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Da 'Ole Of Death Chapta 10 | |
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Chapta 10 |
The alien mind watched as the warband made its way down the passage, switching from one remote sensory system to another. Their ability to not only open the access portal, but also to defeat the unit that it had been able to awaken in time to position there was unexpected. What was more they now possessed a warscythe taken from one of the minds best troops before it could be recalled to the main tomb complex below. The mind continued to monitor the warband as it continued, but turned its main focus to the state of the occupants of the tomb. Most of the occupants remained in their slumber that had lasted for aeons, but those who maintained the tomb had the process of waking them up underway. Soon there would be an army ready to march and cleanse the planet of the life forms that dominated it, but that army would not be ready before the intruders reached the outer portion of the tomb itself if they continued at their present rate and they had proven that they had the capacity to cause damage. The mind came to the conclusion that the revival process would have to be delayed slightly, and some of those performing the revival would instead be used to deal with the intruders. Satisfied that a suitable strategy had been determined, the mind shifted its focus back to the intruders themselves while above its servants moved into position. For what seemed like an age the warband had made its way down the winding passage, the only illumination provided by the torches they had brought with them. The irregular light that they provided made it difficult to see a great distance ahead, and Hazug was concerned that they could meet another party of the strange alien skeletons with very little warning. With this in mind he had slung his rifle and was instead wielding the alien weapon he had taken though its size prevented him from carrying a torch. Most of the other orks had chosen to follow his example and had tucked their pistols away and were carrying their own assorted blades in addition to the torches lighting their way. “’Ang on a mo,” Hazug said, stopping suddenly, “I think dat dis passage opens out ahead, dis could be it.” “So wot do we do boss?” asked an ork, one of the larger members of the warband. “Simple Zhagrad me lad,” Hazug said to the ork, “we send in a grot.” Fobbit should have realised what was about to happen, but he had not learnt his lesson from earlier and once more the other gretchin shoved him forwards once more. “Good on ya for volunteerin’ grot,” Hazug said, “now go take a look at wot’s down dare,” and he kicked Fobbit towards what appeared to be the end of the passage. Picking himself up, Fobbit advanced slowly ahead of the warband. As Hazug had predicted, the passageway ended a short distance ahead. It emerged on a ledge in a giant underground cavern. In the centre of the cavern a green light shone from within a spire that reached almost to the cavern roof, illuminating the entire area and Fobbit gasped as he saw the city that stretched out as far as he could see. “Well wot’s dare grot?” Hazug yelled from within the passageway. “Dare’s a big city ‘ere master, I don’t see no-one movin’ about in it.” “’Ang on grot, we is comin’ for a look.” Fobbit heard the sound of footsteps from behind him as the warband advanced while he continued to stare down at the city. Then something caught his eye; there was something immediately below him. Fobbit peered over the side of the ledge as saw five objects rising rapidly but silently up the side of the rock face. As they came closer he saw that they did not actually touch the rock face itself, but instead were floating in mid air. He jumped backwards as they reached the level of the ledge and he saw that they were multi limbed machines, with numerous legs like an arachna-squig, though they did not use them for locomotion, and a pair of large menacing claws. The machines looked at the small creature before them and moved closer. Fobbit turned to run, but one of the giant machines took him in one of its claws and crushed him without any effort. Inside the passage, the warband heard Fobbit’s scream and the crunching sound that ended it suddenly. “Move it!” Hazug shouted, and the warband broke into a run. Before they reached the end of the passageway they were confronted by the five hovering machines moving towards them, the lead machine had blood dripping from one of its clawed arms. Feggit was the first to react, firing his gun until it clicked on an empty chamber. The hail of bullets struck three of the machines but only one appeared to be damaged, with one of its rear limbs being blown loose. Hazug raised the alien weapon high and a cry of “Waaargh!” he charged at the machines, followed by the other orks. The machines continued to advance, meeting the ork charge head on. Hazug brought his weapon down at the last moment, and its unnaturally sharp blade impaled the lead machine through the centre of the cluster of eyes on its head. Then, by bringing the weapon upwards again he cut the upper platting away from the machine’s back. He was about to bring the weapon down again for another strike when the machine glowed green and faded away just as the skeletal types had done earlier when critically damaged. There was a series of sharp metallic clangs as the other orks attacked the remaining machines in close combat, followed by a scream as one of the machines pushed a claw through the abdomen of an ork. There was a flash of light as Drazzok poured psychic energy into the already damaged machine and flames erupted from within it and it crashed to the floor before it too disappeared. Swinging his empty weapon by its muzzle, Feggit struck one of the machines on its head. But the attack did no more than jerk its head momentarily before it span to face the ork and, grasping him with both claws, ripped him in half. As the machine dropped the two large chunks of flesh that had once been Feggit, Nizz leapt onto its back and began to jab his blade down to where its short neck emerged from beneath the armoured shell of its body. The machine trashed about with its claws, trying desperately to dislodge the smaller or, but he held on tightly with his free hand until, with a shower of sparks, the machines head was cut free. “’Ow d’ya like dat den?” he yelled. The now familiar green glow surrounded both the severed head and the body, and Nizz jumped clear before the remains could vanish and, possibly, take him along with them to wherever it was that they were going to. “Nice one lad,” Hazug shouted as he saw the young ork take out the machine single-handed. Then he swung his own weapon and watched, first with glee as he cut a clawed arm from the machine that he was currently fighting, and then with frustration as a cluster of wires erupted from the stump of the arm and dragged the claw back into place almost as though it had never