BATTLE FOR TALLASSAR PRIME

Tallassar Prime was enveloped in a thick blanket of smoke. The Imperial Artillery had been hammering it solidly for a week. Colonel Karlov didn't think much of such tactics. He knew full well that the bombardment would not kill nearly enough of the enemy troops who would be hiding in deep, and reinforced dugouts, waiting for the barrage to lift and the subsequent assault. What it would succeed in doing would be to make the whole city a nightmare of ruined buildings and streets; it would be next to impossible for tanks to advance through at any reasonable pace, and the enemy would have an unfortunately large number of traps and ambushes waiting for the Imperial Forces, hidden amongst the rubble. But Karlov had been overruled. The higher ups had decided that a weeklong bombardment was in order, so they would have a weeklong bombardment. After all, it wasn't their men who would have to advance through the hell of their own creation, the Imperial Guardsmen who would pay for the advance with their blood were just statistics to the generals running the campaign. To Colonel Karlov they were more than that; they were his men. Well, at least the Prandiun "Remnants" were; the other four regiments going in with the 24th were not, but Karlov knew those regiment's commanders felt the same way. Karlov wondered what the famous Colonel he'd been named for would have thought of the whole sorry state. That as usual got him thinking about the rumours surrounding his name. The men said that he was the legend reborn. That he, the second Colonel Karlov to command this regiment, was somehow the reincarnation of the man who saved the regiment on Prandiun; the man who, through sheer tactical genius, destroyed the Ork attack on Xanthia Prime. The man who took the head of the Ork Warboss leading that invasion as a trophy. The same trophy of which a replica resided on his banner pole. How could he be such a man reborn?

It was the job of the 24th the assault and push past the North gate, or at least what was left of it. Unlike a large number of Imperial cities, Tallassar Prime was not built as a fortress, and so the walls all around the city were in ruins. But what Tallassar lacked in fortifications it made up for in sheer size. It was going to cost a ridiculous amount of men and material to recapture, especially considering that the enemy was not likely to yield an inch of ground without exacting a fearsome toll on their attackers. The 24th were ready to fight. Karlov could see it in their faces as he walked along the trench encouraging his men, preparing them for the fight ahead. When the artillery barrage let up, an eerie silence descended over the battlefield. Everyone had grown so used to the endless roaring of the guns and the answering crashes of explosions. For about a minute no one spoke, it was as if nobody was willing to be the first to break the silence, as if the whole city would hear their words. Karlov knew that the longer they gave the defenders to get into position the harder the fight would be.

"Alright men!" He bellowed at the top of his lungs. "Its time to give these traitor scum a kick in the arse they won't forget as long as they live! Which isn't going to be long, because we're going to kill them all!"

With that Karlov leapt up the steps and into the open expanse between the city's limits and the Imperial trenches. With a great shout the men of the 24th followed him over the top, and charged into the teeth of the enemy's guns.

