Emperors Will be done Pt16

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Well, this one was a little more one sided.
7 brave votes for NOT resting while staying way ahead of possible opposition
52 voted for resting a little. I guess everybody wanted a little bit of a breather.

The choice is on the next part:

Here we go:
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It is hard to describe how Imperial armor; although cheaply made, was able to save my life a few times. As I pulled off the chest armor while holding back some bile coming up from the smell, I noticed a few indentations on the chest. Using the light disc, I examined the armor. Two ork slugs had made their home embedded into the chest plate. The Emperor Protects.

Looking over at my Tau companions, I noticed they got closer to the subterranean river. Kai sat on his haunches, while Xin used a wet cloth she soaked from the river to wash out his injuries. He wasn’t looking too well.

I waded into the river and used my hands to scrub off the grime and sweat from my chest armor. Removing my shirt, I washed that out as well. Water wasn’t as cold as I thought. But it was refreshing. A few minutes later, I returned ringing out my shirt of river water. The light disc Xin borrowed from me showed that I had been scraped and bruised all over. Also, new scars had shown up.

I sat down by the shore and began to rub my sore neck. Looking over to see how Kai’Faan was doing with Xin, she had a painful and confused look on her face as she watched me. Was it the sight of my injuries, or had I offended her in some way? Such a strange species. I assured her I was fine. She nodded and continued to work on Kai’s wound. After re-wrapping his injury, Xin seemed to get into a conversation with Kai. Afterwards, he lied down on the rocks began to rest. I’m sure he needed it.

It was nice to rest. I can’t even remember the times that I hadn’t had to worry about danger of death around every corner. I mean, it seems like a fading dream of memories back when my brother, sister and I used to sit on top of the agri-hydration filter back on the farm, and we would come up with outrageous story after story while eating mom’s freshly baked gramize fuit pie. If I came up with a story that matched what I’m doing now, both siblings would do their traditional “far-fetched-story-gets-the far-fall-glory” and push me off the filter unit into the haystacks gathered below……those times are long gone, and no one will know.

But, I have a purpose now. Something that is more important than being one of countless grunts that will meet their doom on this planet just from a sergeant’s finger point on a map. To be killed just to get the bloke behind you a few steps closer to the enemy before he gets killed for the guy behind him to make it a few more steps is a cheap end. But to be killed to bring a few priceless Tau closer to home and to save an entire planet of suffering colonists……that is something I can work for. Will I tell Xin this fact? Probably not. She feels she need to protect me, but I am going to do the same for these two if it the last breath I take.

I hadn’t realized I was daydreaming for almost an hour until Xin’Vauk sat next to me to check my bruises. As I snapped out of my daze, she poked at a huge scar I had on my back. After asking me where that came from, I told her of the story when Brutus and his comrades used to throw me around and slam me into the bunks. The scar she had been touching was when I was thrown so hard, the bunks buckled and fell on top of me. After stitches from the sanatorium, I was punished for breaking Imperial property; therefore receiving 10 very painful lashes.
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