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Chapta 10 | |
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Da Raiders From Da Shadows Chapta 10 |
“Now!” Hazug shouted as he estimated the eldar were in range, but Thuggrim did nothing, “Now Thuggrim!” he repeated, but still he did not fire. “Shoot ‘em!” Drazzok shouted and Thuggrim pulled the trigger. The line of bright red tracer fire showed clearly the path of the burst that sent an eldar jetbike spinning into the ground, while a second one of the lightweight vehicles became caught in the torrent of fire being put out by the other two ork vehicles and blew up in mid air. The continual gunfire from the ork vehicles stopped the eldar jetbikes from repeating their previous tactic of slicing up the exposed orks with the blades built into the vehicles. The only way to get close enough to attempt such a manoeuvre would have been to fly right down the path of the bullets and the dark eldar were not fool enough to try that. Instead they simply rushed past the ork vehicles on their first pass, studying the orks’ reactions and then looped around for a second run. From the vantage point on the raider Mayleth saw the remaining reavers fall upon the vehicles at the rear of the ork convoy as some of its occupants threw open it large rooftop hatch and began to fire at them. It did not look like it had been built by orks at all; instead it resembled a heavily decorated human vehicle. Clearly it was something else stolen by the orks. One of the reaver jetbikes mounted a heat lance in place of the splinter rifle typically carried and it was with this weapon that the ork vehicle was engaged. In a moment the air between the jetbike and the armoured vehicle distorted slightly, then turned red and finally a brilliant white as the energy beam heated it up. The bean struck the rear of the vehicle, just above were one of its motive tracks disappeared into the hull. There was a brief flash and the smoke that had been coming from the nearby exhaust pipe grew thicker and poured out from every available hole. Then the entire track flew off and the vehicle spun around before coming to a complete halt. Orks piled out of the burning rhino as fast as they could only the gunner remained, his position at the pintle mounted weapon keeping him safe from the thick black smoke that was filling the interior of the vehicle. The first ork to leave rushed away from the rhino as fast as he could, unsure if the vehicle was about to explode. But in doing so he ran into the path of the reavers and he was cut in two as one of the jetbikes ploughed into him. Other orks coughed and spluttered as they got out of the rhino, gasping for air. Cognailer on the other hand exited in an orderly manner, holding his bag close to his chest. He reached inside the bag and pulled a bulky pistol from inside. There was a slight hum as he flipped a toggle switch positioned beneath his thumb as he gripped the weapon and he pointed it towards the eldar. One of the reavers saw Cognailer standing motionless out in the open and she accelerated towards him, intending to run him down just as her comrade had done to the first ork to try and escape. Cognailer remained motionless and adjusted his aim. Then he spoke calmly. “Yes, now.” And a single shot rang out. The reaver’s head jerked backwards as the bullet passed between her eyes. Upon striking bone the soft tipped projectile broke up and from there it tore through her brain and blew out the back of her skull. Without a word Cognailer lowered his pistol as the rider less jetbike ploughed into the ground and skidded to a halt just in front of him. Hazug swung his truck around, forcing his passengers to grab hold of something or be thrown out. Immediately the baby began to wail. “Make it
quiet!” Ratish shouted, letting go of the truck’s frame and clamping his
hands over his ears. Mayleth saw the lead ork vehicle turn back as orks continued to pour from the stricken one. She noticed that the vehicle was decorate with a pattern similar to that which often adorned human vehicles in crude efforts to conceal their locations rather than the various shades of red that the other two were painted. “Magnifiers!”
