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Blood And Rocks Chapta 9 | |
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Chapta 9 |
Unsurprisingly the Traders’ Association held its meetings in a building located close to the main marketplace in Git Town, in building that stood out from the somewhat dilapidated ones that made up the bulk of those in the area. Dragging Rhia behind him, Hazug accompanied Thayne towards the main entrance that Hazug was surprised to find was unguarded. No ork leader would ever leave the main entrance to his fortress unguarded and open to attack like this. “Why aint dare
any lads on guard?” he asked Thayne as they entered the building, much to
the surprise of the people inside who had not noticed the ork column
parked outside. “Oi Hazug!” Drazzok’s voice suddenly called out as the weirdboy came marching up to the building, “I though I’d come and join ya.” And then he jabbed a thumb back at the madboys in the truck, “Dem loonies is drivin’ me as mad as dem. Of course if I’d known ya was bringin’ dat bleedin’ bit of rock with ya I’d ‘ave stayed put. It’s givin’ me another ‘eadache and I aint got no grub to take me mind off it.” Hazug frowned as he looked back at his truck. There he saw Thuggrim located in the gunner’s position at the top of the roll cage and the other madboys in the passenger carrying area at the back of the vehicle. Amongst these orks he also saw Ratish who still had the rock in his bag. So if Drazzok was picking up the presence of such a stone then it could only mean that there was another one close by and Hazug began to look around for where it might be hidden. “What’s
wrong?” Thayne asked him. He had not understood any of what Drazzok had
said but he could tell by Hazug’s reaction that he suspected that there
was something serious going on. Though he did not understand orkish, Hal did recognise the sound of his name when Rhia called it out and he reacted by drawing a pistol from beneath his jacket and firing a shot towards Thayne. The shot missed but it created panic both inside and outside the building as people tried to escape. On the other hand, upon hearing the shot the orks still waiting outside began to rush towards the building to join in the battle they thought had begun. “Watch ‘er!” Hazug snapped, thrusting the end of Rhia’s chain at Thayne, then both he and Drazzok began to force their way through the people attempting to leave the building in the direction that Hal had fled. Neither of them had actually known who Rhia had been pointing to, particularly since her chains prevented her from lifting her arms much higher than her waist but from the moment he had drawn a weapon he had marked himself out as an enemy. Hal reached a set of deserted stairs and began to head up them, pausing briefly to turn and fire two shots at the pursuing orks before he continued to rush up them. He hoped that he would be able to lose his pursuers on the next floor up, but when he reached it he found the door from the stairwell was locked. “Feth no!” he cursed as he banged on the door, hoping that someone on the other side may open it. When this did not happen he returned his pistol to its holster and then swung the case he held in his other hand at the lock in an attempt to break it open. “Oi!” Hazug shouted out as he and Drazzok saw Hal from the stairs, ”Stop right dare.” Hal turned on the spot, dropping his case and drawing his pistol again. Then he fired it repeatedly. One of the bullets clipped Hazug’s arm but the projectile was too weak to affect an ork as large as Hazug with such a minor hit and instead Hazug just plucked his own pistol, the only weapon he had brought with him from the truck and returned fire. The single shot hit Hal just above his eye and the passage of the bullet tore off the side of his head, spraying blood and bone fragments across the wall and door behind him. Both orks then rushed up the stairs to take a closer look at the body now slumped against the door and as they looked down they saw Hal’s case had burst open when he dropped it. More importantly, lying on the floor beside it they saw a rectangular piece of carved stone. Drazzok scowled at the sight of this and lifted his staff, ready to bring it down on the stone to smash it. “Wait!” Hazug snapped, “I got it.” And he reached down and scooped it up along with the case it had been held in, “Now lets get back to da others.” Most of the other orks from the warband had attempted to crowd their way into the building after they heard the gunshots, but with no sign of either Drazzok or Hazug when they arrived they had instead settled for waiting for them to return. The few humans who remained eye them up nervously, especially when there was the brief sound of more gunfire. “Where is he?” Thayne asked when he saw the two large orks returning without Hal. “Dead.” Hazug replied and then he held out the case and opened it, “’E ‘ad dis.” Two Heads
snorted. “Wait a minute.” Rhia said suddenly as she peered around the orks at the case for herself, ”Look at the padding.” The inside of the case was lined with several layers of cloth that looked as if they were intended to protect the stone from getting damaged. Hazug had simply put the stone back into the case in a roughly central position, but there was still an indentation in the cloth from where it had been before the case had burst open and the stone fell out. Or more precisely there were two such indentations. “Dare’s another rock.” Hazug said and he looked around, wondering how to determine where Hal could have hidden it. “We’ll need to evacuate the building.” Thayne said, ” Conduct a full search.” But then there was a shrill scream. “Or maybe not.” Hazug said and thrusting the case at Thayne for safekeeping he ran towards the source of the sound. He paused briefly and turned to face the other orks, “Well? Wot is ya waitin’ for?” he asked and then the rest of the orks present ran after him. The sound led
Hazug up a different set of stairs and along the way he heard the sound of
a human made pistol being fired several times. He considered the
possibility that Hal had had an accomplice who was now firing on the
occupants of the building, but as he burst out of the stairwell he found
himself confronted by a dead human lying on the floor in front of him with
a pistol nearby. The body looked as if an attack squig had been set on it
before someone had set it on fire, but there were no other bullet wounds.
