Golgotha; Place of the Skulls

By Richard Walter

Private Smarkz' mind wandered as he surveyed the desolate dunes of Golgotha. He had been on the planet for 6 weeks and the only blood he had seen belonged to the clumsy cook. It seemed as Smarkz was always sent to the boring places, he missed out on action at the bloody Pacana-X campaign by mere hours.

Smarkz was not a killer who lusted for battle, just a trooper in the 2nd Ardantan Imperial Guard - "The Cowboys" as they are more commonly called, who joined up to see different planets and cleanse a few heretics in the Emperors name.

All he seemed to be doing was standing on guard for hours at a time and taking pot shots at the local grazing animals - much to the farmer’s rage.

"By the Emperors Bones, is there nothing to do on this damned hell hole of a - Huh!? What the devil is that?" Smarkz said to himself as he fumbled for his spotting scope.

The crosshair zeroed in on where Smarkz had caught movement. Along the top of the sand dunes marched a company of two hundred or so figures. Smarkz cursed himself for being so foolish and not spotting them sooner. The figures zoomed into the view of the lone guardsman.

The shapes stood tall and elegant even though the harsh sand of Golgotha made it impossible for anyone to look good. All of the warriors brandished long and beautifully crafted weapons. Smarkz lowered his scope and cursed again - "Eldar!" Turning back, the Imperial Soldier ran as fast as he could.

"The Eldar are coming!" Private Smarkz reached the entrance to the Imperial Base 'The Emperors Faith’; part of a strong point dubbed 'The Lions Dens'. Within seconds he had awoke his fellow guardsmen. Moments later a klaxon sounded off and the whole colony prepared for combat. Seconds after Smarkz reached his men, the Mk 2 Heavy Stubber, which could sweep the field as far as the eye could see, was manned. Horak and Lensman, the two machine-gunners, peered through the small slits of the bunkers, but there was nothing to be seen.

"Where is the support Heavy Bolter?" bellowed Sergeant Bowser, Ocsan and Damanitci, the two members of the Heavy Bolter team, appeared almost as soon as the Sergeant had finished shouting. They followed Smarkz outside.

The two Heavy Bolter men went to the left of the bunker and set up the weapon where it could cover a blind spot.

The other bunkers came to life with troops readying fire-points, sergeants barking orders and threats alike and the mechanical whirr of the fearsome Sentinels.

Sergeant Bowser stood out of the bunker and held his field glasses to his eyes, paying particular attention to a patch of scattered bushes and uprooted trees which would offer ideal cover. He spotted the first Eldar when they where about 100 metres away from the Imperial position. "There they are men, bring them to their death!" he cried, and Smarkz suddenly saw several clouds of white mist, although Golgotha was a desert world, it was terribly cold, the mist was not too far away: it was the exhalations of the Eldar warriors who had so skilfully approached the Imperial position. However, the made of grave error, Smarkz caught them, as they would soon find out - much to their cost. Smarkz crept over to Horak.

"Target in sight!" Horak shouted, even before Sergeant Bowser could speak. "Open fire!" As the belt fed Heavy-stubber began to rattle, Smarkz, too, opened fire with his Las-rifle. He took aim at a gaily-decorated Eldar who had just landed from the sky. Exactly three seconds after the action began the Heavy Bolter opened fire; at the same time one of the Shurikien Cannons the Eldar had hauled into a depression also began to fire. Clusters of tracer fire from the Eldar weapon hissed over the rim of the trench in front of the base. The bullets struck the sand covered bunker with a smacking sound. Finally two neighbouring bunkers opened fire as well.

The entire sand-covered plains of Golgotha came to life on that day; the Eldar attacked without warning and without mercy. Sectors Alpha and Beta fell almost immediately, the degenerates now headed for Sector Gamma. The Eldar thought they would have it easy and sweep the humans under their alien feet. However, they reckoned without the might of the Imperial Guard and the bravery of one regiment in particular - The Cowboys.

Three or four Shurikien Cannons was firing now, and other evil weapons from the concealed positions of the sandy dunes joined them. The Eldar drew nearer and nearer. They were scarcely forty metres away from the bunker when the Heavy Stubber fell silent.

"JAMMED!" screamed Lensman, trying desperately to clear the stoppage, cursing with every passing second as he did. Smarkz dropped his Las-rifle and pulled his Bolt-pistol from its holster. He slapped home a magazine of experimental shells, and headed for the nearest Eldar troops. With loud shouts and screams, the Eldar charged the Imperial lines on a wide front, the bursts of heavy weapons doing little to slow their advance.

