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Chapta 17 | |
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Da Raiders From Da Shadows Chapta 17 |
Mishura felt herself being pushed back into her seat as her razorwing shot from the massive entrance to the human fortress. Normally the acceleration would have been unnoticeable, but she had dialled down the power being used by the compensation systems. Though not critical, her fighter’s fuel levels were not very high. If the orks had any air support available she doubted that she could engage them for very long before she would have no choice but to either flee from battle or eject. She lifted the nose of the razorwing and watched the altimeter as she gained height. Though perfectly capable of engaging the orks from treetop height, Mishura had determined that the most efficient way would be to fly at high altitude until she sighted the ork force and dive down upon it. The warband
halted by the abandoned vehicles to plunder them. Mek Batrug, along with
several meks from the mining settlement inspected each one carefully
before ripping off any parts they found interesting. A few of the vehicles
were found to still be in working order, but the only way for them to be
recovered would mean sending them back to the settlement with some of the
orks from the warband. Hazug was relieved when not one ork volunteered for
this and the meks instead looted what they could from these vehicles also.
With no interest whatsoever in the vehicles Drazzok remained away from
them, further along the trail that Cuddles was still attempting to drag
Ratish along with Thuggrim standing loyally beside him. Then Drazzok heard something. It was faint but getting louder and Drazzok looked around for its source. All he saw were orks and gretchin gathered around the vehicles they were ripping apart. Then he looked up. “Ork force spotted.” Mishura signalled, “Stationary at location five five by three eight. I’m starting my run now.” “Pansy!” Drazzok bellowed. Though he hated vehicles of any kind, he knew enough to tell the difference between an ork and an alien built one and the aircraft now swooping down from the sky was most definitely not built by orks. Though her fuel levels were of concern, Mishura’s fighter still at least had its full load of weapons and Mishura smiled as she unleashed her entire load of missiles at the orks. “Rokkits!” Drazzok bellowed when he saw the weapons dropped from the eldar aircraft. “Scatter!” Hazug yelled without even bothering to look up. The orks ran in all directions and sought out what cover they could find. Launched from a relatively high altitude, by the time the missiles hit the ground and detonated they caught only a handful of greenskins in their blast instead of detonating in the midst of a tightly packed group. The eldar fighter roared overhead as it pulled out of its dive and the orks opened fire with everything they had. Belt fed weapons, rocket launchers, rifles and even pistols were pointed skywards in defiance. With so many weapons being fired at the razorwing, it was inevitable that at least some of them would strike it and as Mishura began to climb once more the cockpit was filled with the sound of alarms. Frantically Mishura checked all of her flight instruments to assess exactly how much damage had been caused. It was only when she saw that her aircraft was still airworthy that she realised that she had been holding her breath and she exhaled. Then she banked and began to set up for another run. Sophie lay on the ground, clutching the screaming baby in her arms. All around now orks ran about firing their weapons into the air as the eldar aircraft closed in again. She glanced over her should and saw Drazzok sat on the ground. The weirdboy was clutching at his staff tightly, but even so Sophie could see his eyes glimmering from the amount of power the orks were generating and channelling into him. “Wait here.” She said to the baby as she lay it back in its basket, “I’ll be right back.” And she ran towards Drazzok. She grasped his staff and tugged at it, but the weirdboy’s grip held firm. “Thuggrim help me!” she called out and Thuggrim looked down at her with a puzzled look on his face, “Hazug!” Sophie shouted, “Hazug where are you?” Hazug appeared, fumbling with his rifle and trying to remove an empty magazine that was jammed in the weapon. “Wot?” he demanded. “I need help with Drazzok’s staff.” Sophie said and Hazug looked at the weirdboy for himself. Rushing over he dropped his rifle and shoved Sophie aside. He took a firm grip on Drazzok’s staff with both hands and then delivered a sharp kick to the weirdboy’s chest that sent him sprawling backwards. “Wotcha reckon ya doin’?” Thuggrim yelled, lifting his own rifle towards the ork that had just struck Drazzok. “Get down!” Hazug shouted back and he dived on top of Thuggrim just as Drazzok opened his mouth wide and let out a scream. Mishura’s eyes opened wide in terror as the sky ahead was filled with green lightening from the ground. As the razorwing flew through the green bolts of energy they wrapped themselves around her aircraft, crackling with power. Again the cockpit was filled with alarms, but this time they were accompanied by the smell of burning as the psychic discharge overloaded every system it came into contact with. Realising that her aircraft was doomed Mishura reached for the ejection handle and pulled it. A moment later her canopy was blown clear and charges beneath her seat fired her out of the cockpit. Right into the path of one of the energy bolts. When Mishura’s flight chair dropped clear and her parachute deployed, her charred corpse hung limply beneath it. Lord Shraycht watched with dismay as the razorwing fighter plummeted from the sky. He had hoped that it would have taken a far greater toll on the ork warband than it had managed. From his vantage point in his personal raider transport he could see that only a dozen or so of the green skinned brutes had been killed. Around him the remnants of his force waited for the order to dive down and attack. Apart from his own raider there were eight other identical vehicles all filled with troops. Mainly the kabalite warriors that made up the bulk of any dark eldar fighting force but there were also two units of trueborn warriors, including the unit that had belonged to the late Dracon Hynor and a squad of heavily armoured incubi warriors. Finally, supporting firepower was provided by another vehicle similar in appearance to the raiders. A ravager used the same chassis, but with additional weaponry mounted in place