Secret War: Upon Blood Sands by BAD Agar, Adrassil (amazing books to read TXT) 📕

He'd grown fond of Karmen, despite her ability and her penchant for extreme pragmatism. Jelket hoped this mission wouldn't cost her.

At times like this, Jelket missed the good old days under Taryst's employ. Back when all he had to was patrol corridors and practised at the rifle range. His thoughts wandered back, back to his old squad. All of them had died along with Omnartus, although none he'd seen die first hand. Jelket smiled and looked down at his prosthetic hand as he opened and closed it repeatedly. He'd lost his arm and lost consciousness a split second before his sergeant and best friend, Roldar, had lost his head. Jelket closed his eyes and exhaled heavily out his nose. He supposed he was lucky. Lucky it was him and Roldar who had carried Attelus back instead of another. Lucky that his arm had exploded instead of his skull. Jelket frowned and looked out the window at the outrider, who he thought might be Attelus. Or was he? Roldar had been ranting and raving at Attelus for keeping secrets, but now Jelket knew; he wasn't sure if he wanted to. Despite his search for truth in other fields. Maybe Roldar was the lucky one. He'd died a quick, honourable death. A death not many soldiers of the Imperium would.

Jelket had left the guard because he couldn't handle the constant battles and death, yet here he was, at it again. The others could go on about having purpose and all that crap, but Jelket was here because he had to be. He wasn't inhumanly skilled and fast like Attelus or as vastly talented as Hayden Tresch. He was a damn good shot, but in essence, he was just normal, a know-nothing ex-guardsman who lived in the shadows of the best of the best.

At least he wasn't responsible for the death of an entire world.

Karmen suddenly jolted upright in her seat, causing Jelket to flinch back into reality.

The vox crackled awake.

"Attelus!" Karmen said. "I have finished my sweep of Kelitia."

Kelitia was Sarkeath's capital city and main hub. Containing its largest spaceport and the head base for its administratum. That naturally made it their first target to investigate.

"Yes, go ahead," Attelus said.

"I..." Karmen paused. "I could not go far...I..."

"It's okay, Karmen," said Attelus. "We understand-"

"No, you don't. It is like the world itself resists me. The air is like sandpaper, constantly scratching on my ethereal form, and something just keeps trying to pull me into my body. I have never experienced it before. Every second I'm out is painful."

"I'm sorry, Karmen. Did you find anything?"

Karmen sighed. "Honestly, no, Attelus. I could only see as far as the outskirts; there were no life signs. Nothing. But the entire city is incomplete ruination."

"Like it was bombed?" said Halsin.

"No, that is where it gets strange. I have seen cities destroyed by bombardment. But the ruins of Kelitia seem different-"

"What do you mean, different?" growled Vark.

"They...I am no expert on these things, but it seems that it was crumbling. It seems to have aged for hundreds or perhaps thousands of years. It's like nothing I have ever seen."

There was a long, weighted pause.

"This is just getting weirder and weirder," said Halsin.

"Now that an under..."

Attelus wandered off in one of his catchphrases.

"Halt!" he cried. "Everyone, stop! Now!"

Instantly Vark stopped the ATV.

"What? What's wrong?" demanded Karmen, her voice shrill.

"Figures at our twelve o'clock," said Attelus.

"I never saw anyone!" said Karmen.

"Karmen, please calm down," said Attelus. "We know your abilities are being repressed, don't beat yourself up."

"Have they spotted us?" said Verenth.

"No, they...by the Emperor!" Attelus breathed.

"What's wrong, now?" said Vark.

"Don't worry, they're enemy; I don't doubt it. Fifty or sixty, about a kilometre away," said Attelus. "Delathasi, Adelana, Verenth with me on point. Hayden, cover us. The rest of you guard the ATV. We're going to-"

"I want to go," said Jelket on a whim.

Attelus sighed. "Jelket, we're just scouting and-"

"Please, boss."

Attelus sighed again. "All right, if you must. Just hurry it up! They might see us soon!"

As the others threw the cameleoline tarpaulin over the ATV and took up their positions. Attelus, Adelana, Delathasi, Hayden and Jelket advanced. Hunched and silent, invisible beneath their cameleoline cloaks. Jelket could barely keep up and didn't feel invisible. He was sweating despite having his bodyglove's fans on full power.

Jelket had yet to see these enemies. Soon after Attelus had reported their presence, they descended into the bottom of a dune.

Attelus had described them as 'Khornate cultists.' Jelket had fought their kind many times during his years in the guard. But despite this, when they converged on the dune's peak, lain prone, and Jelket watched them through his scope. Jelket reeled and barely contained a gasp, understanding why Attelus had cursed earlier.

Never had Jelket seen such brutish freaks. Their skin brown and bronzed from the sun; they were covered in rough scars, scars that almost seemed to cover every inch of their freakishly bulging musculatures. Many scars carved into patterns and sigils on their sun-beaten skin made Jelket's stomach turn. Sigils announcing their allegiance to their horrific god.

They didn't wear armour, just robes. Robes that were once white but now stained all over with blood. It differentiated from cultist to cultist how stained the robes were. It was obvious that those with less staining stormed at the back of the large, unruly mob. They were unhealthy, their eyes bloodshot and psychotic. The weapons they carried varied as well; many had chainswords or long bayonet swords or massive two-handed axes. The ones with less bloodied robes carried auto guns or las guns, all in terrible condition.

All of this Jelket had expected what caught him off guard was their teeth. To a man, if they could be called 'men' anymore, their teeth were sharpened into jagged, disgusting, brown incisors, like the teeth of feral predatory animals.