He noticed another human cowering behind a desk just as Drazzok, Gorgoga
and Two Heads came up the stair behind him. The three nobs rushed through the doorway into the room beyond. A large table that had upturned chairs all around it dominated the room and standing on top of this table was a bizarrely shaped, multi-armed creature with bright pink flesh. All around the room cowered humans that Hazug realised he recognised, having met many of them on several occasions. This was the Traders’ Association itself. The creature cackled as it spun to face the newly arrived orks and it extended its arms out in front of it. “Down!” Drazzok yelled as he felt the sudden build up of warp energy. Just in time Gorgoga pushed forwards and held up his heavy shield as a blast of pink and blue flames erupted from the daemon’s fingertips only to be blocked by the shield. Roaring, Gorgoga brought his inactive powerclaw down on the closest edge of the table, flipping it up and catapulting the daemon into the air. It grabbed hold of a chandelier that looked as if it had not been used since the ork invasion over thirty years earlier and cackled once more, extending one arm while using the other to hang on. “Oh no ya don’t!” one of Two Heads yelled and before the daemon could unleash more warp based fire he emptied the magazine of his rifle into it. The bullets tore through the daemon but it just laughed off the attack as it dropped back down to the table and then lunged at Two Heads. Hazug reacted
quickly, slamming his fist into the face of the daemon and interrupting
its charge. “Gotcha!” he yelled, believing the daemon to be destroyed. But then as he watched each of the two halves began to sprout more limbs so that each half formed a distinct and complete creature. The flesh also changed colour as part of this transformation and now Hazug found himself facing not one but two smaller blue daemons in place of the original pink one. The two daemons began chattering and both reached out push one another away. One of them then jumped back up onto the table and ran headlong towards the crowd of orks in the doorway while the other remained to face Hazug. There was a blaze of gunfire as every armed ork opened fire on the blue daemon that jumped back up towards the ceiling and then much to the annoyance of the orks below came back don on top of them and began to leap from the head of one ork to another. Meanwhile the other daemon simply danced about in front of Hazug, evading each of his blows with ease. “Let em
through!” Drazzok snapped as he pushed his way out of the tight group of
orks attempting to swat the blue daemon using their skulls like
stepping-stones. The daemon near Hazug sensed Drazzok’s approach and leapt
towards him, but the weirdboy reacted quickly enough swing his staff like
a club and the daemon was propelled through a nearby window, plummeting to
the ground below. The daemon did its best to try and fight back, scrapping and clawing at the orks that came within arms reach but there were far too many of them and the attacks only ended when Two Heads slammed his rifle butt into the daemon’s face and there was a ‘Pop!’ as the daemon was no longer able to maintain a physical form and it returned to the warp. “Downstairs!” Hazug yelled, “Dare’s still one left.” Outside Thuggrim and the other madboys still remained with the vehicles, as did Ratish and Cuddles and so when the daemon came tumbling out the window they saw it clearly. “Squig!” one of the madboys snapped, “Blue squig!” and he pointed to where the daemon had landed. The fall did not injure the daemon at all and it quickly picked itself up. Then it saw the ork and began to charge towards them, still emitting its typical cackling. “It’s comin’ right for us!” Thuggrim snapped from the gunner’s position and he swung the trucks weapon around at the daemon. But his aim was off and instead of hitting their intended target the bullets bounced of the pavement and wall. The other madboys joined in the shooting, pointing their pistols at the daemon and firing as fast as they could. But even this failed to stop the creature. Ratish however had a different idea. As soon as the first madboy had drawn attention to the daemon Cuddles had done what came naturally to him and taken a dislike to it and while Ratish had at first kept hold of the squig’s leash he now released his grip and allowed Cuddles to charge the oncoming daemon. Both the daemon and Cuddles leapt at one another, the daemon spreading its arms wide as Cuddles instead opened his mouth. Then the two met in midair. Cuddles snapped his jaw shut around the daemon’s head as the pair dropped back to the ground. The squig was able to keep his grip on the daemon as they landed roughly and rolled across the ground and out into the road. As the daemon writhed about, scratching at Cuddles’ tough hide in an attempt to free itself Cuddles shook the daemon and bit down harder. All of a sudden the body of the daemon turned dissolved as its grip on reality faded and Cuddles’ mouth snapped shut onto nothing. Confused the squig began to look around for where its prey had gone, but all that remained of the daemon was a pale blue fluid seeping down into the ground through the cracks in the road surface. It was then
that the ork warband came charging back out of the building, hunting for
the second blue daemon. “I is pleased
to announce dat da blue squig ‘as melted.” Thuggrim called out in
response. “Nice one.” Hazug said, looking at Cuddles. Then Thayne came rushing up to him. “Hazug it
looks like you were just in time. We’re moving the Traders’ Association to
the medicae building now, but it looks like most will pull
through.” “Wot? Did de not get ‘it den?” he asked. “They have bite and claw injuries, along with a few broken bones.” Thayne explained, “But it looks like it’s mainly the shock of facing whatever that thing was.” “But da wounds aint rottin’ den?” Hazug then asked. “No. Why? Should thy be?” “I dunno.”
Hazug replied, “But all da others ‘ave been.” Hazug looked at the other nobs. “We need to get da humans to see their doks.” He said, “Dey’ll ‘ave to ride in me trucks. Da rest of ya can wait ‘ere.” “Den we go ‘untin’ da gits with da rocks right?” one of Two Heads asked and Hazug smiled. “Dat’s sorted.” He told Thayne, “I needs to go see if Mayleth’s woken up yet anyway.”
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