Straken

by Toby Frost

  The upper armour of a hundred tanks stretched away like roofs in a hab-zone, a field of turrets and riveted armour. Straken felt as though he were standing on the roof of a spacecraft. Beyond the tanks there was a yard, dotted with metal huts. And beyond the yard, like a steel mountain, the gargant began.

  As Straken watched, orks began to climb onto the vehicles. They scrambled over the tank hulls as if they were on an assault course, their massive bodies ill-suited to the work. The greenskins ran past the first few vehicles, but then started to work the turret hatches. Two slipped out of sight behind a Medusa siege mortar – onto the firing platform.

  In two seconds Straken had turned and jumped down. ‘Mayne, get over here!’ he called. The vox-trooper stopped beside him, taking as much cover as he could from a tank sponson. Mayne’s face glistened with sweat. Up ahead, gunfire erupted and a man cried out.

  ‘All Sentinels move up to waypoint three,’ Straken barked into the comm-link. ‘Repeat, get up here right now. We’ve got orks climbing over the tanks, trying to start them up. Shoot them off. Move it!’ he added, and he tossed the handset back to Mayne. The sound of engines was rising; engine smoke spluttered into the air. Straken advanced, the young vox-trooper beside him.

  A heap of metal sheeting blocked the way ahead. Straken turned right, slipping between the prow of one tank and the rear of another. The barrel of a battle cannon threw a wide shadow over them as they passed underneath.

  ‘They can’t move the tanks,’ Mayne said. ‘Can they?’

  ‘Not most of them. But they can still fire the guns.’

  ‘Emperor! I didn’t–’

  ‘Just keep moving. I– Look out!’

  Two snarling balls of red flesh rushed into view. Straken glimpsed tiny eyes, legs running flat out and huge, snarling mouths. They looked like severed, bestial heads. Straken swung his shotgun up and fired one-handed. The nearest squig burst like a rotten fruit, showering the walls with purple gore, and the second one jumped at Straken’s face.

  He threw his arm up just in time, but the sheer force of the assault knocked him stumbling. He tried to draw his knife before the huge jaws snapped his metal arm. Mayne stepped in, pushed his lasgun against the beast’s head and emptied a burst of fire into its earhole. The squig screeched and rolled away, its legs drumming against the side of a Chimera.

  Straken gave him a nod of thanks. He quickly reloaded his shotgun; Mayne covered him. More troopers advanced around them. The warren of vehicles rattled with gunfire. Somewhere to the right, an ork howled with either pain or rage.

  A shadow passed over them. Straken glanced up and saw a rickety copter. Below it hung a net, crammed with scrap. Las-shots clattered against its hull, and suddenly it released its cargo. The tanks blocked Straken’s view, but he heard girders rain down onto the Catachans. Seconds later, the copter pitched to the north, its engine belching smoke, and crashed whirling into the cavern wall.

  He ran forwards. Around the corner, a bare-chested corporal had clamped his arm around an ork’s throat. The man was almost as big as the alien, his torso a patchwork of old scars. They stumbled around, locked together like drunken dancers. Straken stepped forward, but the corporal twisted around and caught his eye. ‘I’ve got him,’ the corporal grunted, and he roared and hurled the ork head-first into a row of tank tracks. It flopped down unconscious.

  Straken laughed. ‘Yeah, you have,’ he said. He nodded at the ork. ‘Best make sure.’

  The corporal crouched down and drew his knife. Straken stepped past him and looked around the edge of the nearest tank.

  An ork lurched out and let rip with some kind of energy gun. Straken darted back, hearing plasma hiss against metal. Light flared overhead, and las-fire raked the turrets and hulls above him. He dropped down, rolled on his metal shoulder and came up firing. The ork fell back in a flurry of sparks. Its weird cannon had absorbed much of the shot, but the brute was still peppered with wounds. It tossed the gun aside, more enraged than hurt, reached down and pulled a spanner the length of a man’s femur from its belt.

  Fury made the ork clumsy. It took a massive swing at the colonel, but he darted aside, leaped in and barged it with his shoulder. The ork stumbled – it reeked of sewage and engine grease – and Straken grabbed its ear with his flesh hand and punched its skull in with his metal fist.

