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Da 'Ole Of Death Chapta 12 | |
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Chapta 12 |
The attack came as the sun was setting. A cloud of dust in the distance indicated the presence of vehicles moving through the desert. At first Hazug was concerned that the aliens had been able to overtake the truck with more of their fast moving skimmers, but as the cloud of dust drew closer he saw that it was being created by a group of lightweight wheeled vehicles of ork manufacture. Each of the vehicles carried a pair of orks, one to drive the vehicle and the other to operate the weapon mounted centrally. With no information regarding why these orks were driving towards them, Hazug decided to be cautious. “Get ready lads,” he said, “dis lot could be out ‘ere lookin’ for trouble.” Right on cue a burst of gunfire erupted from the lead buggy, kicking up plumes of sand in front of the truck as the shots fell short. The Blood Axes drew their pistols, but only two of them actually fired before they realised that they were well out of range. Hazug swerved directly towards the war buggies, and the distance between them began to shrink rapidly. The buggies fired again, but only a few shots actually struck the truck, and those that did all bounced off the remains of the frontal armour plate. The buggies were now close enough for Hazug to see that the orks riding on them all had varying amounts of blue paint covering their clothes and faces. “Death Skulls!” Hazug shouted, “Dey is after me trukk! Well dey aint getting’ it without a fight, right lads?” “Right boss!” came the chorus of replies. Hazug drove straight through the centre of the squad of war buggies, two of them passing either side, “Let ‘em ‘ave it!” he shouted as the distance between them was reduced to almost nothing. The roar of gunfire was directed both at and from the truck, a single bullet from one of the Death Skulls’ weapons killed another Blood Axe and the dead ork fell from the back of the truck, his body rolling across the sand. On the other hand the mass of fire from the Blood Axes’ pistols caught one of the Death Skull Drivers in his throat. On reflex he clutched at the wound with both hands and lost control of his vehicle, which promptly flipped over and crushed both of its occupants beneath it. Another burst of fire erupted from one of the war buggies, and the truck lurched as first one of the middle tyres exploded and then its wheel shattered completely. There was the sound of grinding metal as the misshapen metal that was all that was left of the wheel ground against the chassis of the truck. Hazug brought the truck to a stop before the damage got worse. “Everybody out!” he shouted, and the truck’s passengers began to jump down. With both hands free, Hazug was now able to use his rifle and with three short rapidly fired bursts he killed one of the Death Skull gunners. “Everyone stay low!” Hazug shouted as a further burst of fire came from the Death Skulls, and most of the group followed his order. However, one of the Blood Axes instead got up and charged towards the nearest war buggy as it circled them, yelling the traditional ork war cry of “Waaargh!” as he did so. The war buggy’s gunner aimed at the charging ork, but before he could gun him down the driver had also aimed the vehicle itself at the ork who was thrown into the air as it ploughed into him. The change in the war buggy’s direction proved its undoing however, as Hazug plucked a grenade from his belt and hurled it at the vehicle as it headed towards him rather than speeding past. He watched as the explosive tumbled through the air and landed just behind the driver of the war buggy. Both of the vehicles occupants had just enough time to realise what had landed between them before the grenade detonated and tore the lightweight vehicle, occupants and all apart. Meanwhile the remaining two war buggies moved further away from the truck and the group huddled around it, anxious to avoid further grenade attacks. But the growing cloud of smoke from the wreck of the buggy destroyed by Hazug’s grenade made shooting at the group much harder, even without the poor marksmanship that was common to orks. Ubgrub suddenly got to his feet and dashed towards the buggy that had upturned after the death of its driver, and when he reached it he dived underneath it. Moments later he emerged holding the ammunition for the buggy’s weapon. Looking around briefly, he ran back to the truck when he was sure that both of the remaining buggies were not near him. “’Ere ya go boss,” he said as he crouched down once more, “will dese fit dat big shoota of yours?” Hazug grinned as he saw the nearly full box of ammunition. “Dey will indeed, good work lad. Someone get dat big shoota for us.” Ratish and the gretchin began to scrabble back up onto the truck to retrieve the heavy weapon. There was another burst of gunfire as the smoke cleared just enough for the Death Skulls to see the two gretchin. Ratish reacted quickly enough to duck behind a crate and avoid the attack the second gretchin did not, and he fell backwards from the truck, dead before the hit the sand. “Is ya alright grot?” Hazug shouted. “Ratish is fine master,” the gretchin replied, “and Ratish find da big shoota.” The weapon landed with a ‘thunk’ in the sand as Ratish pushed it over the side of the truck. Hazug grabbed the ended of the ammunition belt from the crate and loaded into the gun. Then he cocked the weapon and stood up with it at his hip. “Kop dis!” he shouted as he gripped the trigger tightly and sent a stream of heavy bullets towards the nearest war buggy. He saw both the driver and gunner twisting as they were struck by the burst. He let go of the trigger when it became clear that its occupants were dead and it ground to a sudden stop. The only war buggy remaining had only a driver, and with no one to operate hi vehicle’s weapon he decided to withdraw. A cloud of dust concealed the war buggy as its driver drove straight away from Hazug, but he did not take any evasive action and when Hazug fired another burst into the centre of the cloud the driver was hit several times and died immediately. Hazug turned to Ubgrub and handed him the automatic gun, “’Ere ya go lad,” he said, “ya can use dis from now on. Ya deserve it for dat idea,” then he spoke to the remains of the warband, “Now everyone get lootin', dare’s probably more ammo in dem buggies.” While most of the orks began to search through the remains of the Death Skull war buggies that were not burning wrecks Hazug went to inspect the damage to his own vehicle accompanied by Drazzok, Ratish and Sophie. There they saw that the destroyed wheel had made a deep gouge in the chassis. “That looks bad, can we still travel in this?” Sophie asked. Hazug bent down to take a closer look at the damage. “We’ll ‘ave to wots left of da wheel off,” he said, “but it aint one of da drive wheels so we should still be able to get somewhere on it.” “Bah!” Drazzok snorted, “Its knackered. We aint goin’ to get back to da city in dis.” “We don’t ‘ave to,” Hazug said, “We can get it fixed.” “Fixed? Where?” Drazzok demanded as both Sophie and Ratish also stared at him with puzzled looks on their faces. “Da Death Skulls must ‘ave a camp somewhere near ‘ere,” Hazug said, “and I reckon dat last buggy was runnin’ straight towards it. We’ll go dare instead.” “But they just tried to kill us,” Sophie said. “But dey didn’t manage to did dey? Even if da other Death Skulls know wots ‘appened ‘ere, day aint goin’ to care provided we can pay.” “Can we pay?” Sophie asked. “We can once we pull all da teeth from da Death Skulls,” Drazzok commented. “Exactly,” said Hazug. Then he looked up at the darkening sky, “We better not try findin’ da camp in da dark though, we could wind up anywhere. Problem is we can’t go wanderin’ off lookin’ for somewhere to camp ourselves, so we is goin’ to ‘ave to stay ‘ere for da night.” “Wot out in da open?” Drazzok said “I know, I don’t like it either, but we aint got no choice dis time,” Hazug admitted, “we’ll leave some lads on watch just in case.”
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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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