Mayleth shouted and she looked around. “Take us down.” She said to the pilot s she returned the magnifiers to where she had got them, “The reavers have slowed down our target.” “Turn Gorrid! Turn!” one of Two Heads yelled, looking down into the battlewagon while the other one aimed the twin weapon mount he grasped. The eldar jetbikes were now scattered across the sky. By splitting up the individual vehicles were less vulnerable to ground fire than they were as a tight group. Now they made solo attack runs over the orks, strafing their vehicles and corralling them near to the burning rhino. Two Heads frowned as another sustained burst from his weapon went wide and the eldar jetbike zoomed away. Then he spotted something else. Like the jetbikes, it was clearly of eldar manufacture but this vehicle was far larger. “Oi Batrug!” he yelled, “Wot d’ya reckon to dat thing to our left?” Inside the battle wagon Batrug pushed his way to one of the slots in the side of the vehicle intended for the occupants not only to see out of, but also to shoot through. Pressing his face up against the slot and looked out. There he saw the sailed alien vehicle coming to a halt, floating above the ground. “Nowt good.” He called back, “Better blow da thing up quick!” “Kragglat!” Two Heads shouted, “Ya ‘eard da mekboy. Let rip!” Mayleth was the first of the wyches to leap down from the raider and land on the soft ground. From behind her the rest of her unit disembarked, some of them settling for just jumping off the raider’s open deck while other somersaulted past her. She saw the patterned ork vehicle coming to a halt near to the damaged one and without a word to her troops, Mayleth ran towards it. A booming sound from side caught Mayleth’s attention, but it did not distract her from her target. What did distract her was the massive explosion that followed and the shock wave that sent her tumbling across the ground. See looked back towards the raiders and saw scattered pieces of the vehicle burning. Both the pilot and gunner were clearly dead, their bodies either smashed or burnt in the explosion. “Get up.” She said to the wyches around her that had also been knocked down by the blast and she began to run towards Hazug’s truck once more. Thuggrim provided covering fire as the other greenskins jumped down form the truck. Only Sophie remained in the vehicle, still holding on to the crying baby. When the ammunition belt was exhausted, Thuggrim picked up his own rifle and followed the other orks. Hazug led them to were the occupants of the rhino had gathered. Now that they were clear of the smoke filled vehicle’s interior they were starting to take notice of their situation – out in the open and under attack. “Keep together lads!” Hazug bellowed and he waved for the orks to gather around him as another jetbike made a run at them. “Remember lads, great massive bursts. Make sure ya target is dead. Thuggrim, time for ya good eye I reckon.” Thuggrim nodded and reached for the tiny pouch around his neck. He opened it and tipped the contents into the palm of his hand. There was a stubby metallic cylinder that had a lens at one end and electrical contacts at the other. He lifted the patch from his eye and pushed the cylinder in, contact end first. There was a brief whining sound and the lens glowed a dull red. Then Thuggrim lifted his rifle to his shoulder and lined up the sights with his bionic eye. The reavers came again, two of them coming in low and fast. One of them was the one equipped with the heat lance that had brought the rhino to a halt. “Dat fancy one’s mine.” Thuggrim said, smiling as he took aim. The orks
opened fire, multiple burst of fire going towards the pair of rapidly
approaching eldar. Sparks flew as some of the shots found their marks, but
bounced harmlessly of the eldar vehicles. Then Thuggrim fired three shots in rapid succession and the heat lance-equipped jetbike first began to spew smoke, then wobbled and finally exploded. “Dat’s wot ya get!” Thuggrim bellowed, “Dat’s wot ya get fer messin’ with da big lads!” then he ducked as the second jetbike screamed overhead. Back in the truck Sophie saw the orks desperately trying to fend off the eldar. Though it was still crying, she crouched down and returned the baby to its basket. Then she reached for the laser weapon Hazug had loaded into the truck. Attached the rifle was a sling that held several power packs. Sophie removed one and slammed it into the weapon and released the safety catch. By no means was she an expert marksman, but Sophie knew how to use the weapon and knew that unlike a projectile rifle it did not need leading against a moving target. She lined up the rifle on one of the eldar jetbikes and squeezed the trigger. Seeing the flash of a directed energy weapon, Mayleth at first thought the orks had some other heavy support unit that she had previously been unaware of. But a glance to her side told her that it was in fact a human using one of that species’ own primitive long arms. “Keep after the orks!” she shouted and she changed direction, now heading for the human in the truck. Drazzok stepped to the front of the huddle of orks and held his staff out in front of him. “Kop dis!” he yelled and rather than using the staff to channel energy from his body safely into the ground he instead released it into the sir in front of him. Unfortunately, what had been supposed to be an arc of lightning that would fry the oncoming eldar it instead came out as a rapidly pulsating green light. “Wot’s dat?” an ork asked, “Its crap.” But viewed
from the other end of the weirdboy’s staff the light was blinding and as
one of the approaching reavers found himself unable to see as he jinked he
ploughed his vehicle into the ground. The rider was thrown forwards with
no means of controlling his path and landed just in front of the
