Legends of the dark ange.., p.57
Legends Of The Dark Angels, page 57
Tauno switched his view and laid his lasgun on the top of the barricade. The light of two moons broke through open patches in the cloud and a little way down the ridge he saw hunched bodies picking their way through the rocks. He sighted on one of the dark shapes and pulled the trigger. He saw the bolt of laser energy flash down the slope and hit, but the ork did not fall.
The sparkle of muzzle flare split the night. An instant later, bullets were rattling against the crate wall. Tauno flinched, ducking back into cover. He felt a hand grab the scruff of his jerkin. Sergeant Kaize hauled him back to the firing position.
‘Hiding ain’t going to make them go away, is it?’ said the sergeant. ‘You want to stay safe? Shoot the bastards!’
All along the line squads were firing. A couple of brave souls ventured down the ridge line and hurled illumination flares. The patches of guttering red light revealed even more orks; the two troopers who had made the foray were cut down in a hail of fire as they sprinted back towards the defences.
‘Come on, come on,’ Tauno whispered to himself. The orks were using the undulating ground to work around to the squad’s right.
‘Sergeant, they’re getting too close,’ said Kauninnen. ‘We should pull back.’
‘No chance, trooper,’ replied Kaize. ‘Vinnaman! Get that flamer over to the right. Torch that stand of bushes. Give covering fire!’
Trooper Vinnaman was propelled out of the emplacement by Kaize’s shove. Tauno added his las-fire to the rest of the squad’s, firing past the slowly advancing flamer-man. When he was just about in range, Vinnaman opened fire, emptying the tank of his weapon. The dried branches of the bushes erupted as yellow fire bathed the slope. Orks thrashed in the inferno; some fell, many retreated, patting frantically at burning clothes and patches of lighted fuel sticking to their bodies.
The burning bushes gave the squad more light to see by and Tauno was able to pick his targets more clearly. He shot an ork in the arm as it lumbered from behind one boulder to the next. The hit caused it to drop its pistol. Stumbling back into the open to retrieve the weapon, the alien was met by another blast from Tauno’s lasgun. The shot hit the ork square in the chest. Glaring back at the troopers, the ork snatched up its pistol and fired back, oblivious to the smoking hole in its padded armour.
Tauno gritted his teeth as more bullets whirred past, missed his next shot, but scored another hit with the following one. Finally the ork went down, its leg wounded. Tauno shook his head in disbelief as he saw the ork dragging itself away through the long grass. He fired twice more, a growl in his throat, until the ork stopped moving.
Lausso shouted in pain and stumbled back from the barricade, blood streaming from his left shoulder. Tauno turned to help him but was pushed back to the wall by Kaize.
‘Keep shooting, I’ll sort him out,’ said the sergeant.
The next few minutes blurred into a harrowing experience of feral faces lit by las-bolts and dancing flames, the crack and whistle of bullets flying around answered by the zip of the lasguns. At one point the orks came close enough to throw stick grenades into the emplacement to the squad’s right. Tauno watched in horror as troopers were flung across the barricade by the detonations.
‘Direct your fire to the south!’
Lieutenant Laursor strode along behind the defence line, waving his chainsword at the orks, his command squad tailing him. The bark of autocannons added to the cacophony and tracer shells tore through the blackness from higher up the slope.
‘Look at that!’ said Kauninnen.
The trooper pointed north. The Dark Angels Assault squad that had been left to guard the ridge leapt forwards, jump pack jets burning with bright blue flame. Plasma flickered from a couple of pistols as they descended on a group of orks a few dozen metres from the line. Tauno watched the ensuing fight as he ejected the spent power pack from his lasgun and fumbled home a fresh charge.
The trooper winced as he saw pistols blazing, blades and chainblades swinging. It looked a complete mess, but the Assault Marines carved into the larger body of orks with purpose, seeking out their towering leader. The mob of greenskins swirled around them, hacking and firing.
‘Don’t worry about them, lad.’ Tauno looked over his shoulder and found Staff Sergeant Maikon crouched in the emplacement. The command squad veteran pointed south. ‘Worry about them.’