  Around him, the orks were dying. His men were doing what they did best, and already cheers and shouts mingled with the sounds of battle. Straken let the ork mech drop, satisfied that it was dead. For half a second he wondered what the hell all the wires wrapped around its arms and waist actually did, and then he felt disgust well up. Time to kill more orks and rescue whoever they could.

  Mayne said, ‘Colonel Lavant on the vox, sir. He’s moving up parallel through the tanks. Says it’s clear.’

  ‘Good. Tell him to keep moving and get those demo charges ready. Damn it, where the hell is everyone?’ Straken looked over his shoulder and yelled, ‘This is the colonel – do I have to do everything by myself? Move it up, Guardsmen!’

  Ten metres on, the tanks ended. Suddenly they were in a huge open space, strewn with machinery and workshops. Everything was dwarfed by the gargant. Its metal body was covered in gantries and scaffolding, like paths up a mountain. Straken paused, listening. Under the racket of gunfire and voices, he heard a rumble so low that it was almost a sensation.

  Men stood at the edge of the tanks, securing the area. Among them, Lavant was barking out orders, pointing to the vehicles. ‘I want these things checked, you hear? There may be orks hiding inside.’ He saluted Straken. ‘I’m having them search the tanks, sir. You can’t be too careful.’

  ‘Get your team ready,’ Straken replied. ‘We’re going to blow the gargant. I want snipers and weapons teams up on the tanks, covering us. Mayne, vox Tanner and find out what the hell he’s up to. Damn,’ he added, looking over the yard, ‘I thought there’d be more orks than this.’

  At the edge of the group, a dark-haired trooper looked at Straken for a moment, and then glanced away as if he saw nothing of interest there. It was Marbo. Ork blood was drying on his forehead and cheek.

  ‘They’ve got slaves down there,’ Lavant said, looking at the sheds. ‘Best get ’em out before we blast the gargant. If we climb up on the left, plant charges on… Wait. Wait a moment. There’s smoke coming out of its head.’

  As Straken boosted his vision, the gargant’s eyes boomed into life. Two broad beams of light burst forth, throwing huge blurred shadows of the gargant’s ork crew onto the cavern wall.

  At Straken’s side, Mayne whispered, ‘Look!’

  Slowly, as though it were rising from the grave, the gargant began to move. Armour plates rumbled as huge engines fired up beneath them. Greasy black smoke rose from chimneys. Lights flared up in clumps over its massive torso. In the eyes, fire arose, and the ork crew were silhouettes against it.

  For a moment, nobody moved.

  ‘What do we do now?’ Lavant said. ‘What now?’

  ‘Mayne,’ Straken said, ‘Vox Tanner and the commissar. Tell them both that there is to be no retreat. We can’t let the orks get it out of here. Tell them to get all the heavy weapons trained on the gargant. If they’ve got people who can work tanks, they’re to bring them up right away.’

  Mayne ducked down and spoke quickly into the comm-link.

  ‘Lavant?’ Straken said.

  Blinking as if jolted awake, Lavant looked at him. ‘Yes?’

  ‘See those gantries? Let’s get up there and plant the charges.’

  For a moment, Straken thought the captain was going to refuse. Then Lavant saluted. ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘We’re going to have to work fast,’ Straken said.

  ‘Right.’

  Straken yelled, ‘Let’s get that thing! I want charges placed on the main joints before the orks can get it walking. Catachans – follow me!’

  Straken and Lavant tore forwards. As they ran a great drawbridge in the gargant’s belly fell open.
A gun barrel appeared in the aperture; behind it, massive cogs turned. The barrel was like the entrance to a tunnel.

  The gun boomed so loudly that rocks fell from the cavern roof. A nine-metre shell sailed up, turned almost lazily and slammed into the rows of tanks.

  The explosion sent tanks flipping over like tossed pennies. Men were liquidised by the force of the blast, hurled into the air or crushed between rows of sliding vehicles. A stack of cannon shells exploded, and forty tonnes of Leman Russ rolled onto the rear of the demolitions team.

  Mayne was blown to pieces as he worked the comm. Sergeant Dhoi turned to run, and the walls closed in on him, killing him like a fly between two clapping hands.

  Morrell saw the tanks fly upwards as though punched from beneath by a giant fist. A moan of dismay rose from the citizens behind him. He would have known that noise anywhere: the sound of cowardice.