"By the Emperor," Jelket breathed.

They were moving quickly, almost with purpose. Kelitia was still fifty kilometres away; if they'd come from there, they must've been walking for a while. Did the enemy know of their presence already? Send out this party to intercept them?

Jelket doubted it, but as Attelus would say, 'there's no such thing as coincidence.' And it seemed like one hell of a coincidence that this cultist mob just happened to be heading their way at this time.

Jelket's microbead beeped.

"Fall back," said Attelus. "I'd like to ambush them here, but it'll only be a few minutes before they're here. So we'll fall back, fifty metres. Adelana, myself, Helma, Verenth and Torris will set up twenty-five metres north. Delathasi, Jelket, Vark and Hayden twenty-five metres south. Karmen, Halsin reveal the ATV. Draw them in with the pintle mount; we'll hit them from the flanks. Throw frag grenades, then catch them in a crossfire. Any questions?"

There was a chorus of confirmations.

"There's frigging seventy of the bastards!" said Jelket.

"We can do this, Jelket! Fall back, now! We haven't much time!

Jelket barely kept back a curse and did as ordered. Was Attelus losing his mind or lost it already?

"Take any survivors for interrogation?" said Adelana.

Attelus barked a laugh. "Adelana, we've got more chance interrogating intel from a rockcrete wall than getting anything from these zealots. Kill them all!"

Attelus hated waiting, but as much as he hated it, over time, he'd learned to cope with it. Well, 'cope' was a strong word, in all honesty. A long time ago, he'd decided he didn't have what it takes to be a soldier. Waiting, standing still, was a large part of soldiering. Ironically, he was commanding an infiltration squad into a warzone, a job that would usually be the realm of soldiers.

"Hostiles sited," said Halsin over the vox in his almost enviously cool, calm manner. "Opening fire."

The heavy chatter sound of storm bolter fire erupted.

There was a psychotic, blood-curdling roar that shook Attelus to his core, and he had to fight the urge to cover his ears and writhe.

Perhaps he'd overstepped the mark; perhaps Jelket was right.

Attelus repressed the thought; if the others thought the same way, they'd have said so.

"Seventy metres," announced Halsin.

"Prep grenades," Attelus hissed into his link as he pulled the pin of his, applying pressure on the stub.

"Sixty metres."

Attelus clenched his teeth and gripped the handle of his autopistol harder. He wanted to check the clip of dumm dumm rounds for the hundredth time but fought the urge; even the slightest movement could give him away. They might be blood-crazed khornate cultists, but he wasn't going to underestimate them.

"Fifty-five."

The scarred bare feet came into view, stampeding past so hard it seemed to shake the very world.

He waited for as many pairs as he dared before giving the order.

"Grenades! Now!" Attelus snarled and threw his.

The explosions ripped through the horde, sending many screaming and sprawling in every possible direction.

"Open fire!" Attelus snarled, throwing off his cloak, his silenced autopistol spitting, sending reeling a reeling cultist writing off his feet.

The others opened up a second after, Adelana's booming bolter fired a metre from Attelus' left. Attelus saw half a stunned cultist's torso explode into a red haze. Another cultist's head was vaporised as he raised his lasgun to fire Hayden's work. Helma's hell gun blurted flurries, slicing through cultists with almost innate accuracy. Torris's shotgun barked over and over. Erupting messy holes through the cultist's ranks.

Attelus cut down cultists left and right. There was no cover, so he and the others focused their fire on the enemies with ranged weapons. His dumm dumm rounds were hollow point, designed to expand on impact against soft tissue. Low on penetration, but high on stopping power. Unlike the others, he didn't wield a rifle due to his close-range specialisation and desire to travel light.

About forty of the enemy lay dead or dying in the initial few seconds of combat. But despite this, the cultists gathered themselves with impressive speed and charged. Six came at Attelus, screaming out their devotion and rage. They were even more, terrifying up close, their savagery breathtaking in its intensity. Spit flew from their razor-sharp, brown maws. Their bloodshot eyes wide and chainswords and blades raised with unskilled wild abandon.

Attelus knew their horrific appearance, and the psychotic way wasn't just for their god. It was calculated. Used to inspire fear and demoralise their enemy. He fought the fear thundering through him, hiding it under a cool, calm exterior.

He killed two with the last three rounds in his clip, blowing out the back of the skull of the first, then put two through the second's chest. Even with his quick hands, Attelus didn't have time to reload, so he dropped his pistol and drew his powersword, activating its edge in a blaze of blue.

The third cultist was on him, swinging his whirring chainsword at Attelus' skull. With ease, Attelus ducked and disembowelled him with a horizontal slice.

The fourth cut down wildly. Attelus slid out the way then beside the cultist and slashed through the cultist's ribs and heart.

The fifth and sixth came at him almost at once. One thrust his long blade at Attelus' guts, the other chopped around his chainsword. They were quick, deceptively skilled, but to Attelus, they seemed to move in slow motion. Their attacks ridiculously telegraphed. Attelus darted aside of the long blade, and his powerblade decapitated the cultist. The one with the chainsword was still in mid-swing as Attelus lunged and plunged the tip of his sword through the side of his chest.

He pulled out his sword and glanced about. Only a few cultists were left. Adelana, with her monomolecular sword, engaged one. Adelana was struggling. Losing. This while Delathasi was fighting three at once, another two lay dead near her. Delathasi was skill was impressive as she dodged and weaved and parried. But she wouldn't last much longer.

Attelus didn't hesitate. In a split second, he crossed the distance and cut down Adelana's attacker as he was preparing the final blow.

The gasping Adelana nodded her thanks, and Attelus