The Kriegsman stood over the inert form of the other human, waiting for them to get up and possibly explain the sudden change of scenery. Lasgun was up, eyes searching the surrounding terrain from behind his mask for possible threats to be dealt with.

The human stirred, holding a hand to her head and slowly, painfully sitting up. Her eyes opened, blinking several times at the brightness of the scene, before settling on an anomalous figure standing before her.

"Shit!" she muttered unashamedly, and started scrambling back on all fours. "I'm fine! I swear, there's nothing wrong with me! I - I can fight, I can get up - just, just -" she stuttered, bumping into a tree and rising to her feet as promised. Krieg Quartermasters were known to take the weapons of/finish off allies, not just fellow Krieg Guardsmen.

The Kriegsman stayed put, presumably watching the panicking human without turning his head. She continued, oblivious to his non-action. "All I have is an autogun! You guys don't even use autoguns!"

"Name." a deep, rough voice spoke, silencing the woman.

"Uh, Rhia." she replied to the voice, before realizing the disembodied voice wasn't actually asking for her name.

"Planetary Defense Force of Tarsae." she said, shoulders sagging a bit.

At that, the Kriegsman grunted and turned, walking away. Rhia took a moment to glance around, and at the forest around her, and her jaw dropped.

"By the Throne!' she gushed to the other human, sprinting up to him. "Look at this!"

The masked face swivelled, but the Kriegsman didn't stop.

A stupid grin plastered over Rhia's face, she paid no heed to him. "Trees! Green! Oh, sweet Emperor, I can't believe something like this even exists!'

The Kriegsman grunted again and faced forward, continuing on his way.

"Look, look. This is amazing. I've never seen life like this, like, ever. I mean, a few picts of Garden Worlds and an old propaganda poster had nice forests in them, b-but." Rhia said estatically.

"I guess you don't really care, do you?" she muttured after a few moments of silence. Huffing, her grin returned a second later "I have no idea where we are, but if some horrible xeno comes along and kills me, I'll die happy."

~

Apparent mid-afternoon left the pair slogging through knee-high snow, having left the comfort of their original location in the forest behind. Stopping occasionally to check they were still heading south, the Kriegsman otherwise shouldered his lasgun and marched with stolid determination.

Rhia, on the other hand, was jumping from footstep to footstep that her companion left in the knee-deep snow. If you could call this guy a ‘companion’’, of course.

He wasn’t technically being unfriendly . . . he just really wasn’t talking. At all. Not since the bad impression they had made on each other when they had first realized their predicament had he spoken. In fact, she was just following him at the moment. There had been no discussion of their situation or destination, just checking his compass and moving out after her short rave.

“Hey.” she said for the thousandth time, stomping impatiently beside him.

“...”

“Where are we going?”

“...”

“What’s your name?”

“...”

“Do you know how we got here?”

Rhia stopped, sighed, and fell back behind him. It really was beautiful up here. And contradictory. They were struggling through - what was it, snow? - yet intense sunlight bore unceasingly down on them, and she was tempted to take off her flak armor. The land rose and fell beneath them, and every time they reached the peak of these relatively small hills, she was treated to the sight of lush fields and meadows, as far as she could see.

Truly, the Emperor had blessed her. She didn't know how she'd gotten here, and she'd honestly put very little thought into it, but who was she to care? She meant what she said - she knew she was above hundreds of trillions of Imperium citizens to be in such a lush, virgin environment.

Aha. She knew what would get her companion to talk.

“Who do you serve?” she said finally, smiling a little at her cleverness.

There was a slight pause, before the Kriegsman finally spoke in his raspy voice. “The Emperor.”

“Mhm, and why do you serve him?” Rhia pressed.

“Look to yourself, PDF. You are unworthy of asking an Imperial Guardsman of Krieg that question.” he replied.

Surprised at the length and complexity of his response, but nevertheless undaunted, Rhia tried her luck again with the now-speaking Kriegsman.

“And what am I lacking? I have an autogun, a helmet, armor, this badge, I me-”

“You are lacking the will to die.” he said abruptly, and strode away, slightly faster than before, she imagined.

Rhia shook her head, and tried to think of less depressing life goals. Not exactly the response she’d been seeking, but having another human voice was reassuring, at least.

She checked her equipment for the umpteenth time in this world, her auto-gun, flak vest with assorted pockets, and personal pouch hooked to her belt. Weapon, cardboard armor, enough rations for a week, and her literal life’s possessions. Could’ve been a lot worse. Did she . . . ?

A huge case of vials and rolled up paper tubes still took up half the space in her personal pouch. She smiled at the sight, but inwardly sighed a little at her vice.

“So, where are we headed?” she asked, bored again.

“...”

~

Hours of silence later, the sky was splashed by brilliant hues of orange and gold, even as the sun began to sink under the hills to their right. Unfortunately, the beautiful colors didn’t mask the fact that the temperature was dropping quite drastically.

“Can we at least stop and, y’know, make a fire or something?” Rhia asked in exasperation, rubbing her arms desperately in an attempt to stop them from freezing.

The Kriegsman finally seemed to notice her, and hesitantly stopped trudging forward, turning to face her.

"Why?" he asked, and she swore he sounded genuinely curious, if that was possible.

"Because I might freeze to death, that's why!" she gasped, a powerful gust of chilling mountain wind blowing over them.

She could swear his actual face was looking back and forth, from the trail to her, though his mask didn't move an iota.

"N-not everyone has a trench coat." she pleaded, realizing she was much colder than she had thought.

Another miserably powerful wind came, and she fell to the snow on both knees. Her hive-world body had never experienced such cold, and her thoughts settled on how morbidly ironic her deciding her death would be a happy one were. The feeling in her limbs drained away.

Faintly, she felt herself being lifted out of the snow, and her body shuddered at the sudden warmth that enveloped her.

She was being sheltered in the Kriegsman's trench coat.

The wind howled now.

Author's Notes:

Rejoice, rejoice. It only took 30 weeks, but this story lives again!