When he was asked to volunteer for service with the Palace Guard, Gunther had lept at it. Sure, it was a demotion of sorts, going from the Imperial Guard and back into the Planetary Defence Force, even if the Palace Guard was a supposed elite regiment of the PDF.
It had been an easy choice, really. Instead of the screams and cries of men dying in muddy trenches there would be the murmur of whispered conversation in marble halls. Instead of the rattle and squeals of tanks grinding through the mud, the dead and the dying, there would be the soft patter of slippered feet and the low hum of servitors. Instead of the mind-wrenching cacophony of the front and the sour feeling of constant dread, there would be the silence and boredom of the Palace Guard. Sir, yes SIR!
After a week, Gunther had begun to relax and enjoy his new post at the Palace Guard. Although he still felt rather like a preening peakock in his dress uniform and ornate, silver-inlaid lasgun, he was starting to get used to the idea. The food was better, his quarters were actual rooms, not just a board-covered hole in a muddy ditch, he could bathe every day, if he so chose. It was, comparatively, heaven.
After twelve weeks, Gunther had taken to drinking and gambling with others of the Palace Guard and some of the gardeners from the grounds.
After six months, he was so thoroughly bored that he seriously contemplated insubordination, in order to be sent back to the front. That or shooting himself in the foot. He would have chosen the latter if not for the fact that a good number of the wounded guardsmen never left the infirmery, they were instead vivisected and implanted with tools and pistons, lobotomized and turned to servitors and cogitators.
Standing guard in the halls was the worst part. Two times five hours every day, staring blankly at rose marble or studded bulkheads, hoping for some kind of action, any kind. The passing of a hover-palanquin became a momentous occation, the occational muted whirr of servo-skulls was sweet music and the daily routines of the cleaning servitors became overwhelmingly interesting. Gunther took to counting vermin, cracks in the walls, bricks, anything that could be numbered.
Once every week, he rotated to the Audience Hall and that was almost as bad. True, there was a bit more action but most of it was so bland and boring that he struggled not to cry out in desperation. One thing was fighting and dying in the muck for some unseen leaders, it was something else entirely seeing those same leaders be fat, incompetent, uncaring bureaucrats intent on lining their pockets and stuffing their faces.
The conversations he overheard while guarding the Audience Hall were often wildly stupid, bordering on idiocy and every time, he wondered how those people came to power in the first place. The Lord Regent, His Glorious Highness Telor Uzir wad nothing but a poorly disguised puppet for the Imperial Govenor of Veldraan VII, Raadomer XV. A fat, lazy, stupid puppet. In fact, every single person that came and went was in some way under the control of the Governor and it was he who waged war on the rebels of the southern continent, not, as was the public story, the Lord Regent.
When the Lord Regent, His Glorious Highness Telor Uzir came gliding into the room, his hover-palanquin straining under his enormous bulk, he was largely ignored by all, except for the Palace Guard, who snapped crisply to attention. Mostly. In fact, some times the only sounds announcing the Lord Regent was the shuffling of the guardsmen's boots, the strained drone of his palanquin and the Lord Regent's wheezing breath.
Obese beyond belief and studded and pierced by tubes, respirators, pneumatic corsetry and various other mechanical enhancements, the Lord Regent was a nauseating sight and, as he drew closer, a not too pleasant olfactory experience either. The sweet and sickly smell of old sweat and dead skin mingled with the cloying scent of the spiced smoke that emanated from the regent's breathing apparatus and along with the stench of seeping flatulence, made any close encounters unpleasant, to say the least.
-
Though nobody remembered any longer, the original cause of the conflict had been a taxation dispute between the Regent and the largest of the southern hive-cities, Praxor Ibris. As the civil war on Pashen IV moved into it's fifthieth year, the estimated deathtoll reached a staggering 500 million, roughly equally shared between the warring factions. At this time Praxor Ibris’ sister hive, Praxor Nerath had been pressed for funds to continue the campaign and failed to comply. One thing led to another and before anyone could even as much as whisper the word "negotiation", the Palace Guard, the Regent's private army, were dispatched to the city. Not that half a million poorly trained peacocks with antique equipment and a complete lack of fighting spirit would be able to even dent the hive-city with it's 2 billion inhabitants, but it wasn't long before their real purpose there was revealed. After having been pushed around by the well-fed, lazy and rather snobbish Palace Guard for a week, the malnourished, light-starved and overworked citizens of the underhive of Praxor Nerath had had enough. A small band of angry protesters became an even bigger riot when the Palace Guard ill-advisedly opened fire.
The standard M35 M-Galaxy-pattern las-rifle is a real workhorse on the battlefield. It is reasonably light, fairly accurate and very cheap to manufacture and maintain. It is also absolutely rubbish when used against an angry mob. 354 Palace Guardsmen died, along with 1272 rioters, before the shock-troops of the Adeptus Arbites were deployed to contain the situation.
The Arbites set about the task with usual efficiency. 3 warnings were duly given from Rhino APC’s with voxcasters before the shotguns and grenade-launchers were employed. 2 hours and an estimated 8000 dead citizens later, order was reinstated.
-
Gunther sighed heavily as he surveyed his new command. 40 Palace Guardsmen scowled back at him, probably wondering, as he did, how in frack he had landed the dubious honour of being promoted to Lieutenant of the Palace Guard. Wether it was a form of punishment for speaking out of turn or a reward for pointing out several near-fatal flaws in the Regent’s latest over-convoluted and under-considered battleplan, was unclear to anyone involved, including the Regent, by all accounts. On the other hand, Gunther reflected as he inspected his troops, the Govenor had had an odd twinkle in his eye when he silently nodded his assent. Surely, he had not smiled. That had to have been a trick of the light or the result of one of his scars.
He had only inspected half of his men when he gave up. Undisciplined, over-fed, insolent and lazy, his troops had mostly been drafted from the upper elite of the planets nobility or merchant castes while he was a wiry hive-son and veteran of the Imperial Guard. The Guardsmen were not impressed but then, neither was he.
He requisioned a Chimera APC, a grenade-launchers and a Flamer for each of his four squads and to his extreme surprise recieved everything within a week.
After another week of training, he felt reasonably confident that his platoon would be able to mount and dismount the Chimeras without injuring themselves. It would have to do.
Declaring his platoon battle-ready, he recieved orders to join the ongoing battle for the loading docks of Praxis Ibris.
To be continued…
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