s the thing about living. You… get used to it. You grow covetous of time you’re not sure you have.’

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A BLACK LIBRARY PUBLICATION

‘Raised in Darkness’ first published in Inferno! Volume 6 in 2021
‘The Exorcism of Karsa V’ first published in Inferno! Volume 6 in 2021
‘Vova’s Climb’ first published in Inferno! Volume 6 in 2021
‘The Stuff of Nightmares’ first published in Inferno! Volume 6 in 2021
‘The Last Knight: Part Two’ first published in Inferno! Volume 6 in 2021
‘The Last Knight: Part One’ first published in Inferno! Volume 5 in 2020
‘Respite’s End’ first published in Inferno! Volume 5 in 2020
‘Castle of the Exile’ first published in Inferno! Volume 5 in 2020
‘Best Death Wins’ first published in Inferno! Volume 5 in 2020
‘No Quarter’ first published in Inferno! Volume 5 in 2020
‘The Karsharat Abomination’ first published in Inferno! Volume 4 in 2019
‘Firstborn Exile’ first published in Inferno! Volume 4 in 2019
‘Journey of the Magi’ first published in Inferno! Volume 4 in 2019
‘Green and Grey’ first published in Inferno! Volume 4 in 2019
‘Where Dere’s Da Warp Dere’s A Way’ first published in Inferno! Volume 4 in 2019
‘Blackout’ first published in Inferno! Volume 4 in 2019
‘The Spirit of Cogs’ first published in Inferno! Volume 3 in 2019
‘City of Blood’ first published in Inferno! Volume 3 in 2019
‘Empra’ first published in Inferno! Volume 3 in 2019
‘The Weight of Silver’ first published in Inferno! Volume 3 in 2019
‘The Emperor’s Light’ first published in Inferno! Volume 3 in 2019
‘The Thirteenth Psalm’ first published in Inferno! Volume 2 in 2019
‘What Wakes in the Dark’ first published in Inferno! Volume 2 in 2019
‘Solace’ first published in Inferno! Volume 2 in 2019
‘Turn of the Adder’ first published in Inferno! Volume 2 in 2019
‘The Unsung War’ first published in Inferno! Volume 1 in 2018
‘No Hero’ first published in Inferno! Volume 1 in 2018
‘The Emperor’s Wrath’ first published in Inferno! Volume 1 in 2018
‘The Enemy of My Enemy’ first published in Inferno! Volume 1 in 2018
‘The Firstborn Daughter’ first published in Inferno! Volume 1 in 2018
‘Mercy’ first published in Inferno! Volume 1 in 2018
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