The first shell landed in front of the convoy.
A whole section of asphalt in the middle of the street exploded, sending chunks of stone and metal fragments flying in every direction.
A small war vehicle at the very front was flipped over by the blast wave.
Its chassis landed upside down, its wheels still spinning, while more than a dozen Orks aboard were thrown clear.
Two smashed through the windows of a ruined building beside the road.
Another rolled more than a dozen times before climbing back to his feet, and the first thing he did was raise his gun and point it wildly in every direction.
“Who shot me?!” A second shell came down.
It landed twenty metres closer than the first.
He went flying again.
This time, the blast hurled him into a pile of scrap metal beside the road.
Half his body disappeared beneath it, leaving only one hand waving outside.
Gragoth raised his head.
On the outskirts of the distant industrial district, rooftops that had looked like nothing more than abandoned buildings began opening up with a series of grinding mechanical noises.
Sheets of metal folded aside one after another.
Gun barrels were revealed beneath them.
The barrels varied in length and calibre, but there were plenty of them.
Blackfang stared upward for two seconds.
“When did Blastfurnace put up this many guns?” “Spread out!” Gragoth roared.
The convoy immediately failed to spread out at all.
Every driver turned at the same time.
Those on the left tried to go right.
Those on the right tried to go left.
Those in the middle tried to escape toward both sides.
Three war vehicles smashed straight into one another in the middle of the street.
The front of the first climbed onto the roof of the second, while the side of the third jammed itself into another vehicle’s tracks.
Wheels spun uselessly against the ground, and iron armour scraped against iron armour in showers of sparks.
“Where da hell are you driving?!” “Da Primarch said spread out!” “Then why’re you spreading out toward me?!” “Why don’t you spread somewhere else?!” A shell flew over their heads.
Gragoth stood on the rear platform of his own war vehicle and watched the entire thing happen.
The corner of his mouth twitched behind the faceplate.
“Everyone off da vehicles!” The Orks swarmed out.
Some rolled straight off the sides.
Some climbed over nearby vehicle roofs and jumped down.
Others were squeezed over the edge of cargo beds and landed face-first on the ground.
One climbed back up with his nose bent crooked and didn’t even bother with it.
Blackfang was the first to charge.
All three exhaust pipes on the back of the First Company Captain’s power armour spewed thick smoke at once.
His battle axe was already off his shoulder and in his hands, its blade pointing toward the rooftop gun positions still firing ahead.
“Any Boy who wants into First Company!
Charge with me!” The Orks behind him immediately went wild.
Several hundred greenskins sprinted forward along both sides of the street.
Iron armour clanged together, while heavy boots crushed loose stones and broken glass underfoot.
Shells kept screaming overhead.
Explosions scattered sheets of metal, rubble, and abandoned machine parts across the street.
Some Orks were blasted off their feet and smashed into walls beside the road, only to push themselves out of the holes less than two seconds later, shake their heads, and keep running.
One Boy had just poked his upper body out of a shell crater when another stepped directly on his head and jumped over him.
“I’m going ahead!” “Get back here!” The entire charging formation instantly stretched into a chaotic line.
The fastest had already reached the middle of the street.
The slowest were still near the convoy trying to figure out which direction to run.
The shellfire grew denser, but once the Orks spread out, the chances of actually hitting them dropped instead.
The faster ones had already closed the distance enough that the gun emplacements could no longer lower their barrels far enough to hit them.
Gragoth stood at the intersection blocked by abandoned vehicles.
The street ahead stretched roughly two hundred metres before reaching Big Smokestack District’s first defensive line.
Dozens of rotating gun emplacements and tracked gun vehicles built from scrap metal opened fire at the same time.
Every one of them was operated by Gretchin.
Small green heads poked out from turret hatches.
Some crouched inside, frantically hammering jammed mechanisms.
Others spun adjustment wheels beside the barrels to change their elevation.
Gragoth looked ahead and roared, “Gretchin first!
Da rest of you Boyz follow!” Dozens of Gretchin emerged from behind the convoy, their short green figures running forward along the walls on both sides of the street.
But some Orks still managed to stay in front.
The dozens of Boyz leading the charge raised their guns and returned fire.
Muzzles spat sheets of flame as bolter rounds hammered against the frontal armour of the mechanical gun emplacements, producing dense showers of sparks.
The gun emplacements and machine guns opened fire together.
Rows of bullet holes instantly appeared across the iron armour of several Orks at the very front.
One Ork was driven three steps backward by the impacts.
He looked down at the bullet holes in his chestplate, then raised his head toward the gun emplacement ahead.
“I wanna get into First Company—” Another shell hit him directly in the face.
His entire body flew backward.
Stikk charged past him.
The iron ball was already spinning above his head, its chain whistling through the air.
He rushed to within roughly five metres of the first gun emplacement, planted his feet, and hurled the iron ball with both arms.
“Get—” The iron ball left his hands, and the chain snapped taut with a metallic rattle.
“DOWN HERE!” Boom!
The iron ball slammed into the side of the gun emplacement.
The welded metal plating caved inward, the rotating base jammed solid, and the barrel twisted to one side.
The Gretchin operating the adjustment wheel behind it was shaken out of position and rolled twice down the slope before ending up flat on the ground.
A Burna Boy immediately stepped forward and aimed his weapon at the Gretchin before it could get back up.
Fsssssh!
Flames washed across the ground.
The Gretchin’s scream lasted only half a second before cutting off.
Stikk ran over and yanked his iron ball free from the dented turret.
He turned toward Gragoth, tusks showing at the corners of his mouth, his voice clearly fishing for praise.
“Primarch!
Can I get into First Company now?!” Gragoth ran past him and cursed over his shoulder.
“You took down one Gretchin and you already want in?!” Stikk froze for a moment.
Then he looked down at the charred lump on the ground before raising his head toward the dozens of gun emplacements still ahead.
He tightened his grip on the chain and charged toward the next one.
Blackfang smashed into the defensive line from the other side.
The First Company Captain’s power armour charged straight through machine-gun fire.
Bullets continuously ricocheted from his breastplate, while a few rounds struck the additional armour on his pauldrons and scraped off showers of sparks.
He rushed all the way up to a tracked gun vehicle and grabbed the end of its barrel with both hands.
“Get down here!” The hydraulic systems gave off a piercing hiss.
Blackfang pulled with both arms while driving his knees downward.
His full body weight, combined with the strength of his power armour, poured into his arms as the exhaust pipes belched smoke.
The barrel and its entire rotating mount were forcibly wrenched sideways.
The metal shaft groaned under the strain before snapping with a loud clang.
The muzzle ended up pointing directly at another gun vehicle.
Blackfang bared all his tusks.
“This is good!” The shell already loaded inside the gun fired at that angle.
It left the barrel and almost immediately slammed into the side armour of the other gun vehicle.
The machine exploded through the middle on the spot.
Boom!
The blast hurled the entire gun vehicle and the two Gretchin operating it three metres into the air.
Blackfang stood between the two burning machines.
He turned toward Stikk.
The side of Stikk’s second gun emplacement had also been badly caved in, and he was pulling his iron ball free from the wreckage.
The two looked at each other.
Blackfang raised two fingers and waved them toward Stikk, mouthing, “Two.” Stikk’s grin vanished immediately.
He ripped the iron ball free from the wreckage, tightened the chain in his hands, and turned toward the next gun emplacement.
Blackfang watched him go, then turned back around.
Four more gun emplacements were still firing in front of him.
He picked up the broken section of gun barrel he’d torn off the tracked vehicle and used it like a club, swinging it toward the nearest one.
It really helps the fic grow!