Following up their grenade attack, the orks had swarmed from cover and were trying to get into the emplacement. The few survivors of the squad within desperately swung their lasguns like clubs, battering at the orks as they clambered over the barricade. Two of them fell to the surging greenskins; the other two turned and ran, dropping their lasguns in their haste to get away.
No sooner had the orks poured over the wall of boxes and dirt-filled sacks, then they were engulfed in a wall of fire from both sides. Tauno added his own shots to the volleys; cramped by the emplacement’s walls, the orks were a hard target to miss, even if only a few of Tauno’s shots did any serious damage.
Tauno ducked involuntarily as a missile streaked over his head. It exploded in the heart of the onrushing orks, scything down half a dozen with shrapnel. Heavy bolt-rounds whickered through the air a few metres from the Piscinans, cutting down the surviving greenskins. Another missile streaked along the ridge from the Space Marine Devastators, passing almost within reach of Tauno before it detonated twenty metres further on, blowing apart even more orks.
‘Emperor’s fury, I thought they were going to hit us,’ gasped Kaize, slumping back against the barricade, eyes fearful.
‘Show a little faith, sergeant,’ said Maikon. The staff sergeant stood up and looked south. ‘Looks like that attack has been dealt with.’
Tauno scanned the ridgeside to the right. There were a few orks still alive, skulking back down the slope, some limping along. He fired a few more shots at them to hurry the orks on their way.
‘And don’t come back!’ Lisskarin shouted after the retreating greenskins. ‘We got more where that came from!’
Tauno laughed with relief. His first proper battle with orks, and he had survived. His mood swiftly changed, though.
‘Sergeant Maikon, redress the squads,’ said Lieutenant Laursor. ‘Astartes report more infantry coming, this time with vehicle support. Rasmussen! Run with these coordinates to the mortar crews and tell them to lay on a heavy bomb.’
The lieutenant showed none of his earlier indifference. His eyes gleamed in the glow of the fires. Tauno thought Laursor looked like he was enjoying himself; truly officers were a different species.
It wasn’t long before the troopers could hear the deep growl of ork engines. The smoke from the guttering fires was tainted with the oily stench of exhaust fumes. Motors revved in the darkness, a mechanical war-cry every bit as unnerving as the howls of the orks that had come before.
Tauno looked at his lasgun and pictured the little damage it had done to the orks. Against anything tougher, it was useless.
‘Sergeant, should we move a bit closer to the heavy weapons squads?’ he suggested. ‘You know, to give them some protection.’
‘Nice try, Tavallinen,’ laughed Kaize. ‘We’re staying right here. My advice is to shoot at the green bits.’
There was a ripple of flashes several hundred metres down the ridge. Half a second later, Tauno heard the deep retorts of big guns. Above, shells whined as they plunged downwards.
‘Incoming!’ Tauno bellowed, hurling himself to the base of the barricade.
The troopers hit the ground a moment after, as the two shells exploded some way behind the defensive line. From his prone position, Tauno found himself looking into the dead eyes of Lausso. The shadows from the dying light of the fire made the trooper’s face appear to move, grimacing at his fate. Tauno shuddered and looked away.
‘Get up,’ said Sergeant Kaize, kicking the men back to their feet.
As he set his lasgun back on the barricade, Tauno saw more flashes of field guns in the distance, perhaps a kilometre northwards up the line. The orks weren’t holding back, that was for sure.
This time the shells fell around the Devastators. The Space Marines ignored the dirt and flame exploding around them and continued to fire, picking out targets only they could see.
‘Look lively!’ The call came from Staff Sergeant Maikon. ‘Maintain fire discipline. Hold the line.’
Maikon gestured for Kaize to join him. Tauno kept one eye down the ridge as he listened in on what was said.
‘The lieutenant’s just received word from Colonel Grautz,’ Maikon said. ‘The orks are trying to push out of Kadillus Harbour to link up. Although the whole line has been attacked, it looks like the greatest numbers are here. The colonel thinks the orks are making a bid for the relay station. Grautz is sending an armoured column, it’ll be here just after dawn. We have to hold, no matter the cost.’