orks. A flash of light signified Sophie’s entry into the fight, a burst from her rifle narrowly missing one of the remaining eldar. Hazug looked towards the truck where she was crouched. As de he did so he saw that beyond the truck more eldar were approaching on foot and that Sophie had not seen them. “Stay ‘ere and stick together!” he yelled and he barge out of the huddle and ran for the truck. Mayleth smiled when she saw Hazug emerge from the group of orks and head for the truck. This was just what she needed. “Keep after the main group of the beasts!” she ordered and then she too headed for the truck that lay between them. As she got closer she saw the human still crouched there that had fired on the reavers and heard the distinctive sound of a crying infant. Building up as much speed as she could, Mayleth leapt through the air and landed gracefully in the back of the truck. This was the first time that Sophie had seen an eldar up close, having stayed away from the bodies of the reavers that attacked them the previous day. The alien looked almost human, slender and graceful but with ears that came to a delicate point. Its build was too slim for an human that was healthy yet it seemed to be able to move with the speed of an athlete. The example now looming over Sophie was obviously female, at least it was if the eldar were as similar to humans as they seemed. Unlike the jet bike riders who wore all enclosing bodygloves this one was almost naked, Sophie would never dare go out wearing as little as this one did. Mayleth hissed at Sophie as she swung her rifle around to take aim at it. Then it lashed out with one of its long, slender legs and kicked the weapon from her grasp. Looking straight at Sophie, Mayleth spoke strange words in her own language moment later a voice came from a tiny device strapped around her neck in the human language, gothic. “Give up ape. I’ll make this quicker.” Suddenly Mayleth looked towards the baby in the basket and the smile she already wore spread further across her face and Sophie saw her urn her tongue across her lips. “No!” Sophie cried out and she dived for the basket, putting herself between it and the alien. Hissing again, Mayleth lunged towards Sophie and the baby but was stopped before she reached them. Hazug dropped both his pistol and the necron warscythe so they did not slow him down as he rushed towards the truck. The approaching eldar were moving quickly and he knew that Sophie would be incapable of fighting them without his help. Even as he watched one of the aliens broke off from the main group and headed directly for the truck. The eldar made it to the truck ahead of Hazug, leaping through the air and landing in the rear cargo area. He saw Sophie’s weapon knocked from her grasp and the alien warrior stand over her with a weapon of its own in each hand. Had it struck immediately Sophie would have died right there and then. But it delayed for just a moment and in that moment Hazug made a leap of his own. It was not enough to get him from the ground up into the truck, but it brought him high enough to grab hold of its side and reach out towards the alien. Oblivious to Hazug’s presence, the eldar made its move. But Hazug’s hand was clamped firmly around the long thin tail of braided hair that ran down past the alien’s waist and he gave it a sharp tug. Now Mayleth screamed. She had been too focused on her prey to notice the large ork clambering onto the truck. She turned into her fall, wanting to get a good look at her opponent and her eyes widened when she saw that it was the one in the camouflage clothing the mandrakes had told her about. Hazug dragged Mayleth close to her and holding her face to face with him he bellowed. “Stay away from ‘er ya runt!” and he slammed his forehead into hers. Momentarily disorientated by the powerful blow Mayleth rolled off the back of the truck, her weapons flying from her grasp. At the same time Hazug let go of Mayleth’s hair and climbed into the truck properly. “Is ya alright?” he asked Sophie, who just nodded in return, “Right den.” He added turning towards Mayleth, “Let’s finish dis.” And he leapt down from the truck. Mayleth rolled away, narrowly avoiding having Hazug land on her with both feet. She knew she was much faster than Hazug, but he was bigger, stronger and tougher. She could dodge most of his blows but he would only need to land one or two to end fight. In the mean time, without a weapon she could do little to him in one go. Then she spotted what was at his waist. Several of the pouches on Hazug’s belt had small holes in them, either from poor construction or wearing with age. It was typical for an ork. But what was significant was that through one of the holes she could make out the unmistakable appearance of an item of Commorragh technology. It was the portal. Mayleth now knew what she had to do. It did not matter how many of these orks lived or died, all that mattered was that she escape with the portal. Even her troops lives were meaningless the portal was everything. The Evil Suns’ attention was focused skywards on the jetbikes that continued to swoop in low. Clustered together the orks made a relatively easy target for shooting at and two of them had fallen to the ground, screaming and convulsing from the slightest wounds. Lacking a gun, Drazzok was not so focused on the attacking reavers, so when the orks fell he went to see what he could for them. He was not a painboy, but his long life of over thirty years had let him pick up some useful skills, especially when it came to poisons. Snake Bites like Drazzok were regarded as the most conservative of orks when it came to their traditions and Drazzok was an excellent example of this. He avoided technology and those who worked with it as much as possible. But he kept with the ancient ways of his clan, including the way in which they got their name to begin with. There were many breeds of snakes and other similar reptiles on worlds throughout the galaxy and though they were not a part of the self-sustaining ecosystem that the orks and similar species represented the