‘Where are the Kauth?’ he asked Sergeant Pillier, who’d just scurried alongside him.
Pillier shook his head, stooping low and tagging a cadet in the knee with his hellpistol. A muffled cry of pain rewarded his efforts before one of the cadet’s allies dragged him clear. The chairs where they’d had the Kauth were tipped over and empty. Only the dead officer remained, face down in a pool of oozing blood.
‘They have us pinned, sir,’ said the sergeant, taking cover from the inevitable return fire.
Culcis leaned out of hiding to get a better idea of the situation. Exploding shrapnel forced him back quickly.
‘They’ve spread out across the back end of the room, four cadets plus Arbettan.’
For their part, the Volpone had Culcis and Pillier crouched behind one bulkhead with Regara and Drado a metre away opposite them taking advantage of one of the columns.
Pillier was right – they were pinned. Arbettan had more men and probably the means to contact them. The nearest vox-bead for the Volpone and possible reinforcements wasn’t near enough.
Regara knew it, too. Culcis could see the realisation of it manifest on his face as livid anger. His hellpistol blazed in the half-dark, lighting up his visage. His shots were largely ineffectual – the commissar and his men were well hunkered down by now. Arbettan saw that as well.
‘Give it up, Regara,’ he shouted over the din. ‘You are all dead men, anyway. The punishment for treason against the Emperor is death. Death! Death!’
‘He’s lost his mind,’ Culcis muttered, unable to get a bead on any of them.
Something was moving out of the corner of his eye, ahead by the next most advanced bulkhead. It was Hauke and his banner bearer. They were crouched, like predators stalking prey. Each carried a small hatchet blade in his right hand.
Culcis bristled with self-directed anger. He’d thought the Longstriders were completely disarmed.
As if reading the lieutenant’s thoughts, Hauke turned and smiled. He pointed two fingers at the loitering silhouettes that were Arbettan and his men.
‘Pillier,’ said Culcis, ‘on my mark, direct suppressing fire against the right column.’ Without waiting for a response, the lieutenant caught Drado’s attention. Regara was too busy emptying his power pack in a frustrated rage.
‘Corporal...’ Culcis had to shout.
Drado noticed the lieutenant and nodded to his gesture as he caught on to the plan.
Culcis slashed his hand down at the same time shouting, ‘Mark!’
The Volpone fired as one, lacing the columns at the far end of the room with las-fire and pressing the cadets back.
The Longstriders advanced, skirting around the bulkhead at speed and slipping up to a pair of cadets. When the first stuck his head out, Hauke slammed a hatchet into it. The cadet’s nose and face caved. The second took a blade to the stomach – the grim handiwork of the Kauth banner bearer.
Arbettan saw what was happening too late and screamed in incoherent rage. He overextended himself, ducking a flung hatchet that pitched the man behind him off his feet, and Regara shot him in the chest. The commissar’s pistol burst went wild, raining rockcrete on the Longstriders but otherwise doing no damage.
The Volpone were already moving, screaming at the last cadet to surrender.
‘It’s over!’ yelled Culcis. ‘Put up your arms.’
Momentarily shocked by the felling of his commissar, the remaining cadet found his wits but not his common sense – Speers, groggy but braced against a column, shot him through the heart before he could fire.
Dust motes and the strong scent of cordite laced the air with an unhealthy pall.
Regara strode though it like a smoke-wreathed avenger. Arbettan was stirring as the major reached him, still scrabbling for his fallen pistol.
Regara shot him through the head without ceremony, shattering his glare-goggles and displacing his cap.
In the far corner of the room, bunched in a foetal position, was Ossika.
‘I di-di-didn’t know,’ he stammered, looking up through tear-rimmed eyes at Culcis. The lieutenant seized the Munitorum officer’s chin and stared.
‘He’s clean,’ he said to the major. ‘Must be all the time he’s spent in the bastion. The recyced air would’ve been purified of the blood taint.’
Regara was glaring down at the purple cataract webbing Arbettan’s left eye. How long had it been there behind his goggles? How long had he been enslaved to the so-called ‘Tongues of Tcharesh’?
‘The cadets are the same,’ he snarled, as Drado turned one of the dead over. ‘All traitors.’
‘We know where they are,’ said Hauke, simply.
The major gave the Longstrider a disdainful look.
‘We found caves, out in hills. We found source.’
Culcis remembered. They’d apprehended the Kauth returning from some scouting mission. Evidently they’d been busy after ignoring direct orders to return to camp.
‘Sir?’ he ventured, standing next to Regara.
‘Sagorrah is going to explode when this gets out,’ said the major, referring to the dead commissar. His eyes never left Hauke. ‘You’ll lead us there, to these caves,’ he said. ‘All of your men.’
Hauke nodded, leaving to gather his men. Sergeant Pillier went with him at Regara’s order to release the Longstriders’ weapons from the armoury.
‘And us, sir?’ asked Culcis.
The grim mask of Regara’s face broke into a dagger smile. ‘You, I and thirty men are heading into the hills, lieutenant.’
Regara had left Captain Stathan in charge. His instructions: protect the sovereign territory of the Royal Volpone 50th. Pillier stayed behind to deal with Ossika. The sergeant was to return him to the bastion with a full-squad bodyguard and await the major’s return. Regara had wanted to decamp the entire billet to the Departmento fortress but that desire was outweighed by the practicality of moving almost nine hundred troopers over potentially hostile ground. For now, they needed to keep things as quiet as they could.
A red dawn was bathing the desert as Lieutenant Culcis arrived at the reconnoitre point with his squad. Major Regara was already there, panning a pair of magnoculars across the hills where the morning heat was shimmering the air.
The only other officer, Sergeant Brutt, nodded as Culcis hunkered down beside them.
‘Thought we’d lost you again, lieutenant,’ remarked Regara without looking up from his magnoculars.
Following on the heels of the Longstriders, the three squads had taken different routes through Sagorrah Depot. The infighting was getting worse. Culcis recalled a large, but thankfully distant, explosion lighting up one quarter. Gunshots and belligerent shouting were ever-present on the copper-tanged breeze. Deciding stealth was preferable over strength, the Volpone had crossed the camps in small groups, keeping clear of the worst of it and avoiding undue attention.
‘My apologies, major,’ Culcis replied. ‘We had to detour several times.’
Regara grunted in what might have been acknowledgement, and gave the scopes back to Speers. The corporal’s shoulder had been hastily bandaged. It was just a flesh wound and, as his aide, he had no intention of leaving the major in the lurch.
After a few moments, Hauke appeared in the distance.
‘Here they are, the savage bastards,’ Regara muttered.
Despite everything, he still didn’t trust them. He was just pragmatic enough to realise he had to work with them.
Hauke waved them on. His men were nowhere in sight. Privately, Culcis marvelled at their stealth. Brushing the ruddy sand off his knees and elbows, the lieutenant followed the rest of the Volpone out.