The Beast Arises

Haas threw herself down as the blast slammed fire and wind over both armies. The charge of the ork infantry had pushed her back even as other Crusaders, closer to the tanks, had continued to move forward. They were swallowed by the death of the battle fortress. The boom, so loud it was a physical force, echoed back and forth between the mountain chains. When it faded, all that remained of Imperial and ork armour was a coral reef of smoking, twisted metal.

Ork reinforcements came leaping over the ruins. They slammed into the stunned Crusaders like a battering ram. They smashed through the soft bodies of humans, advancing dozens of metres before the sheer volume of Crusaders slowed them down. The orks laid into the butchery with chainblades and power claws. For several seconds, the human force disintegrated further, its untrained warriors ground to pulp, their blood splashing over their comrades and killers alike, staining the ground red with the taint of folly. Many civilians broke and ran.

‘Fight or die, cowards!’ Sever, his uniform shredded and smoking, his face pouring blood, strode past Haas. Then he yelled, ‘Now!’ and ducked.

Haas did the same. So did the Crusaders whose discipline still held, who listened to orders, who understood. Dozens more were cut down by friendly fire, clearing the way for the disciplined, concentrated volleys of las from a platoon of the Jupiter Storm to cut into the ork flanks. Grenades followed. The blasts killed humans too. Needed sacrifices as the counter-attack began to eat into the ork column.

The greenskins fired back. They began to spread out. Their flank grew longer, opening up more opportunities for the Crusaders. Haas saw hers and rushed in. She drove her shock maul down on the skull of an ork that was reaching for Sever. The brute stumbled, stunned by the discharge. While it was slowed, she fired her laspistol into its eyes.

Her training was in the suppression of mobs, not military combat. But she looked at the orks as a well-armed mob, and her instincts kept her alive. In their undisciplined rampage, they reminded her of rebellious underhive gangs. But much stronger.

She took a step back as her target dropped. She hunched down, using its body as a shield. The next orks rushing forward swung without looking for her. Their blades went wide. She fired up, blinding one, then caught it in the face with the maul as it fell forward, tripping over the corpse of its fellow. Another brought its cleaver in too quickly for her to dodge. She turned her body and caught the blade in her pauldron. She rammed the shock maul into the greenskin’s belly. It snarled in anger. It was too big, too powerful to stun, but it reflexively lost its grip on its blade. It reached for her throat with both hands.

She fired into its face at the same time that Sever did. She looked at the commissar just as he was struck from behind. He dropped to his knees. She fired at the ork towering over him while she lashed out blindly to either side with her shock maul, trying to stave off an ambush on herself.

There were orks on all sides. She and Sever were drowning in the green tide.

Haas’ maul struck bodies, drawing grunts. Her shots didn’t kill the ork over Sever. It was too big. But they drew its attention. It came for her, a colossus in spiked metal plate wielding a large hammer. Sever must have been hit by the most glancing of blows.

A hit from an ork behind her clipped Haas’ helmet and struck the cleaver still embedded in her shoulder’s ablative armour. The blade went deeper, drawing blood, before it fell out. She fell towards the giant, tucking herself into the tumble and rolling along the ground between the ork’s legs. She spun around and fired at its back.

The las did nothing against its armour. It turned, but then there were hands pulling her and Sever out of its path, and a storm surge of Crusaders, brandishing bayonets, crashed into the monster. It roared at them, smashed heads to pulp with its hammer, but they kept coming in endless, desperate frenzy. There were so many, they climbed over each other as they struck at the ork. Haas made it to her feet. Sever was already up, exhorting the civilians who streamed by on either side, buffeting him in their rush. She witnessed the impossible: an ork submerged by the human tide.

Dozens of Crusaders died. But they trampled the ork to death.

A group of orks came back hard, avenging their leader, and the greenskin formation was diluted still further. More platoons of Imperial Guard closed in. They turned heavy weapons on the orks. Rockets and flamers exterminated unlucky humans as well, but there were fewer greenskins, and always more humans.

We’re fighting like them, Haas realised, and that part of her mind that could still think critically was horrified that the children of the Emperor had reached this state. The rest of her met savagery with savagery, and she rejoiced to see the enemy’s advance slowed, then stopped.

Then reversed.