‘Why don’t we fall back and protect the relay station?’ asked Kaize.
‘Better defensive position here, Saul,’ said Maikon. ‘We fight and die on Koth Ridge.’
Kaize nodded and rejoined the squad as Maikon walked on to talk to the other sergeants.
‘Looks like the worst of it will be coming our way,’ he told them. ‘This is it, boys. This is where you get to defend your homes.’
Tauno remembered what the colonel had told Laursor: if the orks linked up, the Space Marines would bombard Kadillus rather than let it fall into enemy hands. He looked at the Space Marines along the ridge – now firing their bolters as well as their heavy weapons – and wondered if they would be withdrawn before that happened.
He dismissed the question. If what Sergeant Ophrael had said was true, the orks would only break through when the last Space Marine on the ridge was dead. It gave cold comfort to Tauno; he realised that he was far more likely to die before the last of the Astartes.
‘Pay attention,’ snarled Kaize, cuffing Tauno round the back of his head. ‘Targets to the front!’
Snapping back to the immediate threat to his continued survival, Tauno sighted down his lasgun. The roar of engines was everywhere, to the left and right. He saw orks on massive bikes hurtling up the ridge straight at him. He fired vainly along with the others, most of their las-bolts missing the fast-moving bikers or harmlessly striking the heavy machines. A few lucky shots hit one rider, sending him crashing from his ride, the half-tracked bike careening on for a few metres before toppling into a crack in the volcanic rock.
Slightly ahead of them, the Assault Marines were bounding back up the ridge. The bikers opened fire, unleashing a storm of bullets, tracer rounds and shells from their mishmash of cannons and guns. Tauno had difficulty seeing what happened; he saw one of the Space Marines land badly, his leg wounded mid-jump. The Astartes toppled to one side, overbalanced by his jump pack. More rounds crashed into the squad as the Space Marines formed up around their fallen battle-brother.
Tauno opened fire at the bikes closing in on the Assault Marines, his finger tapping the trigger over and over, sending a hail of las-bolts into the orks. The flashes of energy zipping down the hillside lit the entire ridge, searing blurred lines across Tauno’s vision.
Mortar bombs erupted, lascannon blasts burned through the dark to ignite fuel tanks, autocannon shells screamed and heavy bolters thundered. Tauno could barely hear the words of those around him as they shouted in fright or hurled abuse at the onrushing greenskins. He realised he was shouting too, a meaningless torrent of insults and curses.
Two remaining bikers slammed their machines directly into the Assault Marines; the orks’ guns were still blazing as they hacked wildly with fearsome blades. One Space Marine was hurled from his feet by the impact, but the bike fared little better, flipping and tumbling across the rock from the crash. The Space Marine slowly rose to his feet; the ork biker did not.
For all the fury of the troopers’ fire, the orks were still advancing, no more than a hundred metres away. More shells exploded around the Piscinans and bullets thudded into the barricades. Ork walkers – four-armed Dreadnoughts that made even the largest greenskins look small – stomped alongside the infantry, hurling rockets and flares of explosive energy.
A Space Marine land speeder darted out of the night, skimming just above the ground. The rip of its assault cannon cut through the other noises of war, the speeder illuminated by several seconds of fire. A swathe of orks fell to the attack run, gunned down by hundreds of rounds. The gunner strafed left and right with his heavy bolter, firing short bursts, every salvo ripping apart an ork warrior.
It was a chaos of flashing light and deafening sound. Tauno tried to block it all out. He exchanged his charge pack again and kept firing, pouring shot after shot into the greenskins. Maybe one in three found his intended target; of those, few stopped the ork they hit.
Slowed by the biker attack, the Assault Marines were in danger of being swamped by the tide of green aliens pouring up the ridge. Tauno did what little he could: firing endlessly into the mass of orks closing with the Space Marines.
‘By the Holy Throne!’ Kauninnen gasped next to Tauno.
The other trooper was looking further north. Tauno dragged his eyes away from the enemy to see what had prompted such a reaction.
A lone figure clad in power armour and blue robes strode purposefully towards the orks. In one hand he fired a bolt pistol with metronomic repetition; in the other he carried an ornately carved staff tipped with a winged skull decoration. A nimbus of power surrounded the Space Marine, a swirling aura of black and red.
