'What's this? Penal legion scum!' he hisses, looking at what's written on the parchment.
'Not any more. I'm a proper officer now/1 tell them, still half-baked with the wine. 'Look, I'm sitting around on my fat arse
doing nothing, shouting at the troopers and trying to jump a lass from the local town, I must be an officer/
Той should've been hanged!' Big Moustache adds, looking over his comrade's shoulder. 'You're a disgrace to the Imperial Guard/
'You'd all be dead if it wasn't for us/ I mumble back. 'Should thank me, ungrateful bastards/
You think so?' the third one demands, his piggy nose thrust into my face. You're nothing! You're scum!'
You should all be killed!' Baldy declares, face a bright red now.
'We were!' I snarl back sickened by their attitude. They were fraggin' heroes. You part-time soldiers don't even deserve to lick their boots!'
You traitorous filth/ Pig Nose bellows, pulling an ornate sword from its scabbard and waving it at me. Something inside me snaps, looking at these prissy, pompous, spoilt, officer-class weevil-brained snobs. A feeling I haven't felt since Coritan-orum surges through me, a feeling of energy and vitality, of being alive, infusing me with strength and power.
'I'm a man, a soldier!' I scream back at them, hauling myself to my feet. "They were all soldiers, real men and women! Not scum!'
Pig Nose makes a clumsy swipe with the sword, but he's too close and I easily grab his wrist. I trap the basket hilt in my left hand and twist, wrenching it easily from his grasp, as easy as taking sweetmeats from a babe.
You want it rough?' I shriek, slamming the hilt into his pig nose, causing blood to cascade over the white breast of his tunic. They begin to back away. I hear murmurs from around the room. You're Guard, can't you fight me? What did you get those medals for? Polishing? Shouting? Fight me, damn you!'
I take another step forward, lashing out with the hilt into Big Moustache's stomach, doubling him over. They stumble away again, eyes darting around looking for the trooper that's going to fight for them.
'No one else to fight this battle/ I snarl. You'll have to get bloody and dirty now/
There's a clamour all around as people scramble for the doors. Chairs and tables are overturned as people back off from the madman screaming and waving a sword around. This is the
closest half of them have ever been to a fight. The alcohol mixes with my anger to fuel me with blood lust, a red mist descends in front of my eyes and I keep seeing litde piles of ashes, faceless strangers clawing at me from my dreams, men cut down and blown apart. My head whirls with it and I feel dizzy. It's like four thousand voices are crying out for blood in my head, four thousand men and women crying to be remembered, asking for vengeance.
This is for Franx!' I shout, plunging the sword into Pig Nose's guts. The others try to grab me, but I lunge back at them, slashing and hacking with the sword.
'ForPoal! Poliwicz! Gudmanz! Gappo! Kyle! Aliss! Densel! Harlon! Loron! Jorett! Mallory! Donalson! Fredricks! Broker! Roiseland! Slavini! Kronin! Linskrug!' The litany of names spills from my lips as I carve the three arrogant Typhons to pieces, hacking into their inert bodies, blood splashing across the light blue carpet to create a purple puddle. With each stroke, I picture a death. All the ones I saw die, they're stored up there in my head and it seems like they want to rush out. 'For fraggin' all of'em! For Lorii!' I finish, leaving the sabre jutting from the chest of Pig Nose.
People are shouting and grabbing at me, someone's throwing up to my right, the coward, but I push them away, remembering at the last second to turn back and snatch the pardon from Baldy's dead fingers. I stumble out of the door and start running off into the streets, the rain cascading off my bloodied hands as I stuff the pardon back into my pocket.
I wake with a banging in my head loud enough to be all the forges on Mars. My throat feels as if several small mammals have nested in it for a year and my limbs feel weak. With hazy recollection the events of the night before come back to me. I can feel the Typhons' dried blood caked on my hands. I really should try to control my temper. My next instinct is to check that I have my pardon. I fumble in my pocket and my heart leaps into my throat when I find it empty.
Just then I hear a tearing noise and force my eyes open. Someone's stood over me where I'm collapsed against an alley wall. The sun reflects off a window behind him, so he's hidden in shadow. Squinting into the light, all I can see are two pinpricks of glittering blue. Two pieces of flashing ice. He drops
something and I see my pardon, torn in two, fluttering to the wet ground. He pulls a bolt pistol from his belt and points it at my face.
The first thing that pops into my head is, 'What the hell is he doing here?'
The second is, 'How in all that's holy did he get his arm back?'
'I knew you would come back to me, Kage/ the Colonel purrs savagely, 'You are one of mine. You always will be. I can kill you now, or I can give you one more Last Chance/
Oh frag.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Gav Thorpe works for Games Workshop in his
capacity as Warhammer Loremaster (whatever that is).
Something to do with making stuff up and designing
games, apparently. He has written an armful of short
stories for Inferno! magazine, and people constandy
nag him for more Last Chancers stuff. You may be
worried to known that when he is thinking really
hard he has a tendency to talk to the mechanical
hamster widi which he shares a flat.