By the time they returned to the mansion Sel’s teeth were chattering. Guard cold weather gear suffered from the unique curse of all guard issue equipment in that it never quite did what it claimed. The cold weather gear didn’t quite keep you warm, the hot weather gear didn’t quite keep you cool, the insect repellant didn't quite repel all mosquitos, and the infantryman’s primer didn’t quite tell you the truth. The one exception, by mutual agreement, was the las gun which would probably still be laying waste to the Emperor’s enemies a thousand years from now, assuming a sergeant materialized to shout at its custodians to properly oil the base plate hinge spring, and scrub the groves of the receiver housing with their toothbrush. Sel clutched her own las gun, flexing her fingers to keep the blood moving. She still had her carbine, despite vague assurances to sergeant Crispin that any day now she would turn it in and draw one of the standard Mars patterns from stores.



With the shield down, the vast manor house was much worse for wear. The inrushing blizzard had already killed most of the ornamental gardens, coating everything with a layer of clear and glistening ice.  Fountains had been frozen in mid spew and cracks could be seen in the anthracite where the expansion of the fluid had broken it open.

“Bravo five this is scout element,” she voxed, reminding herself that she really should get some kind of callsign. In theory a driver shouldn’t need one but given people kept dreaming up things for her to do she might as well bow to the inevitable. Idly she wondered if Kayden was keeping warm with the baroness. Probably not, he might be a top lofty aristo but he seemed to take his soldiering seriously and the situation was still uncertain.

“Driver, this is Bravo five,” Crispin's voice came back, “you boys and girls ready to come in.”

“Roger, we are approaching over the east lawn, please don’t shoot at us. Driver out,” Sel replied, obscurely satisfied with the designation.

“Alright kids lets move it out, nice and slow,” she encouraged and stood up and walked across the frozen lawn, blades of icy grass crunching beneath her boots. Her keen eyes picked out the barrel of a heavy bolter protruding from between two marble planter boxes. She altered her course to take a look at the picket, impressed at how still the troopers there had remained.


They were still because they were dead. Two troopers, Klane and Merkaba lay in shiny pools of frozen blood. Both had been hacked open with some heavy weapon, perhaps an axe of some kind. The had been taken from behind if Sel was any judge, a blow to the head for Merkaba while she lay at the gun. It looked like Klane had tried to roll over and gotten his hands up judging by missing fingers on his left, but a second blow had split him from throat to sternum before he could so much as scream. 

“Emperor's bloody balls,” Spade breathed.

“Bravo stand too!” Sel yelled into her comm bead, the cold forgotten in the sudden flood of adrenaline.

“We have troopers down and possibly enemy infiltrators,” she snapped as her squad fanned out and took cover.