"Get your head down!" Lt. Malie screamed!

Justen obliged, and a moment later a hail of auto-rounds danced across the area where his head was. Justen had no choice but to look out again, as the situation required precision. Across the cluttered hallway, which was once part of a temple (although the god in charge didn't seem to be all that concerned with its desecration) a makeshift barricade cluttered the hall. Manning the barricade, was a fire-platoon of Phiel cultists, plucking away at random with their semi-autos and winch rifles. If the had numbers on their side, they would have just smashed through the barricade, but, over the course of the day, Malie's platoon had been whittled down in such assaults to barely enough men for a squad, and too many for a fire team.

"No good sir," Justen said, just dodging another hailstorm of bullets, "so long as they keep shooting, we can't move an inch. Forward OR back."

"Moving back was never an option," said Marshal Felmeir, who showed how skilled he was simply by having survived so long with only a sword and bolt pistol.

"Never said it was, Marshal," Justen said, "I'm simply saying, if we tried it now, the cultist would save you the ammo."

"Seems odd, don't it?" Helmer (who used to own a whole squad) noted.

"What does?" Some fire-bait Justen had never seen before asked.

Helmer jerked a thumb over his shoulder, "if these were full-blown Phiel loonies, shouldn't they be trying to mash our brains in, instead of blowing them up?"

And that's when it hit everyone: for the zealots of the god of life, these loonies seemed content not to extend theirs in infidel blood. This prompted Justen to look over their hiding place again. While one could be forgiven for mistaking a Phiel cultist for a Sol cultists (save said cultists), they were most definitely the servants of the immortal god. Their outfits were red with gold trim (Sol outfits tend to be gold with red trim) and they also spouted the signs of people trying to extend their life, such as drug pumps, poorly scrawled scrolls, and blood tokens made from some luckless L.O.E.D.er or plebeian. Justen was about to slink back into cover, when he saw something.

One of the cultists had run out of ammo (and had tested this by pulling the trigger several more times) and, instead of taking the time to reload, bellowed out a war cry, switched his grip on the gun so that the but was now the end, and made to charge over to them. A hand reached out to yank him back into cover, and maybe even convince him to reload. The owner's outfit had lightly more red then the others, and also spouted a good number more blood tokens then the others did. In addition, his gun seemed to have actually been military quality (even if it was only L.O.E.D.er quality) and had definitely seen some use. Justen didn't even wait to kill him.

With their leader dead, and one of their own charging, the Phiel cultists forget all about what a gun was supposed to be for, and charged the Empire position. Despite being outnumber roughly three to one, the disciplined volleys cut down the cultists in no time at all.

"Alright," Malie said, after placing a bolt through a still twitching cultist, "we move out. Remember, we have to kill the cult leader, or else this will have been a waste of bolts and blood."

"No problem Lt.," Deimon said, while reciting some Empirical cult nonsense, "we will have these Heretics dead soon enough."

"You know," Felmeir said, while putting a new clip in his bolt pistol, "if your religion gets in the way of the mission, I'm within my rights to kill you."

He shrugged, "Zanabar protects the loyal."

"Tell that to the dead", Gargats muttered, while checking his clips.

********
It was ten minuets later before anyone spoke again. It was not because there was a silence in order, it was because they weren't in a talking mood. They had checked several rooms over that time, but had found little more then Phiel symbols, in place of whatever other symbols were supposed to be there, and large numbers of useless objects. In a way, having less men was better, as they didn't have to march in formation, and could check rooms at will. It was in the eleventh of the room sweeps when the silence was broken, and with good reason.

"What's this?" the fire-bait asked, after picking looking behind a bench.

The rest of the troopers moved over there and shook their heads.

"It's a dead cultist," Deimon observed, before sticking him with his bayonet.

The man gave out a feeble moan.

"Correction," Felmeir sighed, while shacking his head, "now it's a dead cultist.'

"Still," Helmer said, while sticking a finger in a bullet hole in the man's chest, "how did he get like this? We only just got here, and it's not like Phielist to kill each other, at least, with guns."

Malie shrugged, "we did get separated from the rest of the company, maybe it was some of them."

"Doesn't fit," Helmer said, while flicking his hand clean, "them's auto rounds. And we would have run into them by now."

"But what about the gunfire?"

Everyone in the unit turned towards Justen.

"What gun fire?" Malie asked.

Justen gestured in a vague direction, "I head some semi-autos in that direction, thought I heard a bolt rifle or two too."

"Why didn't you tell us?" Felmeir growled.

"I thought you could hear it."

"Idiot," Gargats muttered.

********
They followed Justen's vague direction, and indeed, the shooting did seem to get louder, and, when the shooting couldn't point them in the right direction, the cultist bodies they came across (a few of which had been killed by bolt rifles), helped correct it. In no time at all, they had exited into a large chamber which filled them with awe. It was humongous, being at least two-hundred yards across by three times as many wide. Dominating the fifty foot doors were a sort of back alter, which could have held whatever musicians the religion used, and dominating the far wall, was a large painted glass window depicting the various aspects of the god with another (possibly sacrificial) alter. Between those two giants, was an endless sea of pews, benches, and columns, whose current inhabitants interested them most of all.

