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“The Vineyard” By
Phil Tortorici
The Emperor would not be proud of Sister Geneose today.
But Sister Geneose had more important things on her mind right now.
Now, she had a much more human concern-
the need of saving her skin.
She clambered over the hedgerow- her shouldered meltagun clanking
scoldingly against her power armour. -------------------------------
The assignment seemed routine enough.
Due to a lapse of vigilance at a PDF defense facility, a battletank was
stolen by a raiding Ork force. The
force, and the tank, disappeared into dense forests of Terpandre, and that was
all that was heard from them. The
PDF’s search turned up no clues as to the missing property’s whereabouts.
This was a relief to the PDF’s section commander, as it was now only a
matter of reams of paperwork and Commissar-supervised atonement.
About six semaines later,
the stolen tank announced its triumphant return with a volley of battle cannon
fire, and a brand new red paint job. It was going to be a bad cycle.
It must have galled the PDF section commander greatly to ask the abbey
for their help in locating the stolen tank, but the ork raiders were taking full
advantage of their new firepower, and the situation was getting worse.
The raiders would shell an outlying village from the cover of the forest,
race in, loot what they could, burn the rest, and shell the village again-
apparently for the good fun of it. The
abbey sent the whole of its Order Militant out to join the hunt; Sister Geneose
was assigned to the squads that were to search the Nyl Parish.
This was the site of the last raid, and there was a good chance that the
hated orks could, or would, strike there again.
The faithful, of that parish, directed the sisters to a vineyard on its
perimeter; it was said that the
sounds of battle were heard out in that area , and that this place would be a
good place to start the search. The
Adepta Sororitas cautiously approached the vineyard. The commotion was reported to be coming from
behind an old grape vineyard surrounded by a thick hedgerow.
There were two ways to enter the
enclosed field. The first was from
the front, through a paved stone road flanked by ancient, low, stone walls.
The second was off to the right, and in the rear, adjacent to a corner of
the farm home, belonging to the vintner. --------------------------------
Smoke unpleasantly drifted upwards from the home’s visible
windows and open door. --------------------------------
It was decided that the force would split into two halves- each to circle
around the outside of the hedgerow and join up behind the vineyard.
From their concealed position, they could see
the turret of the stolen tank just above the top of hedgerow; the tank
commander was scouting the area, as well, with his crudely- made binox.
Making the most of the cover available, the two units
were able to creep up to the vineyard- unnoticed- and proceeded in
towards the raiders. Sister Geneose
fielded the meltagun in her squad; the other squad was equipped with the heavy
flamer. Geneose’s squad lead the advance.
Peaking through gaps
in the hedgerow, the sisters could see that the ork in the turret had
withdrawn to the safety of the inside. “Much
the better, “ thought Geneose, “ It will be even less aware now.”
The turret was turning from side to side,
watching vineyard for intruders. As
the sisters closed on the farm home, the guttural sounds of the alien raiders
could be heard over the din of the tank’s engine.
The occasional bolter shot, and, crude laughter was heard, as well. Geneose and her four battle sisters ran across the
vineyard’s rear entrance, and
readied their weapons, in the shadow of the farm home.
A quick look in through the window revealed no enemy, and a
ransacked interior. With
a prayer on their lips, they turned the corner and charged the stolen tank.
And at that moment, the tank lurched forwards through the hedgerow, and
promptly got itself stuck in the middle of it.
There were no other of the hated orks to be seen.
Sister Geneose smiled inwardly and thanked the Emperor for this boon.
She raised her melta weapon and fired- striking the tank in its exposed
side. The shot did not penetrate
its armoured hull. In their horror,
the turret started to turn to face them, bringing its huge gun to bear down on
the battlesisters- now vulnerable on the open ground.. Silent prayers floated upwards.
The next thing the squad saw was a gout of flame and smoke, and then,
nothing. Sister Geneose was not
aware of the rest of the squad. She
didn’t know which of her battle sisters were ripped apart by the blast, or
thrown angrily to the ground, dead or unconscious.
The only thing she knew was that she was still alive, and that she had to
get away from that monster. This
fear was the boost that she needed in order to scramble over the top of the
hedgerow, and into the vineyard, proper.
Geneose dropped to the ground, and tried to run through the old vines in
the field. This proved to be
difficult. There wasn’t much room
between the plants. Gnarled
branches grabbed out at her, slowing her run, and staining her white power
armour with a coward’s purple.
She was fighting her way into the middle of the vineyard when she heard
the groan of the tank finally
freeing itself from the hedgerow. Face
drained of colour, she now realized that she was trapped inside this
field, with the tank.. She
whipped her melta gun around and fired wildly at her pursuer, exploding grapes
and frying foliage, but to no effect. A
battle was being fought from outside of this arena,
but she was barely aware of it. A
meltagun shot, fired from the other side of the tank, struck in front of the
fleeing sister. Her other sisters
must now have control of the battlefield, she thought, but it was of little
consolation right now. Getting
free from these vines was the priority.
The stolen tank was moving in fits- through the old grapes- bogging down,
freeing itself, and bogging down again.
It couldn’t fire its main gun on the move; instead it chose to spray
the inside of the vineyard with shells from its hull-mounted heavy
bolter. One shot hit Geneose in her
back-mounted power unit and it ruptured a hydraulic line, spraying the ground
with greenish fluid. The
impact sent her sprawling face-first into the vines, but she quickly resumed her
flight.
The hatch of the commander’s cupola, opened up and a huge green,
toothed head popped up; massive hands pushing up the goggles to better see the
fleeing sister. Geneose heard the
grunts of the alien, over the straining tank and these grunts were
mocking her. Glancing back, she saw the commander throwing fistfuls of
what appeared to be dung
(?!) at her,
from his position in the top hatch.
And more laughter. The hated ork was enjoying himself, immensely,
at her expense, as she stumbled away-firing back
impotently, at her tormentor. Sister
Geneose then heard the sound of a
engine, being powered up ,to full. Reflexively,
she jerked around to look, and in doing so, tripped over a low vine, which spun
her around, landing her on her
bottom. To her surprise (and
shock), the tank lumbered right
past her-completely ignoring the fallen sister.
The ork commander was hanging on to the sides of the hatch to avoid being
thrown out; when he recovered he started to yell curses down to the crew below
him. She picked herself up and ran.
The battle sister was almost to the paving stones by now.
Sister Geneose placed a boot on the first stone, and then
froze in place. In her mind, she
could see the outline of a frightened little girl, of about six, running down
the road, and crying for her mother. Stones
flew after the girl, appearing out of nowhere, and clicking on the ground around
the phantom. Then the image
abruptly vanished. A warm glow started to flow over the battlesister.
Whether this was the light of the Emperor, or her power armour starting
to overheat, of this, she wasn’t sure. She
was sure, that there was a still a job that had to be done.
And with dead calm, Geneose
turned and re-entered the vineyard, charging up her weapon as she trudged again
through the vines. The battle sister closed to the optimum range of her
meltagun, and then loosed a blast at the creature’s tail, striking it,
and cutting deep.
Too deep, in fact. . The shot must have hit some vital
(and dangerous) piece of its
anatomy, for it exploded into fragments; the force of the blast knocking
its killer onto the ground. Then,
there was silence. ------------------------------- Sister Geneose slowly collected herself, and waved at her approaching battle sisters. There were bodies to be recovered, and prayers of thanks to be proffered. “And a prayer for my mother, as well”, thought Geneose, as the sweat trickling down her cheeks washed lines of soot off of her face. She felt that warm glow again. This time, though, she was sure that it was the amour.
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