[Ides]

“Can you see anything?”

Brother Sergeant Bathian narrowed his eyes, using the back of his gauntleted hand to shield them from the actinic flare of the ion storm above. Around him, the storm cast sickening orange light across every surface and made worse by the constant rain. After a month on this Emperor-forsaken dirtball he was thoroughly sick of it. For a moment, the shadows of the surrounding hills were lit up, before fading away into the murk of the rain. Nothing. Not that he’d expected to spot anything from here, but it would have been a welcome change.

“Nothing, Antus,” he said, more for the benefit of clearing his lungs than anything else. “Any luck with the vox?”

There was a moment’s silence as Antus conversed with the tech-adepts, but in the end he shook his head. Bathian cursed vehemently. For the life of him, he could not see the why four companies of Astartes were needed to cleanse this forlorn-looking excuse for a world when a few regiments of Imperial Guard with rebreathers would have done the job just as well. Then again it was an Ad-mech cruiser that was missing, so they’d probably wasted no time finding the most heavy-handed way of addressing the problem. Below them, the other members of the squad fanned out in a search pattern, scanning the grounds ahead for any trace of wreckage. Bathian and Antus kept pace a small distance behind them, guiding the rhino along. This little jaunt was trying enough without risking a broken drive on the transport.

“Tell me again why we’re out here.”

“Because we didn’t have a choice in the matter,” Bathian said, scratching the back of his head. “Can’t imagine any other reason you’d bother.”

As far as planets went, Faulsam was singularly uninviting, its only high-point being the naval resupply station in orbit. Most of the planet’s land-mass was either mountainous or foetid swampland, neither of which seemed remotely habitable. The lowlands were perpetually shrouded in thick, clinging fog despite the endless rain and the air was rife with some kind of airborne contagion that caused full blown anaphylactic shock in unprotected humans (and some Astartes). This restricted potential habitation to the mountainous areas where the air was almost ridiculously thin, but made up for it by being thick with some kind of static electricity from the ion storm. Without rebreathers their third lungs were hard-pressed to keep up. Either condition alone would have been irritating in the extreme, but now it was downright disturbing. All of their vox and auspex equipment was worthless on anything short of full power and even then they could only get a fraction of the range.

Turning, he spat on the ground beside him. Whatever was wrong with the air it still managed to constrict his throat something awful. Antus didn’t say anything, but Bathian felt the unspoken reproach. Unlike him, Antus chose to keep his helmet on, and enjoy recycled air at the expense of sight-range. For his part, Bathian was willing to endure the discomfort to see the planet with his own eyes. After all, the same conditions that rendered the auspexes worthless were playing havoc with their autosenses. There were already too many rumours of battle-brothers hearing voices in their helmets for his liking. Warp, the Chaplains were practically visiting each squad twice a day to keep morale up. He shook his head; if they found that cruiser at all it would be a bloody miracle. Antus must have sensed his mood.

“You’d think something that size would be easy to spot.”

“If that’s really what we’re after.”

Antus almost paused in his stride.

“You don’t trust our friends in the mechanicus?”

“No further than I could spit them,” Bathian said, his face impassive.

Such thoughts were dangerous, he knew, but the mechanicus had its own objectives which didn't always qualify as for the good of the Imperium. That was unlikely to change in his lifetime. Or anyone else’s for that matter.

“What are you thinking?”

Bathian glanced at Antus and indicated the fog-shrouded lands below.

“We’re going to have to go down there,” he said, “if it was topside we’d have found it by now.”

“You’re…worried?”

The incredulity in Antus’ voice set his teeth on edge, and he narrowed his eyes. Antus was by far the most formidable warrior in his squad, one of the best in the company, if Bathian was any judge, but there was a good reason why he had yet to make sergeant, despite his long service. Going down there meant leaving the rhinos behind and searching each inch of ground slowly and painfully, lest any of the squads lose contact with each other. They’d be lacking heavy weapons, aerial support and any means of reporting findings to HQ. Recipe for disaster, was what the captain had termed it, and he was inclined to agree.

“Its not my decision to make,” Bathian said, carefully. “If the brother captain orders the advance we will comply, but I won’t like it, I’ll tell you that.”

To his surprise, Antus merely nodded. Calling out to signal a halt, Bathian reflected that there might have been hope for him yet.

“Mount up!”

The rest of the squad double timed it back to the transport with almost no extraneous chatter. Bathian watched them go with a certain quiet pride.

“Come on,” he said to Antus, “we’re wasting our time here.”