20 Introduction

governor’s press gangs arrive in settlements suddenly and take

every able-bodied adult away, leaving only the very young
and old to wonder where their mothers, fathers, sisters and
brothers have gone. Some governors may chafe at the wholesale
conscription of such large portions of their population, but they
know it is within the Departmento Munitorum’s rights and
would much rather retain their positions of power (even with
diminished subjects) than refuse.
Part of the Departmento Munitorum’s remit, in addition to
supplying and supplementing the weapons and gear used by
regiments, is ensuring that Imperial Guard regiments receive
at least a modicum of training. Though this is not always
possible, and many a fresh regiment has been plunged into
battle never even having fired their weapons, it is desirable
to get regiments into fighting condition even if it only
slightly extends their life expectancy. Though there are no
exact specifications on what constitutes a “trained” regiment,
countless texts exist on the subject. The first and foremost
level of training occurs when a regiment is raised on a world
and it undergoes the transformation from civilian rabble into
military personnel. How long this process takes and exactly
what skills are imparted (and to what level of success) varies
immensely from world to world. Some, like the hive world
of Scintilla at the heart of the Calixis Sector, have the wealth
and power as well as the military tradition to spend months
or even years turning a man into a soldier and preparing him
for his service. Others, especially feral or remote worlds, do
not have the same luxury, and recruits may not even know
they are to be soldiers until the lasgun is pressed into their
hands and they are pushed in the direction of the enemy.
garnered from planetary tithes for military use. Before a world
can receive assistance, their request must be processed and
considered, their need weighed against the needs of other
systems and other requests for aid. Even as vast as the Imperial
Guard is, it is not endless, and the Departmento Munitorum
must oft choose between worlds under attack, sometimes even
if it means sacrificing one so another can be saved. Lords and
officers of the Imperial Guard are not beyond power of the
Departmento Munitorum either, and their orders to mobilise
troops or deploy to a certain warzone must usually be
authorised by the Departmento, records kept and copies made
before soldiers are released to do their duty. On the ground
or in the heat of battle, a commander can usually consider
himself in control of events, at least to the extent that he can
issue orders to his men and see them acted upon without
unnecessary reliance on the Departmento Munitorum, though
requests for resupply and reinforcement can be tediously slow
if the conflict has garnered a “low” priority or, as often happens
in the Imperial Guard’s galaxy-wide struggle, a new warzone
has flared up and troops have been diverted to deal with it.
To mitigate this latter issue, when a war looks to require
significant effort to win or contain, the Departmento Munitorum
authorises the raising of troops from nearby systems, mobilising
and training large portions of a local population to aid existing
Imperial units. This will go beyond the sequestering of forces
protecting local worlds and, in extreme cases, can mean whole
populaces are conscripted to act as frontline troops. This can be
traumatic for some worlds, such as those yet to be touched
by the presence of the local conflict, where men and
women must give up their lives to fight for strangers
against foes they may never have known existed. A
It has been over seven cycles here on Kulth and we have not seen nor heard anything from the
enemy we
must fight. They have been endlessly training us, making us run around on all this open ground
and practise
our weapons drill. We have also star ted to dig in around Rans Bluff, setting up sandbag walls
and trenches,
which is as hard a kind of work as I have ever done. They have also been briefing us on our
enemy, a vile alien
species known as Orks. Apparently they are crude and brutish with
little intelligence or skill at war, and we have been told if we build
our defences properly there is no chance they will be able to break
through. More of the regiment has been showing up all the
time, and I reckon there must be at least ten thousand
of us here now, along with tanks and artillery from
some Scintillan division. Drayn, Helson, and Torsh
have all started gambling to pass the time between
training and digging (and also to take our minds
off the nothing over our heads). Some of the games
of Emperor’s Ante we have been playing have been
with the Scintillans, though largely they are a dour
lot. It seems they have come from some other part of
Kulth where the Imperial Guard is not doing so
well and have lost a lot of their regiment. I wish
they’d cheer up a bit, their listless stares and
vacant faces give me the creeps.