There's twelve of us left now, not including the Colonel, and we take it in turns to drag the sled on two-hour stints. The Colonel tried to get me to leave Franx behind, saying the additional weight was unnecessary, but Gappo, Loron, Lorii and Kronin volunteered to team up with me and we've been swapping him between our shift and die remaining ploughfoot's sled.
I soon lose track of the time, even die midnight stops have gone beyond counting, so we might have been going for only three days or for a whole week, it's impossible to say. The wind's really picked up now, and the snow is getting heavier again. I remember Ekul's warnings about the Emperor's Wrath storm, and fear the worst. I let the others know what's coming and everybody redoubles their efforts, but it's getting to the point where it takes everything out of you just to stay awake,
never mind keeping walking and pulling the sled. Soon we've emptied one sled of provisions and we decide to dump the tents, nobody's had the strength to put them up since we started. The going gets a litde quicker then, with the two teams and the ploughfoot taking turns with die remaining sled.
'If the orks are up against anything like this, they may never make it across/ Kyle suggests one evening as we gnaw on half-frozen strips of meat.
'Don't you believe it/1 say. "They're tough bastards, you know that. Besides, they'll have looted and built Emperor knows what before trying the crossing. If their warlord's smart enough to come up with the feint, it's definitely got the brains to come prepared. They've probably got vehicles and everything as well.'
'What if we're too late?' exclaims Kyle, suddenly veering from optimism to total depression in a moment. I've never noticed him having mood swings like this before, but then I guess we're all swinging wildly from hope to despair and back again at the moment.
Then we're bent over backwards, good and proper/ Poliwicz says, tearing at his salted meat with his teeth.
'Whole Emperor-damned planet looks the same/ curses Kyle. 'I can't tell where we are, how far we've got to go/
Nobody bothers replying; it's hard enough to concentrate on the next few minutes, let alone worry about the next day. I toss die remnants of my rations aside, too tired to chew, and lie back, willing sleep to claim me quickly and take me away from the pain in every part of my body.
Hoarse screaming up ahead snaps me out of my fatigue-induced sleepwalking.
'What now?' I ask sleepily when I reach the half-dozen Last Chancers clustered up ahead.
'One of die station's pickets/ the Colonel says. 'I have sent him back with the warning about the orks/ I realise diey were shouts of joy, not screams, but in my befuddled state I'd just interpreted them as more pain and misery for some poor soul.
'We're still going on to Epsilon, aren't we?' I ask hurriedly, fearing the Colonel might be about to order us to turn around and go back the way we came.
Yes we are. This has gone on long enough/ he reassures me, and for the first time I notice how thin and drawn he's looking.
There are massive dark rings around his eyes from the sleepless nights, and his whole body looks slumped, like the rest of us.
It takes another two hours' trekking before we reach the gatehouses. A small delegation of officers from the Kragmeer regiments waits for us. Their mood is grim, but they don't look too unkindly on us when, at a word from the Colonel, we fall to die snow a few metres away from diem, completely exhausted.
I don't hear what they're saying; my ears have been numb for the past few days, even with the fur-lined coat pulled protectively over my head. They seem to be having some sort of argument, and I'm wondering if diey've taken the same line as Greaves, accusing die Colonel of abandoning his command. I see Schaeffer shaking his head violently and point up into the sky. I hear a scattering of words, like 'siege', 'time', 'important', and 'orbit'. None of it makes any sense. One of the Kragmeer officers, bloody high-ranking by all the finery on his uniform, steps forward and makes negative cutting gestures with his hand before pointing over his shoulder back into die station. There are more heated exchanges and the Colonel turns on his heel and stamps over to us.
'On your feet, Last Chancers/ he snaps, before marching off, up die valley and away from die gates.
'Where the frag are we going now?' asks Poliwicz.
'Perhaps we're defending die shuttle pad?' Gappo guesses witii a shrug.
After the brief flood of energy once we knew we were close to Epsilon, my tiredness returns with a vengeance. My brain shuts down everydiing except the bits needed for walking and breaming for die trek up to the shuttie pad, and everydiing from the past couple of weeks condenses into a blurry white mess.
We reach the shuttle pad to find die gate closed. Peering through the mesh of the high fence, I can see our shuttle still out on die apron, kept clear of snow by the attendants.
That's a direct order from a superior officer/ I hear die Colonel say and I focus my attention back on him. He's standing at the door of die litde guardhouse next to die gate, and diere's a Kragmeer sergeant shaking his head.
'I'm sorry, Colonel/ die sergeant says, hands held up in a helpless gesture, 'but without die proper authority I can't let you take the shuttle/
My brain suddenly clunks into gear. Take the shuttle? We're leaving?
'Lieutenant Kage!' barks die Colonel and I quick march over to him, standing to attention as best I can. 'If diis man does not open diis gate immediately and clear die pad for launch, shoot him/
The Kragmeerite starts babbling somediing as I pull my pistol out and point it at his head. I really don't give a frag whedier I blow diis guy's brains out or not. For one diing, I'm just too tired to care. For another, if this frag-head is stopping me from getting off diis ice-frozen hell, I'll happily put a slug in his skull.
He relents under my not-so-subtle coercion, stepping back into the hut to pull a lever which sets die gate grinding open. Klaxons begin to echo off the hills around us, and people start scurrying from die hangars and work barracks.
We're leaving,' the Colonel announces, stepping dirough the gateway.
'Leaving?' Linskrug asks. 'Going where?'
You'll find that out when we get there, trooper/ the Colonel says mysteriously.
SIX
TYPHOS PRIME
+++ Operation Harvest complete. Preparing to commence Operation New Sun. +++
+++ There can be no more delays. New Sun must go ahead on schedule or all will be lost. +++
Compared with some of the places I've been with the Last Chancers, and considering that it's been torn apart by bloody civil war for the past two years, Typhos Prime seems very civilised. After touching down at one of its many spaceports, a Commissariat squad escorts us through busy city streets, with people coming and going as if there weren't battles being fought less than two hundred kilometres away. There are a few telltale signs that everything isn't as cosy as it seems, though. There are air raid warning sirens at every junction - huge hail-ers atop six-metre poles - and signs marking the route to the nearest shelters. Arbitrators patrol the streets, menacing with their silvered armour over jet-black jump-suits, wielding shock mauls and suppression shields.
As we pass along a wide thoroughfare, there are shuttered windows amongst the stores along both sides of the wide road. There are a few people around, swathed against the autumnal chill and damp in shapeless brown coats and thick felt hats, trailing brightly coloured scarves from their necks. A smog hangs above the city, visible over the squat buildings to either side, mixing with the cloud that stretches across the sky to cast a dismal gloom over the settlement. A column of Chimeras led by two growling Conqueror tanks, resplendent in blue and gold livery, grumbles past along the road, horse carriages and zimmer cars pulling aside to let them pass. In a reinforced underground staging area, we embark on a massive eight-wheeled roadster designed for long-haul troop movements, and the twelve of us spread out, trying to decide in which of the three hundred seats we want to sit. The Colonel parks himself up front with the driver, intendy ignoring us.