been damaged in the first place. He swung the weapon again, but the alien machine caught hold of it held it fast. Then the machine pulled on the weapon, and Hazug toppled to the floor. Unwilling to let go of his prize, Hazug also held on to the weapon, but only with one hand. With the other he reached for his slung rifle and jammed the muzzle up against the underside of the machine, then flicking the selector switch to the ‘turbo-dakka’ position he snatched the trigger back and held it there. The machine quivered as the hail of bullets from the rifle struck the same spot one after another. About a third of the way through the magazine its armour finally cracked, and the rest of the burst punched through and bounced about inside it armoured casing. The machine finally released its grip on Hazug’s weapon as the glow in its many eyes ceased, and he rolled out of the way before it could come crashing down on top of him. He got back up just in time to see not only the wreckage of the machine he had just destroyed, but also the final functional machine both fade away in their customary green glow. With the disappearance of the alien machines the warband looked around to make sure that there were no more enemies left for them to fight. “Why do they keep vanishing?” Sophie said out loud. “Dunno,” Hazug replied, “but unless dey is busted dey only vanish when most of da others ‘ave been.” “So if we ‘it enough of ‘em,” Zhagrad said slowly, “da rest will just vanish before dey can be ‘it an’ all?” “Looks like it lad,” Hazug said, “now everyone pick up wot ya can, and lets go take a look at dis city da grot said ‘e saw.” Hazug and Drazzok began to continue down the passageway straight way, followed closely by Sophie. Meanwhile the rest of the warband went over the bodies of their fallen comrades to recover whatever possessions they had on them and to pull their teeth. The ancient mind was incapable of feeling true frustration, but it was aware that twice now the forces it had sent against a band of comparatively primitive intruders had been beaten back with heavy losses. What was worse, now four of the tomb’s maintenance units had been suffered critical damage and would have to be repaired before they would be able to assist in the revival of the main army. Have patience. The thought suddenly occurred to the mind that it was not necessary to do anything immediately. The intruders were now at the edge of the primary area, and appeared set on continuing deeper into the complex. Therefore, rather than rushing forces to meet them mind could instead wait until it had an overwhelming force available to utterly crush them. Beyond the abomination brought into being by the ancient enemy, most of the rest of the intruders also appeared to be one of the enemy’s servant races. If this observation was correct, then the available information suggested that they would not withdraw even when faced with a vastly superior force. There would be plenty of time to despatch them before they could leave the tomb and spread word of its existence. Hazug stared out at the ancient city before him. Illuminated by the strange light emanating from the gigantic spire at city’s heart, the rest was an eerie arrangement of pyramids, towers and bridges that did not look like any place that anything would actually live in. He pulled the tau viewing device from his pouch again and used it to look closer at the city. The dim light cast from the spire required the use of the night vision feature, but the strange green tint that this overlaid on the picture he saw did not make the city look any less strange to Hazug. As far as he could tell the entire city was deserted. The many streets and plazas were empty of both traffic and pedestrians, while apart from the central spire none of the buildings cast any light from within. Zooming in further, Hazug could make out carvings on some of the walls. Carvings that were arranged in straight lines, with patterns that repeated like some form of writing that he could not understand. Hazug activated the viewer’s recording function and stored images of this cold, abandoned place within it. He focused on the spire at the heart of the city since it was the only structure that showed any signs of life. As he examined a magnified image of the top of the spire he noticed that directly above the tip of the spire there was a crystal set into the roof of the cavern. A crystal that looked familiar. Then something caught his eye. More light sources had appeared away from the spire, these came from a cluster of small pyramids that appeared to be made of metal similar to machines that had attacked them twice now rather than the stone that everything else had been constructed from. Each of the pyramids mounted a large green crystal atop it, crystals which now produced a light similar to that which came from the spire. Hazug recorded some images of thee pyramids, and as he did so he saw them begin to move. At first the just lifted up from the floor, but then they began to float slowly through the city streets. “Dat looks like trouble,” he said. “Wot does?” Drazzok asked. “Can ya see dem other lights down dare, dem dat is movin’?” Drazzok looked for the lights. “Yeah I see ‘em, wot are dey?” “Wagons I think, though they aint comin’ dis way yet they… ‘Ang on, I see somethin’ else.” “Wot?” Through the viewer, Hazug watched as the base of the spire opened and from within a column of skeletal figures emerged, marching in long straight lines. Similar in appearance to the first group that had attacked them, these lacked the long blades on their hands and instead each one wielded a rifle like weapon. “More of dem skeleton lads,” Hazug said, “lots of ‘em, and I think dat dey all got shootas.” “So what do we do know?” Sophie asked. “We is leavin’,” Hazug said as he returned the viewer to its pouch. “’Ang on,” Drazzok said, “ya wos paid to sort dis out.” “I wos paid to
find out wot wos goin’ on,” Hazug corrected him, “and I think dat its safe
to say dat we all know wot is goin’ on around ‘ere. Now we needs to get
out of ‘ere and let da local boss know wot’s goin’ on too. Den we can
figure out how to sort it out.” “Soddin’ Blood Axe,” Drazzok muttered, “do ya know wot ya problem is?” “I reckon ya is about to tell me anyway.” “Ya thinks too bleedin’ much. One day ya’ll think so much ya brain’ll pop and we’ll ‘ave to get a painboy to stuff a new one in.” Entering the passage once more they met the rest of the warband. “We got everythin’ useful boos,” Ghukil said, “where is we goin’ now?” “To da ork city,” Hazug told him, “we needs to let da big boss know wot’s goin’ on down ‘ere. Den we can come back with ‘is boys to sort dis lot out.”
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The Warhammer 40,000 universe is the intellectual property of Games Workshop Ltd. The fiction presented here is a derived work. It is completely unofficial and Games Workshop Ltd has not endorsed any of it. |
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