One by one he inserted them into the syringe, guiding with trembling hands the targeting probe over the pulsing vein below his bicep. He glanced at the labels on the vials as he removed the hypodermic syringe from its pouch in the lid. Taylor flung open the top of the pack and pulled out handfuls of ampoules, spreading them out on the ground. He would need all of it now, he thought, as he stared at the imposing building in front of him. He had become well familiar with the red haze that would fall over his vision, that rush of strength and sense of power it imparted, and the insanely fast healing that would take place as the medicine coursed through his body. The ampoules contained within had the power, when combined, to start triggering all sorts of physiological effects, both desired and adverse. The supply officer had issued him, and every one of the other marines, a dire warning on the use of the berserker pack. He looked to the backpack he had shrugged loose to the ground before he began this fight, and half-crawled, half-walked to it, seeking out that one package of last resort. He knew that he had taken serious injuries: his hand came away bloody as he wiped sweat from his forehead, and a sharp insistent pain in his midsection told him that he had used up all of his luck. Then he staggered, uncertain, and had to clutch one of the tall pillars that rose claw-like to the sky to keep himself from collapsing to the ground. in, and out, and the dead cacodemons piled up around him until at last, some minutes later that might as well have been hours later, he stood alone and unchallenged amongst the strewn bodies of his enemies. At last his chaingun spun empty, and he threw the useless weapon to the ground and drew the chainsaw, darting in to a turned floating head and daring to hold the chainsaw to the demon as it ripped through the thick hide that held the demons' coherence. It was going to be close, he saw, because he was starting to run low on ammo, while the wave of cacodemons still looked close to endless. He had to deflate as many of the incoming fiends as he possibly could, while dodging or trying to absorb the vicious waves of charged projectiles. The chaingun slung under an arm spat controlled fire.

They moved faster than they looked capable of that he had learned, and there would not be much time left before he would have to engage them in closer quarters. The all-too-familiar bloated red gasballs that floated across the bloodied battlefield drew a curse, and he put away the shotgun and grasped the chaingun that had become his trusted ally against the quickly approaching airborne menace. The structure was impossibly large, embedded into the volcanic surface of Hell. A crackling ball of lightning caught Taylor's shoulder as he took a rolling dive across the ground in front of the tall pillars that stood guard in front of the compound that looked for all the world like a human skull.

Imp doom 4