  Their faces were twisted with fear and astonishment. Suddenly the proud guildsmen of Dulma’lin thought twice about staying put.

  Morrell drew his bolt pistol and fired into the air. Men and women cringed. ‘Hold position, damn you,’ he roared. ‘The first man to break ranks will get a bolt in the back!’

  The explosion hit as Tanner was ordering his men forward to support Straken’s attack. ‘Wait!’ he cried. ‘Hold it!’

  The gargant glared out at them like an evil god. Tanner could just see figures on its front, in the square hole from which the great gun protruded. ‘Snipers,’ he shouted to the vox-officer. ‘I want those ork crew shot. Give me that,’ he added, snatching the vox. ‘Morrell? Are you there?’

  ‘I’m here,’ the commissar replied. ‘We’re holding position.’

  Tanner had more urgent things to think about than his loathing for the man. ‘Morrell, get all the heavy weapons you’ve got firing at that thing. Mortars won’t crack the armour – use the lascannons. Aim for the belly gun and the head, you hear me?’

  ‘I hear you. It’ll be done.’ Like a preacher, the commissar called, ‘The works of the xenos are false! He who labours without the Emperor labours in vain!’

  Straken heard the explosion and knew that there was no option to fall back. ‘Come on,’ he roared. ‘With me, Catachans!’ He rushed on, towards the gargant.

  Lights flickered on its shoulder. A turret began to swivel. It was a matter of minutes before the whole machine, unfinished as it was, could be activated. Straken didn’t know what it could achieve once it was fully operational, but one step of those massive feet could crush his entire team.

  ‘With me,’ he cried again, and he ran at the bottom of the scaffolding.

  Lasgun fire crackled against the gargant’s hull. An ork yelped and fell out of the belly gun. The snipers had got to work.

  Straken reached the bottom of the scaffolding, slung his gun over his shoulder and scrambled up. The pistons whined in his steel arm as he climbed, hand over hand. Above him, a gretchin stuck its head out of a gun turret, pointed and screeched. The turret swung to cover him, but the angle was too narrow. A siren whined into life.

  Straken clambered hand over hand, his metal arm hauling him up. He scrambled up one ladder, ran across a gantry and hurried up the next, the gargant’s engines rumbling around him. At last, he reached the top of the scaffolding and pulled himself onto a walkway. A network of boards and ropes ran up the side of the gargant to its unfinished arms. He bounded forwards, hearing his men shout behind him. He glanced back and saw Lavant hauling a trooper with a bionic eye onto the gantry. Others followed, carrying bombs and melta-charges.

  Cranes stood around the gargant like gallows. Ork overseers lumbered out of the gargant’s head, shouting directions to the gun crews. Gretchin scurried up the cranes. Lavant pointed and yelled, and several Catachans began to pick them off, sending scrawny green bodies tumbling to the floor below.

  More spotlights bloomed on the gargant’s chest. Engines growled, sending a shudder through the great metal body and the scaffolding around it. Above Straken, a heavy stubber chattered into life, spitting a stream of bullets at the Catachans. A krak missile streaked into the gargant’s hip from below, and a chequered metal plate nine metres square dropped off and struck the ground with a clang like the tolling of a colossal bell. But for all the damage the humans did to the gargant, it was steadily coming to life.

  ‘With me!’ Straken called, and he charged up the gangway. An ork jumped down, landing in front of him, and he blasted it in the gut for its trouble. Lavant struggled along in Straken’s wake, a satchel charge over each shoulder, a melta bomb in either hand. He looked desperate, knowing that to stay still was certain death, and yet terrified by the explosives he carried. He paused.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ Straken demanded.

  ‘Nothing, I– Nothing,’ Lavant shouted back. A creak issued from the gargant, the result of something breaking or powering up inside it.

  ‘Then move it!’

  They ran up the narrow walkway, the boards swaying and straining underfoot. The sheer intensity of the ork gunfire began to take its toll. Men cried out and dropped from the gantry behind them. Sparks burst on the scaffolding poles.

  Lavant felt the touch of the reaper on his shoulder. The gantry reminded him of the bridge on Miral. He scrambled after Straken, and suddenly wondered whether he knew what he was doing at all.