of carrying passengers. He should have had far more troops at his disposal, he thought. But the majority of his force was beyond reach within the webway, unable to come here without either the destroyed gateway or the stolen portal. What concerned the archon was that the orks had just displayed the ability to shoot a fast moving fighter out of the air. The slower moving ravager and raiders would be even more vulnerable as they approached the horde. Lord Shraycht needed more information about his enemies. “Scourges.” He said. Five of the winged dark eldar currently gripped onto his raider, using it as a perch until they were ordered to attack, “Find that weapon and destroy it.” Without a word all five scourges let go of the raider at the same time and let themselves fall through the air. As they neared the ground they extended their wings and flew towards the orks. Drazzok was gasping for breath. The amount of power that had flooded through him in such and uncontrolled way had worn the weridboy out. “I ‘ates pansies.” He said. A sudden burst of gunfire caused Hazug and those near him to turn around. One of the orks on the outer edge of the warband was firing his belt fed weapon continuously into the distance. “Wot’s ‘e
doin’?” Drazzok said. Hazug reached for the tau viewing device, intending
to determine what the ork was shooting at. In the meantime Thuggrim used
his bionic eye to do the same. “Course not ya grot brain!” Drazzok snapped, “If pansies ‘ad wings dey wouldn’t need all dem flyin’ wagons would dey?” “Of course not. So wot is dey den?” and he pointed in the direction the other ork was shooting. “’E’s right.” Hazug said suddenly, “Eldar with wings.” “How is that possible?” Sophie asked as she caught sight of the approaching scourges, “You can’t just stick wings on someone and make them fly.” “Da git is right.” Drazzok said, “Even da bestest mad dok couldn’t do dat.” The gunfire stopped as the nob nearest to the ork with the automatic weapon pulled it from his grasp and began to beat him for wasting ammunition. “’Ang on!” Hazug yelled at him, “Look!” and he waved towards the approaching scourges. The scourges had easily avoided the initial gunfire aimed in their direction. Only a single ork had spotted them and his aim at this distance was far too poor to be effective. But after a brief pause in the shooting it seemed that the entire ork horde opened fire together. One of the scourges was cut to pieces almost immediately, without even having the chance to cry out her wings were ripped from her body and she dropped to the ground and lay still. The leader of the scourges let out a defiant screech and drew his sword. Then he dove down onto the orks below, aiming for the small group stood away from the main body of orks from where the attack that had brought down the razorwing had originated. Thuggrim swung
his rifle around like a club as the scourges fluttered about over
head. Sophie screamed and ducked down, clutching the baby close while Hazug began to shoot into the air. Though he tried to take aim at the eldar, he may as well have been firing randomly for all the good it did when they could just use their wings to dodge aside. A sudden cry of “Waaargh!” drowned out everything else as the rest of the warband came charging towards the scourges. The gunfire from the orks ceased as they decided that now was the time to get up close and engage the enemy in the hand-to-hand combat they favoured. This caused the amount of power flowing through Drazzok to increase massively and the weirdboy’s eyes snapped open wide and glowed green with psychic fire. “Waaargh!” he bellowed and the orks around him were infused with the energy that he released. Being close by Hazug caught the full force of this and he dropped his rifle and leapt upwards, plucking the leader of the scourges out of the sky. The eldar swung its weapon towards him, but Hazug simply reached out and took hold of his sword arm at the wrist, stopping the attack in its tracks. Hazug squeezed and the scourge screamed as it delicate hollow bones were crushed. Hazug head butted the eldar repeatedly and the alien’s head jerked backwards under each blow. There was a ‘crunch’ as the scourge’s skull gave way and Hazug threw his body over the heads of the orks. When it landed the nearby orks fell upon it and began to tear it apart. A third scourge was pulled from the air, Two Heads Evil Suns stomped on it and hacked at it with their axes until it was nothing but a bloody mess on the ground. To a cheer from his troops, Two Heads pulled the barely recognisable head from the body and held it aloft. The final two scourges had seen enough. Down to fewer than half their original number they opted to withdraw. In any case they had been successful in their task, they had identified Drazzok as the source of the powerful energy blast that had brought down their fighter. Wing several powerful flaps of their wings the scourges retreated upwards and orks tried in vain to jump up after them before they flew out of reach. “Dey is
getting’ away!” Gorgoga shouted as he waved his powerclaw at the scourges
in defiance, “Stop ‘em!” One ork that had refrained from shooting even though he still had hold of his rifle was Thuggrim. The mad nob lined up his rifle using his bionic eye and followed the eldar as they flew further away. As the focusing of his eye shifted for greater range he saw where the scourges were headed as the force of raiders came into his view. “Dey got wagons.” He snorted, “Flyin’ wagons.” Hazug looked for himself, using the tau device. As he watched the two scourges flew right up to one of the eldar vehicles and grabbed hold of it. Though he could hear nothing of what was going on, Hazug guessed that they were reporting events on the ground to the vehicle’s occupants. A figure on the vehicle then caught his attention. A snakelike being with fours arms it was obviously no eldar, no amount of surgical modification could turn an eldar into something like that. Remembering the alien ur-ghul, Hazug realised that he was looking at the eldar commander’s vehicle; the alien was another of his personal retinue. “Dey is reportin’ to dare warboss.” Hazug said, “Thuggrim, kill ‘em.” Thuggrim’s trigger finger twitched and there was a sharp ‘crack’ as his rifle discharged. Without waiting to see where the shot struck he adjusted his aim slightly and fired again. Then he lowered his weapon and smiled. |
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Copyright Notice 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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