White spears of energy danced from the staff as the Librarian pointed it at an ork buggy racing in his direction. Lightning leapt, arcing across the gap to engulf the vehicle, crawling over the machine and its crew. Something caught fire and a moment later the buggy was a ball of flame rolling back down the ridge. The Librarian advanced further, bolts of energy shrieking from his staff, scouring the orks from moss-covered ruins.
Tauno had little time to wonder at the terrifying powers he was witnessing. The orks had reached the Devastators and a vicious melee was unfolding. With his power fist glowing, Sergeant Ophrael was leading the defence, smashing down any greenskin that tried to clamber over the barricade; others in the squad gunned down the orks with their bolters and slashed at them with combat knives.
For all that the ork dead were piling up by the Dark Angels’ barricade, there were too many to be held back. One or two greenskins managed to get inside the emplacement while others were swamping the Space Marines to either side.
The sight of the beset Space Marines filled Tauno with panic. If the Astartes fell, what chance did the rest of them have? He glanced around. There was a lull in the fighting close at hand – the heavy weapons not far behind him had taken a heavy toll and the orks were funnelling northwards, away from their deadly fire.
If ever there was a time to get out alive, this was it.
A tap on Tauno’s shoulder attracted his attention: it was Daurin. He flicked a glance behind Tauno. The trooper turned and saw Sergeant Kaize face-down sprawled in the dirt, half his head missing.
‘Come on, we’ve done the best we can,’ said Daurin.
Tauno quickly looked around: Lieutenant Laursor was back in his command tent, talking on the vox-caster. There was no sign of Maikon. The defence trooper took in the other squads around him, many of them numbering only a handful of survivors. He looked back at the Devastators, punching and hacking at the middle of a growing number of orks. When they fell, the greenskins would be able to sweep along the line and break out westwards; any line of retreat would be cut off.
He saw Sergeant Ophrael punching his power fist through the skull of an ork. Desperation filled Tauno. He wanted to run so badly, to get back to Kadillus Harbour and see his father again. He had been an idiot to join up.
But he had joined up. He had sworn oaths on big books full of words he did not understand, but that promise he understood well enough. It was a promise to keep his father and grandfather safe. A promise just the same as the Space Marines had made: to lay down his life in defence of the Imperium.
‘We have to do our duty,’ he said, his voice flat, as if spoken by someone else.
‘What?’ said Daurin. ‘Are you touched?’
Something inside Tauno snapped.
‘The Emperor is watching us!’ he screamed. ‘He is judging us right now!’
Tauno snatched the bayonet from his belt and broke into a run, vaulting over the barricade. His fingers fumbled with the blade as he sprinted, but he slotted the bayonet onto its lug at the fourth attempt.
He heard panting and realised it was him. But there was someone else with him. He glanced over his shoulder and saw Laisko and Kauninnen. A few metres behind them, the others followed, Daurin included.
‘No running away this time, eh?’ gasped Laisko.
Tauno gritted his teeth and pumped his arms and legs, charging headlong at the orks fighting the Space Marines. He focussed his attention on the aliens, picturing what would happen to his family in Kadillus Harbour if the orks won this battle.
‘For Kadillus! For Piscina!’ The words bellowed from his mouth unbidden, but his next shout he knew was his, boiling up from the guilt and the horror and the fear that swirled in the pit of his stomach. It was the only thing he could say that made any sense of what he was doing. ‘For the Emperor!’
Some of the orks turned to face the onrushing troopers, startled by the sudden attack. Terror gripped Tauno as he looked at their horrid fanged faces, corded muscles and beady, fury-filled red eyes. Some of them looked like they were laughing. Tauno’s dread fuelled his rage further and he sprinted harder, screeching a wordless cry.
He speared his bayonet into the chest of the closest ork, his momentum sending the creature crashing backwards. Ripping out the blade, he plunged it again, and again, and again, screaming all the while. Something smashed into the back of his head and he slashed out wildly, the tip of his bayonet cutting across an ork’s face.