"Take the ones on the left, show them no mercy!" howled Sergeant Bowser as he emptied the contents of his Bolter into an Eldar Farseer. The humming of Shurkien catapults was drowned out by the crash of exploding hand grenades, which Bowser was throwing towards the attackers. At the last possible minute, the Heavy Stubber spat into life and halted the charging Eldar. Smarkz saw the strange alien glow in one Eldar creature’s eyes; seconds before he was rent apart by a Mortar blast.

Smarkz was amazed at how quickly the Eldar could disappear. They were like ghosts. "What devilry is this?" murmured Commissar Maxim as he withdrew his sword from the still twitching corpse of a Warp Spider. The Eldar concealed themselves behind sand dunes and bushes and in depressions. They were still there, though, and the Eldar fired on any Guardsmen who allowed himself to be seen.

The Guardsmen in 'The Lions Den' tried to spy over the dunes. Bowser crawled over to Smarkz, dragging a metal Frag grenade box with him. "Here, Smarkz," he said, and the two took out grenades and placed them along a small rack under the vision slit.

A dull, rumbling sound caused them to wince; they instinctively ducked down against the wall of the bunker and there was a thunderous explosion as a missile struck the ground a metre in front of the bunker. The shock wave forced the air from their lungs.

"Get up! Get up!" shouted Bowser. Acting on instinct, Smarkz grabbed two hand grenades and got to his feet. He saw the onrushing Eldar warriors about twenty metres in front, threw the two fragmentation grenades and drew his pistol. The grenades sent shrapnel spinning through the Eldar ranks, but it did little to halt the assault. Smarkz dived for cover as a strange, alien, grenade was thrown back in retaliation, by luck of the Emperor, he rolled out of the bunker and landed in the trench. Still, the shock wave dazed the lone soldier.

A dozen Eldar Guardians leapt into the trench. Smarkz saw a tall figure right in front of him. With lightning speed, he fired as quickly as he could and then a blow on the side of his helmet dropped him to his knees. In doing so, he narrowly avoided a hail of Shurikiens from a nearby depression, which smacked into the trench wall.

Sergeant Bowser grabbed up a metal pole from a crippled tower and swung it at the Eldar who dared to charge the enraged soldier. The Heavy Bolter team fired on the following Eldar, further back in the forefield, and was soon joined by Horak on the Heavy Stubber. Smarkz inserted a fresh magazine into his pistol and eliminated the last of the Eldar intruders, while Bowser went back to cursing the enemy and lobbing Frag grenades, slowly the attack bogged down.

Not so to the left, where around Sergeant Hartman's bunker could be heard the roaring of the Eldar. Above the noise of the Eldar, shots rang out and grenades crashed.

"Dixon, Harvey, Smarkz, Jackson, Nash, follow me!" They reached for their Frag grenades and ran along the battlefield at a crouch. Three times they had to pause and move the bodies of dead or wounded Eldar fighters before they began to take fire. Smarkz saw the Eldar who had reached Hartmans's bunker. He threw two grenades in rapid succession and then ran forwards. His whole body exposed to the Eldar yet they did not fire, maybe out of fear of hitting their own, vile, kind.

The Eldar infiltrators, caught in the act of slaughtering the Heavy Bolter crew, where cut down before they could even turn around, and in the lull which followed, Smarkz contacted Sector Delta, alerted the situation to them and requested support. With precious few hours to spare, the fit guardsmen dressed the wounds of the injured men as best they could; the two brave men on the Heavy Bolter, who refused to flee in the face of death, were beyond help, their bodies completely riddled with Shurikiens.

Hour’s later, fresh troops and weaponry arrived to aid the Cowboys. Fresh bunkers and guard-towers had been erected in a matter of minutes. In Tower 45, to the left of 'The Emperors Faith', Private Smarkz and Private Gretchner kept watch, they knew the Eldar would try something, they just needed to know at what time.

Smarkz looked at his watch; it was very late in the morning, with only few hours to go before first light. Beside him, Gretchner peered into the darkness and the thinning dust cloud. He gave a low whistle before whispering to Smarkz.

"Eldar! A whole lot of the bastards!"

Smarkz' eyes followed Gretchner's pointing finger. Vaguely he could see the Eldar moving along the ground at a rapid pace. They looked like ghost's, gliding silently over the sandy dunes; thirty or forty of them.

"Give 'em the good news!"

As the mounted Assault Cannon on Tower 45 span into life, to Smarkz' astonishment, the Eldar replied with Missiles and D-Cannons, plastering the base with explosions - This was no patrol.

The other towers in the Imperial Base came to life, firing off their heavy weapons at the Eldar attackers. A Klaxon howled, and once again, the camp turned into a seething mass of Imperial Guardsmen and booming sergeants.

A bright projectile streaked towards the garrison at a considerable pace and detonated inside the bunker dubbed 'Emperors Fortress'. The night sky flashed briefly as the bunker was rent apart by the deadly explosion. Men screamed as their flesh burned before their very eyes. The explosion sent shock waves tearing through the base and every bunker and tower shook violently.