The enemy manned the walls faster than Karlov would have believed possible, and in greater numbers too. For a brief moment Karlov wondered if the whole city had taken up arms against the Imperium. There wasn't time to worry about it though. As long as he and his men were still in no mans land there wasn't much time to do much of anything except to run from cover to cover, giving covering fire for his men between sprints. His personal bodyguard stuck to him all the way. Ducking behind the hull of a burnt out tank, he and his men took stock of the situation given the brief respite such solid cover provided. He watched as units of men leap frogged each other. He glanced back towards the trenches to see that the regiment's heavy weapons were pounding the enemy defences. He looked at the ground he had advanced over already. It was strewn with corpses. The corpses of his men. How many dead already? There was no way to know. He wouldn't know for sure until the whole fight was over. And maybe not even then, if he became one of the statistics himself. In order not to think about that he lead his unit out into the open again charging across the ground. The city was startlingly close all of a sudden. Individual muzzle flashes could be clearly seen among the rubble of the outer walls. Before he knew it, he was in amongst the walls himself. And then it was desperate hand to hand. An orgy of blood and noise and death. Men fell, mutilated, by the dozen, on both sides. The rubble made it difficult to stay on ones feet, and if you went down you weren't likely to get back up again, crushed to death under the press of charging men. Someone raised their rifle at Karlov, he ducked as they fired, and brought his bolter to bear. The recoil as it fired was somehow comforting, a familiar sensation in that hell of combat. The man's chest exploded as the explosive bolt penetrated his flimsy flak jacket and soft flesh, and detonated. He shot another man, who came at him with a chainsword, and then someone grabbed him from behind. Slamming his head backwards, he felt his skull connect with his assailants face; with the enemy stunned, he flung the man forward over his shoulder. He landed badly. Groaning he tried to get up. Karlov stamped on his neck, and felt it snap under his weight. Satisfied, Karlov stooped to retrieve his fallen bolt gun, and that saved his life and a bright red las bolt zipped through the air where his head had just been. Rolling forward and into a crouching position, Karlov returned fire at the group of men charging towards his position. Keeping the trigger depressed he unleashed a hail of mass reactive bolts at the traitors and watched as they disintegrated under the fire. More and more lasguns were joining in with his fusillade. The enemy troops just kept coming and they were firing back too. The 24th's bright blue lasgun bolts contrasting with the enemies red bolts. When his gun clicked try and he had to stop to reload, he glanced around himself. He found that his men had despatched the enemy troops manning the outer defences, had formed up into neat firing lines among the rubble, and were now sending precise volleys of lasguns fire at the onrushing enemy. Without heavy weapons to help keep the traitors at bay, they almost made it to the Imperial troops. But when they got too close, the Prandiun soldiers opened up with their close range assault weapons. Flamers roared and Melta guns hissed. Some of the enemy burned alive, others were reduced to nothing but piles of slag, and still more were mowed down by the intense close range volley fire of lasguns. They could not endure such a torrent of death and they broke, fleeing to their next line of defence.

"Right men! That's the easy bit! Now we have to flush them out of the city! Form up into units, squad leaders report. Trooper Vero, get on the Vox and let the support units know its time to move up." As his men quickly and efficiently organised themselves into their units, and the squad leaders reported the damage, heavy weapons platoons started arriving, along with three companies of infantry that had been held in reserve. Before long he had a rough idea of the casualties he had taken. Roughly half of each of the two companies that led the assault, his own included, were dead and wounded. And about a quarter of each of the other companies. Around seven hundred men all told, just taking the outer defences. This was going to be bloody. Setting two companies and half of the heavy weapons platoons to hold the ground they had captured, Karlov ordered the advance once more. This time though, it was not going to be a mad dash across open ground, this was going to be a steady march through the city, checking buildings, (those that could still be classed as buildings anyway) and keeping a weary eye out for ambushes and booby traps. The regiment advanced in a series of skirmish lines, one behind the other. Karlov himself was in the front line. Carefully picking his way over and through the rubble, following what appeared to have once been a fairly large street. Something wasn't right. It was too quiet. The outer defences had been heavily defended certainly, but they had advanced a good way into the city now, and had not seen or heard a thing. All of a sudden the quiet was torn asunder. A huge explosion tore the heart out of the advancing lines. Karlov himself was picked up and flung a good ten metres or so. The next thing he knew, las fire started up in earnest. Dazed, he looked towards where the explosion had come from, a huge crater marked the spot, and Karlov realised that it had come from under the rubble. The traitors had dug a mine and filled it with explosives. And now they were counterattacking, attempting to drive a wedge through the gap created by the mine. Where he hadn't before Karlov now realised the explosion had flung him into the ground between the two forces. He started to bang away at the traitors with his bolter. With red bolts going one way, and blue bolts going the other, Karlov felt awfully exposed strung out between the two lines.

Suddenly five Prandiun soldiers dived behind the wall Karlov was using as cover.

"Figured you could use some help sir," one of them said, grinning. It was his third in command, Captain Grinksi. The men started firing at the enemy from their new position. When one of them shrieked and dropped his weapon, Karlov didn't think much of it, until he realised that the man had been hit in the back. It took him only a second to realise what that meant, turning around, he saw to his horror that the enemy had somehow got soldiers behind his forces, and had them caught in a crossfire. Grabbing Grinksi's Vox operator, he ordered the man to patch him through the forces who had remained in the outer defences. Karlov's forces were not in a good way. He'd had four skirmish lines advancing, and all of a sudden two were fighting to the front, and two others were fighting to the rear. Of course Karlov himself, along with Grinski and his men were stuck out between two forces as well, which didn't help matters. When the Vox operator got through, he handed the Vox to Karlov, who ordered the men in the outer defences to move up, and crush the traitors behind him. They would have to hold out for another half and hour or so though.