  They were level with the gargant’s shoulder. A riot of scaffolding stretched across its upper chest, from a landing pad on the shoulder to a set of narrow ladders reaching to its castle of a head. The machine was almost fully operational now. Straken shouted and pointed, and Lavant ran after him, across the machine’s chest.

  The gargant moved its unfinished right arm. It shrugged its shoulder, and a walkway full of gretchin sharpshooters collapsed, sending them shrieking to the ground fifteen metres below. Their bodies pattered off the machine’s belly like hail.

  It took a step forward.

  The gantry fell apart. The walkway vanished; the planks under Lavant’s feet split open as the gargant moved. He dropped, his head hit a pole and white light shot through his brain. Lavant flopped onto the remains of the walkway, on his side.

  Someone screamed – Kreiz, a Guardsman from the demo team, fell past. Trailing a satchel charge, he twisted in mid air agonisingly slowly and bumped twice on the gargant’s chest before hitting the ground.

  Lavant lay on the walkway – panting, frozen. So far down, it’s so far down, he thought, and just as quickly, Get a hold of yourself.

  The charges were still attached to his body. He struggled onto hands and knees, coughed and stood up.

  And looked straight at death. Down below, a figure had clambered onto one of the tanks, and stood with one boot on the turret like a game-hunter posing beside his prey. Lavant took in the details – the long cape, the hood pulled back, the huge rifle held ready, but he didn’t need to. It was the figure he had dreamed of a thousand times, the man with no face, the demolitions man who had gone back to check Lavant’s charges on that bridge back in Miral and who had come back for his revenge.

  His eyes were the dark circles of image-enhancement goggles. There were no lips, just teeth. Quietly, the reaper raised his gun.

  Lavant just stared. The Ecclesiarchy preachers were right: sooner or later, your sins called you to account.

  The reaper leaned in to the scope, and fired.

  Behind Lavant, an ork screamed. It fell back, half its head missing, and toppled over the edge. The sniper lowered his gun.

  Lavant was still alive. Suddenly, he saw the world around him again. People shouted. The gargant’s hull throbbed with power as it prepared to take another step. Above him, perched on the war machine’s shoulder, Straken was yelling to him to climb up.

  Lavant hurled the charges up to Straken. The colonel set them beside him, dropped onto one knee and reached down with his metal hand. Lavant jumped and grabbed it.

  Straken’s cold grip ground the bones in Lavant’s hand against each other. Teeth gritted, Straken hauled the
captain up onto what remained of the scaffolding. Lavant fell down beside him.

  A hatch flipped back on the gargant’s head, and an ork mech emerged. It was bigger than most, and so covered in power cables that they looked like a mass of tendrils sprouting from its back. Goggles covered its eyes, the lenses tinted red. The mech heaved a gun onto its shoulder. Vanes flicked out of the barrel and began to spin.

  ‘The bombs,’ Lavant gasped. ‘You should’ve set the charges.’

  ‘And let you fall? I don’t leave anyone,’ Straken replied. ‘And you’re the demolitions expert, right?’

  ‘Yeah.’ The captain staggered upright. ‘Yeah.’ Lavant looked over the gargant’s head as quickly and efficiently as a scanner, looking for structural weaknesses, welding lines that could be torn apart. He felt suddenly confident. The frozen, superstitious man on the gantry was gone. Straken had frightened him away.

  ‘There,’ he said. He flicked the switch on the explosive pack, and hurled it. The magnetic lock kicked in, and the charge banged into place just below the gargant’s eye.

  The end of the mech’s gun was a blur of rotating steel. Energy crackled between the prongs. Over the chaos of battle, Straken heard the ork snarl.

  ‘Is it good?’ Straken demanded.

  Lavant nodded.

  ‘Back the way we came. Go!’

  They ran. With a sound like lightning, the mech’s gun fired. The scaffolding on which they had been standing, along with a chunk of armour welded to the gargant’s front, simply disappeared.

  Straken and Lavant raced along the gargant’s shoulder, past the dead bodies around the turret. A gretchin sprang out, a sharpened screwdriver in its hand, and Straken kicked it off the edge.

  ‘Wait,’ Lavant said.

  Straken stopped. ‘What?’

  The mech swung its cannon towards them. Bolts of electricity darted around the barrel, reflected in the red lenses. It grinned.