Commissar Maxim stood up; he was the only Imperial soldier to do so.

"Men, are we to let these serpents take what is rightfully ours? Are we to go to our graves without a fight? Are we to let the Emperor down in his hour of need? Men, I will gladly die a true hero than spend my life as a coward." The grizzled Commissar paused before adding. "Trouble is, are you?"

The whole camp was silent, only the sound of the advancing Eldar filled the sandy plains. Smarkz looked at his fellow soldiers, before he spotted the fallen standard, by grace of the Emperor it had remained undamaged, although it was right beside the 'Emperors Fortress' when it went up.

Smarkz walked up to the banner, picked it up and raised it high into the air.

"For the Emperor!" he roared.

The Imperial soldier’s fear dissolved the moment they cast eyes on the banner. With a rousing cheer they got to their feet and charged straight for the Eldar horde.

"Fix Bayonets!" howled Sergeant Bowser, who had a love for close combat.

The Eldar reeled before the rage of the Imperial Guard, never before had they seen such bravery and determination.

Commissar Maxim roared and howled in the face of the Eldar horde, he fought with all the fanatical rage and zeal, one might expect from a Preacher. In one hand he wielded a Power Sword, in the other he carried the Emperor's Wisdom, a book very dear to all who love the Emperor.

Smarkz ran to the aid of the Commissar but leapt to the ground just before he reached him; a frag grenade had been thrown towards the Commissar.

"Commissar, get down!" Screamed Smarkz.

The area flashed briefly, before the air whined with spinning shards of metal. Smarkz saw Commissar Maxim fall to the ground and hold his face, taking the risk, Smarkz ran to the Commissar.

"Are...are you alright, sir?" Asked Smarkz nervously.

It wasn't until Commissar Maxim turned to face the Imperial Solider that the terrible truth dawned on him.

Commissar Maxim seemed to have taken the full blast of the Frag grenade. His face was reduced to a bloody ruin, his grizzled features were still recognisable, but he was badly scarred. His left eye fell from the socket and dangled by his cheek.

Slowly, and painfully, the Commissar wheezed.

"Its just a scratch." before smiling and getting to his feet. The Commissar now possessed by some in-human strength charged for the closest Eldar pocket, cursing and howling as he went.

Smarkz respected the Commissar, and knew he was a very strong man, but to take a full Frag grenade in the face, survive it and charge back into combat, the man was nothing short of a god.

Smarkz held high the banner and ran over to his Sergeant.

With Bowser and five others, covered by the Heavy Stubber, he sprinted off into the darkness, running in a wide semi-circle so as to flank attack the Eldar. Almost immediately they were spotted, and all the free Eldar weapons were turned on them, forcing them to ground.

A second, bold, charge brought the party to within meters of the enemy. Once again they threw themselves down, and as they lay there panting, pulled pins from their grenades. Then with a wild yell, they charged.

For a few terrible seconds, the seven heroes came under a barrage of fire. Bowser took a full blast of Shurikien fire in his chest just as he hurled a Frag grenade at the Weapons platform. Another Shurikien hit him in the throat, yet the enraged Sergeant still ran on, and having thrown his last grenade, leapt in among the Eldar with his Power Sword.

In a panic of sheer terror they turned and ran towards the Imperial Base's, running blindly into the razor wire, to hang screaming there as their attackers cut them apart.

Soon Smarkz was in trouble, for as he took one Eldar degenerate to his grave, another two leapt into his place. He yelled at Bowser for help. With blood pouring from his throat and gut, the Sergeant dashed to the rescue, killing both Eldar with his Sword. In the hand-to-hand fighting which followed, Bowser, having broken his sword in the now dead Avatar's chest, now clubbed the Eldar to death with a metal pole, while Smarkz and the rest killed a dozen more. The seriously injured Sergeant went on fighting until the right flank of the Eldar had fled, abandoning their weapons, and then he collapsed.

In the lull which followed, the other soldiers carried him back to 'The Emperors Faith', where the Sergeant died, soon after dawn. Sergeant Tirius Bowser was entered into the Emperors Book of Heroes and was awarded the Imperial Cross. Commissar Maxim survived the conflict, and after a brief recovery period, accompanied the ‘Cowboys’ to their next campaign on Sartagna, he now wears an eye-patch. Private Smarkz was awarded the ‘Emperors Honour’ for his part in the battle on Golgotha, he now serves in the Ardantan Regimental Elite Corps. The Eldar were completely wiped out during the fighting on Golgotha, the planet was saved by the heroism of so many men. A plaque of all the fallen heroes has been erected on Earth, so nobody will ever forget the bravery of the 2^nd Ardantan regiment – ‘The Cowboys’.