By Paul Quinn

Although the sky was cloudless and bright the path that the Troopers of the 35th Regt of Foot marched down was as dark as the night. The blackness created by the canopy of trees was heavier than Sergeant Colyns would have thought possible and had an almost other worldly feel about it but he wasn’t prepared to detour his platoon from its set path for fear of delay.

His platoon had been ordered to check on the whereabouts of a scouting party that had, as yet, failed to report back. The expansion plans of King Jorje’s empire couldn’t work without proper advance reports of enemy movements and forces as they had paid the price for that mistake already. So, accompanied by a unit of Dragoons on each flank, the 35th Foot marched on.

Colyns was proud of his platoon and all of the extra drills and route marches he had made them undertake since he took command were paying back threefold now. If the King got wind of what Colyns had achieved with a single platoon then he couldn’t fail to be promoted.

A sudden noise and a flash of colour to the left woke Colyns from his daydream and into a heightened state of awareness but he quickly realised it was just the attached Dragoons battling through the thick forest on his flank. Relaxing slightly, Colyns thoughts quickly drift back to his visions of rising through the ranks until startled back into the real world by another burst of noise and colour on the right. Colyns made a mental note to speak to the Dragoon command upon their return home as although his confidence in his men and their ability was boundless he knew the value of not drawing any undue attention to the platoon.

As this thought left Colyns’ head his mind finally registered something wrong with the fleeting image his eye had just glimpsed – the flash of colour had been green and not the red of the Dragoons uniform. In that second an explosion of noise and speed left the trees and a horde of Orcnar Unmann were on top of him and his men. Without the chance to soften the enemy approach with a volley or two of well placed musket fire the struggle was a short lived one.

Fighting to the last Sergeant Colyns finally fell, having had the stuffing ripped out of him. As he collapsed to the floor he gave thanks that he was a soldier of the Britanan Empire, at least the medics could get him stitched up and out fighting for his King again. He just had to wait and hope the next platoon faired better than his.