Snake Bites sought some of them out. They took the venomous breeds of these animals and deliberately allowed themselves to be bitten, stung otherwise exposed to their toxins. Sometimes this was done to gain some vision or insight into the will of the ork gods Gork and Mork and sometimes it was just to prove which ork was the toughest. But sometimes accidents happened and even Snake Bites could be exposed to toxins they weren’t ready for. Because of this they knew what to do when it happened. Looking at the nearest of the orks to have fallen, Drazzok saw that he had been hit in the neck and he knew that the toxin had already likely reached his brain and heart. Knowing there was nothing to be done the weirdboy moved on to the next ork who had a hand clamped over a wound on his arm while he frothed at the mouth. “Give us ya choppa!” Drazzok snapped at the ork and after digging his staff into the ground beside him he plucked the ork’s axe from his belt. He grabbed hold of the injured limb and held it out, “Be done in a mo.” He said and he brought the axe down on the ork’s shoulder. There was a ‘crunch’ as the blade cut through flesh and bone and with a single mighty tug Drazzok ripped the ork’s arm from its socket. “Dare ya go lad.” Drazzok said, dropping both the axe and arm to the ground, “Ya’ll be fine now.” Then he pulled his staff from the ground and turned around. That was when he saw the wyches. “More pansies lads!” he bellowed and he pointed at them. Then he grinned. Unlike the savages currently zipping around above his head and not staying still long enough to get killed these eldar seemed to be civilised enough to come close enough to get what was coming to them. As they drew closer Drazzok sniffed the air and caught the unmistakable tang of poisons. Not enough to be lethal, just a trace carried by the wind from the blades that he could see glistening in the hands of the eldar. Drazzok looked over his shoulder into the centre of the group of orks where Ratish stood, still holding onto Cuddles’ leash. “Grot!” Drazzok yelled, “Release da squig!” Hazug swung
his fist at Mayleth, but she dodged away again. Mayleth uttered a few words in her own language that Hazug did not understand, but just a moment later he heard words in fluent orkish come from the tiny box on her neck. “Catch me if you can beast!” Then she lashed out towards Hazug’s belt, attempting to grab at the pouch containing the portal device. Hazug knocked her hand away. He did not know why she had struck in that way, but it was not the first time she had done it. Then he remembered what was in that pouch and he smiled. He knew what she was going to do. “Gotcha.” He muttered. “You will fail.” Mayleth’s device translated back to him and she dived towards him. Instead of dodging or trying to block Mayleth, Hazug opened his arms out wide and let her get in close. Mayleth was ecstatic as her fingernails cut through the material of Hazug’s belt pouch and the webway portal dropped into her waiting hand. It was only as Hazug’s arms closed in around her that she realised she had made a mistake. She should have tried to kill Hazug after all, then she could have taken the portal from his corpse. Now she was trapped. Hazug wrapped his arms tightly around Mayleth’s body, lifted her up off the ground and squeezed. Even as the breath was forced from Mayleth’s body she screamed. Dropping the portal to the ground she did her best to get free. Her arms were pinned by her sides but she still wriggled and kicked at Hazug. “Ignorant beast!” she yelled, “Release me and this is over!” “It aint never over!” Hazug shouted, “dare’s always more fightin’ to be done. May as well be with ya ‘ere and now.” And he squeezed harder. He felt Mayleth shift in his grip. Normally when grappling with an opponent he would make use of their clothing to get a good hold on them. But this alien wore very little, just enough to cover the parts of her body that Sophie became angry if Hazug ever saw them. But they would have to do, Hazug thought. Keeping his arms around her, he reached down to the tiny garment wrapped around Mayleth’s waist and between her legs and grabbed a firm hold of it. Then he pulled on it as hard as he could. Mayleth shrieked, throwing her head back as she opened her mouth wide as her own clothing dug into her. But she stopped struggling for just long enough. Hazug spun around and threw Mayleth at his truck, bashing her head against it. He did it once more and then let her motionless body drop to the ground. “If she starts to get back up,” he said to Sophie, “kill ‘er.” And having discarded his other weapons, he reached for the rifle that was still in the truck. While the battlewagon wove its way around the battlefield Two Heads fumbled with the replacement belts of ammunition for his weapon, doing his best to reload before the rapidly approaching jetbike flew past again. He snarled as a loud rattling from beside him told him that the second automatic weapon mount had just been fired right past him. A dull ‘crump’ was all that resulted when the hail of bullet tore through the jetbike’s engines and it broke up in mid air. Two heads didn’t even get to hear the panicked screams of the alien pilot as her vehicle was shot out from beneath her. “I got one boss! I got one of da pansies!” “Still more of ‘em lad” one of him snapped back while the other just muttered, “Bleedin’ show off. I’ll ‘ave ya scrubbin’ leaky bits for dat.” Then from the corner of an eye, one of him spotted a bright red shape leap out of the middle of the cluster of orks that had bailed out of the rhino and rush towards a new group of eldar running at them. “Gorrid! Stop!” Two Heads both bellowed, banging on the roof of the battlewagon and he slid down from the gunner’s position, “Take over!” he snapped at Mek Batrug and shoved him towards the weapon mount. Batrug
smiled and began to climb up to the weapon mount immediately. |
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