"Right, we need to get back to the men. You and you start running back with the Captain, we'll cover you, and then you stop and give us covering fire. Go!"

Without hesitation the three men leapt up and ran for it, as Karlov and his two men opened up once more. Grinski went down. Karlov heard him cry out and turned to look. "Right you two, it's our turn now". With that he leapt up and started running back towards him men, he hadn't been thrown that far by the blast, but the lines had moved backwards and inwards to try and close the gap, leaving Karlov further away than he would have been. When he reached Grinski, he saw that the man had taken a hit in his left shoulder. He didn't look too bad though, and when Karlov reached him he got up and kept going. Karlov covered him, before carrying on again. When he reached the lines he found his bodyguards. They were dead. The mine had done to them what it had so nearly done to him. Miraculously the banner was still intact, and had been taken up by his second in command's standard-bearer in place of his company banner.

"Good to have you back sir," Captain Rius said. He was grinning when a las bolt blew out the back of his head.

Karlov stood shocked for a second or two, he had known Rius since before he joined the guard, they had risen from lieutenants fresh out of officer training, to the commanders of the regiment together. It didn't seem possible that he could die. But he was. Dead. Just like that. Karlov recovered quickly. Its amazing what las bolts flying all over the place do to a man's emotions.

"You men, as you no longer have an officer, and I no longer have a squad of my own, you will now be my bodyguard." Turning to Grinski he told him: "You are now second in command of the regiment Grinksi. Pick a lieutenant from your company and assign him command of Rius' company. If he survives, and does his job, I'll make him a Captain when this is over." That done, Karlov took stock of the situation around him. His men had dug in, and were holding against the enemy's onslaughts, just. If the reserve companies didn't arrive soon, then it would be too late. As Grinski turned to carry out his orders, Karlov noticed the wound in his shoulder. He seemed to be paying no more attention to it than Karlov was to the myriad of scrapes, cuts, and bruises that he received when the mine flung him into the air. He counted himself lucky he hadn't been more seriously injured. He didn't think he could have kept on fighting if he had been, but Grinski had been shot and was carrying on as normal. Karlov and his new squad moved up to the forward lines, and aided the men there. He considered voxing the reserves to find out their status, but he knew they would be going as fast as they could so didn't bother. They would arrive when they arrived, until then…

The firefight was fierce. The enemy were dug in about seventy metres away by Karlov's reckoning. Their attack had stalled as the men tried to advance over all the rubble, in the face of intense enemy fire. Karlov grinned savagely, the prolonged artillery barrage had succeeded in making life difficult for the traitors as well as the Imperial troops. That was something at least. Opposite Karlov a man stood up to shoot. He only got off two shots before Karlov hit him squarely in the chest with a round from his bolter. Another appeared, Karlov nailed this one too. A las round scorched the rubble Karlov was hiding behind. A man started shrieking somewhere to his left, crying out for his mother. There was a rumbling noise coming from somewhere up ahead. Karlov could hear it, but was too busy shooting to pay much attention to it. That is until it manifested itself, at what Karlov assumed was once a junction on this road. A Leman Russ battle tank. Karlov had been warned that the enemy had a few tanks. But nevertheless, seeing one was a shock. And seeing one when he had very few heavy weapons with which to combat it was not a situation he liked finding himself in. He had with him several heavy weapons, but most were anti-personnel weapons like heavy bolters. He had not anticipated the tanks, and so only had a lascannon or a missile launcher in the way of anti tank weapons for each company. The rest were in the heavy weapon platoons that he had left to hold the outer walls. Just as he was thinking about this, a bright beam of light speared out towards the offending vehicle, and although it got a solid hit, it had about as much effect as a real spear would have done. In response, the turret tracked towards the lascannon team, and fired. The previous crack of the lascannon paling in comparison to the tanks response. The lascannon team was vapourised by the blast, and the lascannon put permanently out of commission. The missile launcher team from Rius' platoon opened up now. Karlov admired their spirit, especially after what happened to the lascannon team just moments before. His fears proved unfortunately justified, as the missile impacted on the turret with a clang and corkscrewed off into the rubble where it detonated harmlessly. Having witnessed the demise of the other heavy weapon troopers, the missile launcher team had moved the instant they had fired, and so the metal behemoth failed to put them out of commission, and they lined up for another shot. With almost the same result. Except that this time the missile detonated on impact. Meanwhile the enemy infantry were starting to creep forward again, as other heavy weapons were also futilely trying to take out the tank, making it something less than suicide to try and advance. Not much less though, the Prandiun Infantry were renowned for their accurate and precise rifle fire, and they took a heavy toll on the advancing infantry. Forcing them to put their heads down again. Suddenly Karlov spied motion out of the corner of his eye, a figure was creeping through the piles of rubble to the left of the tank. He was making slow progress, but the missile launcher still couldn't take out the tank, and so, when he got within about twenty metres of it, he leapt up and sprinted towards it. All of a sudden it seemed to Karlov that Captain Grinski (for that was who it was, as he could see when the soldier stood up) was engulfed in a storm of light, as all the enemy troopers who could see him opened up on him. Realising, that the main line was now taking considerably less fire, Karlov seized the initiative.