At the alter side of the cathedral was at least a thousand Phiel cultist with about three times as many fighting their way through the endless sea. In the center of the cathedral was a dwindling platoon of troopers, who were firing away with their bolt rifles. If they had fallen back to the gate, they would have been able to set a perimeter and better fight of the cultist. As it was, their current occupants wouldn't think to kindly of the intrusion.

"Are those-"

"Yep."

"Why are they-"

"Who knows."

"Who cares."

"Damned heretics, denying the Empire there rightful place."

"Wankers"

Fire-bait tilted his head thoughtfully, "so those are Thead cultists?"

Clothed in their black robes, and donning their skull masks, the Thead cultists were blasting away at their Phiel cultist, with no emotion. Indeed, when they did score a hit, or even one of their own fell, they simply went on acting like it didn't happen. They were chilling images of the god of death, right up to their impractical scythe bayonets. And caught between their emotionless killing and the fanatical slaughter was Empire troopers. The only reason they hadn't been eliminated was because they had only been hit by the stray shoots of the Theaders and charged by the craziest of the Phielist. But, it was becoming quickly apparent that the Theaders had the upper hand, and that it would only be a matter of time until they won.

"So then, any ideas?" Justen asked, much as one would ask to borrow a centi-thaler.

"We could charge them," Felmeir suggested, while letting his hand rest on his bolt pistol.

Malie, oblivious to this fact, shook his head, "we'd do nothing more then distract them for a few seconds. The Thead cultists would pick us off at range, or the Phiel cultist would hack us to bits."

"But we would be doing Zanabar's will," Deimon added.

"We'd only take out maybe twenty before we died," Helmer pointed out. "not exactly much out of the ten-thousand here. We'd have to do something really grand to take out much more."

"Aren't Thead cultists easy to distract?" Fire-bait asked.

Helmer shook his hand, "Sort of... only if it doesn't make any sense. It have to be the dumbest thing in the entire..."

And then, a collective idea fell on all of them. It was so dumb, that only a Trol would even consider it.

"Let's do it."

********
Death Master Revan Nael-Marlin directed his men as would Thead: he simply watched the apocalypse which was unfolding. His battle plan was going perfectly, even with the Empire troopers in the center, their small numbers, and inability to make temporary allies, meant that they were to few and too dispersed to have any real affect on the actions, and they would be easy enough to mop up afterword. Already, the enemy Life leader had passed into Chaos' realm and, without someone sane at the head, the life loving cultist were throwing theirs away, in the pursuit of extension. Revan mused on this: they were prolonging their lives by fighting, but the difference was so minimal that it would not-

And then, for the first and last time in his life, Raven was surprised.

********
"Keep firing you dogs!" Captain Horkrus bellowed, planting another bolt into a spade wielding Phieler.

Around him, the rest of the men of the 1st company, 1st battalion, 1st legion pored bolt after bolt into the twin hordes engulfing them. They may as well have been giving them party favors for the good it did, as many of them simply ignored the Troopers, intent as they were at their religious struggle. If they had even a molecule of tactical sense, they would have at least assigned some of their forces to defeating the Troopers, and then get on with killing each other. But, they didn't seem to think like that, and you can thank whatever god you want for the fact that they were still there. But, it was only a matter of time until-

Horkrus felt a tap on his shoulder. He turned to see a Trooper with a look on his face that can only be described, by realizing what he was seeing.

Horkrus turned to see the direction he was looking at.

He paused for what might have been a minute, before asking, "is that Justen?"

********
"this is..."

"This is stupid."

"Indeed."

"Well, at least it's working."

"Yes, Zanabar is smiling upon us now. ... Actually, I hope he isn't."

"C'mon, it's not that bad."

"Full moon, Zogger."

********
"Yep," Horkrus confirmed, with a large amount of self restraint, "that's Justen mooning us."

********
Revan was horribly confused. Nowhere did his master plan call for men dropping their pants and showing their behinds to him. Maybe it was a trap and he should- no, because that might cause- but then, that might lead to- he could ignore it, but then what if-

And Revan became so caught up in that train of thought, that he did see or hear the Phiel cultist charge him.

********
With their leader dead, the Thead cultist master plan became lost, as nowhere was it accounted for. At the same time, the Phiel cultist realized that there leader was dead, which lead to infighting between themselves. By the time all of the Thead fighting had died down, their was only about a hundred Phiel cultist left, panting and tired from the whole ordeal. And then they were shockingly reminded of the empire's prescience. And one of the first people killed in the first valley of bolts was the new Life leader.

Enraged, and horrified, the Phielers charged the Empire line, only to discover just how well prepared their training prepared them for just a situation.

********
Captain Horkrus stood silent as he looked at Justen and his diverse collection. With him, was the regimental Marshal, some Empirical sect loony, some normal loony (who may or may not be a caster), a man with too much time and too many books, and some fire-bait he didn't recognize. Technically, although their plan had worked, Horkrus should have ordered the Marshal to dispose of them. Under normal circumstances, he would have done just that, but these weren't normal circumstances.

"Captain."

"Colonel."