"Advance! While they're distracted! We have to give ourselves some more space!" With that he leapt over his pile of rubble, and charged towards the enemy lines, slipping and sliding all over the place. He didn't have time to watch Grinski as he went, but if he had, he would have seen the man go down twice, only to get back up again and continue. He reached the tank, and hauling himself onto it, despite the enemy guns, and wedged a pack of grenades into the space between hull and turret. Before leaping off again. Yet another las bolt caught him in mid air, and he twisted as he fell, landing awkwardly. Suddenly the grenades went off. The turret was ripped from the hull of the tank, and flew through the air, crushing two traitors when it landed. The tank itself started pouring smoke, and the crew tried to bail out. Karlov took a certain savage pleasure in gunning them down. He could see Grinksi crawling away from the tank. Without warning, the tank went up in a huge fireball. Red hot metal scythed out in all directions, one piece even clipping Karlov's arm, despite the fact that he was a good thirty metres away still. He was hurled off his feet as the shockwave reached him a nanosecond later. The explosion was too much for the traitors. Not only had they lost their trump card, but as it died it had carved a chunk out of their line. They fell back, abandoning their positions. To compound this victory, the reserves had arrived, and between them and the rear line that Karlov's men had set up, they crushed the traitors who were behind them. Leaving not one alive. Karlov was suddenly sombre. He realised that this victory had come only through the bravery and sacrifice of one man. Grinksi was surely dead after being so close to the blast. He looked towards the crater that the tank had left behind. Unbelievably, miraculously, their stood Grinski, bleeding from nearly half a dozen gunshot wounds, half his hair singed off, and swaying where he stood, he managed three words.

"We beat them." Before allowing himself the luxury of passing out.

Of course the battle was not over with that victory, but as it turned out, the enemy had employed similar tactics on all five Imperial Guard Regiments. They had committed most of their forces to those attacks, realising that the only possible victors in a long drawn out fight would be the Imperials. Karlov and the Prandiun "Remnants", when they broke out of the trap they found themselves in, thanks to the arrival of the reserves and the bravery of Captain Grinski, broke the back of the enemy. This is because as they were at the centre of the Imperial line, they were able to roll up the flanks of the enemy forces on both sides of them, almost single-handedly winning the battle for Tallassar Prime. After this battle had been won, the rest of the city proved easy to recapture, as it was only lightly held.

The Prandiun Remnants lost around one and a half thousand men in this fight, approximately half their total strength, while the other regiments lost, on average, two thousand men, as they sustained the enemy's crossfires for longer. Colonel Karlov was awarded the Macharian Cross, for being quick to react to the rapidly changing battlefield situations he found himself in, leading to ultimate Imperial victory in the city. Captain Grinksi was awarded the Medallion Crimson for his successful destruction of the enemy tank that was doing so much damage, despite being shot numerous times.

After Tallassar was fully reclaimed for the Imperials, the "Remnants" returned to their homeworld to fill the ranks once again.