Chapter 58: Rally, Break Out — The Warboss Has Come
The Orks around the position broke and scattered. The Waaagh cries that had been deafening a moment before turned into incoherent howling, and they fled into the fog and ruins with the frantic energy of creatures that had seen something they did not want to be near.
A brief silence settled over the battlefield.
Every soldier present was staring at the four Leman Russ. The guns were still venting smoke from their barrels. Sixteen rounds in thirty seconds, one per second without pause — it went beyond anything they understood about how vehicle armament was supposed to work.
Captain Ronan pushed himself through the turret hatch again, his face slick with a mixture of oil and sweat. He turned toward Duvette with an expression that was somewhere between disoriented and stunned.
"Commissar, what just—"
"We do not have time for this conversation." Duvette cut him off. "Check your tanks' status, Captain. Now."
Ronan nodded uncertainly and dropped back inside the turret. Several seconds of silence. Then his voice came back up, the disbelief in it clearly audible even through the hull.
"This is not possible. They have rusted. Commissar — all four guns have rusted over completely. They are inoperable."
"Anticipated." Duvette's expression did not change. "They can still function as mobile cover. Pass my orders."
He turned to face the assembled soldiers. His voice went out across the empty street.
"Southwest! Two kilometers! We link up with the Eighth Squadron! Move!"
No one questioned it. The soldiers moved immediately, collecting weapons and identity tags from their fallen around the position. The tags were handled carefully, placed in the cloth pouches kept for the purpose. Ammunition was stripped from the dead and redistributed. Heavy weapons were reallocated.
The entire process took under five minutes.
The column moved out. All four non-firing Leman Russ led the advance, their tracks grinding heavily across the broken stone. They could not fire. But their armor was intact, and intact armor was cover.
The destruction of five Deff Dreads and a Gorkanaut had completely broken Ork morale in the immediate area. The first half of the route was nearly uncontested. Occasional Orks peered out of the ruins, were lit up by las beams before they could act, and stopped being a problem. The column moved fast.
One hour later they reached the Eighth Squadron's position.
The fighting here had ended recently. Three Leman Russ and one Hydra flak tank held a semicircular defense, the ground around them covered in Ork dead. The tanks bore the marks of sustained fire on every surface, but their main guns were still trained outward.
The Eisenmark soldiers inside the perimeter registered the approaching column, startled, and broke into low, exhausted cheering. An Eisenmark lieutenant came forward at a run and saluted.
"Sir. Eighth Squadron, four remaining vehicles, sixty-seven auxiliary infantry, reporting to your command."
Duvette returned the salute. "Fall in. We keep moving."
No pause. The column kept growing.
Over the following two hours, Duvette led the mixed force through the ruins of the southern district. They fought their way along the main roads, absorbed scattered unit after scattered unit, and the mass of them increased with every junction they cleared.
As their numbers grew, more and more Orks began converging to attack the main column, which meant the isolated tank positions holding out across the district were receiving progressively less pressure. The logic of the snowball worked in both directions.
Finn's sniper element came out of a bell tower. Twelve men, every face covered in stone dust, eyes still sharp.
"Emperor's blessings on you, Commissar." Finn's voice came through the grey mask's speaker. "I counted at least twenty-three kills."
"Well done." Duvette put a hand briefly on his shoulder. "Fall in."
Stroud's recon platoon came up through a drainage access point, pulling themselves out one by one. They were covered in filth from the waist down and their weapons were immaculate.
"We tried to build a relay node, Commissar," Stroud reported. "The interference field is too strong. Every piece of equipment burned out the moment it was powered on."
"Understood. Fall in."
Sister Olivia's Battle Sisters emerged from the ruins of a church. Their power armor was scored with deep scratches and blast craters from end to end, but the bolt rifles were held steady. Olivia walked to Duvette and raised her helmet faceplate, the severe face beneath it composed and unreadable.
"We meet again, Commissar." She said it without warmth, but without hostility either. "It appears the Emperor continues to watch over you."
"And over you, Sister Superior." Duvette nodded. "Welcome back."
More 101st soldiers, PDF fighters, and Eisenmark auxiliary infantry converged from every direction as the column moved. When Duvette checked the Soul of the Legion's display, the numbers had changed substantially from the last time he had looked.
[Current Command Authority: Ash Watchers 101st, Eisenmark 11th Armoured Regiment (2nd, 6th, 8th, and 9th Squadrons), Local PDF, Saint Calais Cathedral Battle Sisters Detachment]
[Total Strength: 1,172 Ash Watchers (including 89 wounded), 403 PDF, 214 Eisenmark 11th auxiliary infantry, 13 Leman Russ (4 completely non-functional), 2 Hydra flak tanks, 2 Trojan ammunition carriers, 8 Battle Sisters]
More than half of the surviving forces had been consolidated. The two Trojan ammunition carriers that had been found along the route had partially restored their supply situation. It was not enough to call the situation comfortable. It was enough to keep fighting.
Duvette stood in the center of a relatively open square and looked at the soldiers around him. Exhausted faces. Worn equipment. Firm eyes. Young Evan, Stroud, Anderson, Finn.
Time: 05:17. The sky had begun to pale at the edges. The spore fog was thinning slightly in the early light, visibility improving to approximately fifty meters. On the Strategic Display, the remaining scattered squads were converging on the tank positions by sound — following the cannon fire. Kleist and Volkov had not been located yet, but he was confident they were at one of the remaining operational tank positions.
"Boss." Stroud came to his side and wiped sweat from his head with the back of his hand. "What's the next step? Keep pulling in the stragglers and then break north?"
Duvette was about to answer.
From the direction of the city wall to the south, a single Waaagh battle cry detonated out of the fog. Like a call answered by a pack, every Ork within earshot responded at once. The cries came from all directions simultaneously, rising and overlapping and building into a single frenzied mass of sound. The ruins trembled in the sound waves. Rubble slid from broken walls.
Duvette's chest tightened.
He looked at the Strategic Display.
At the breach in the southern city wall, red contacts from every other position in the district were converging inward at speed, streaming toward a single point. And at the center of that converging red tide, one contact marker far larger than any other.
That was not good.
He understood immediately what he was looking at.
An Ork Warlord bringing a planet to battle always came with Warbosses serving as subordinate commanders. Each Warboss controlled a substantial force and fought as the Warlord's instrument. Their personal presence on the battlefield meant one thing: the main Ork force had arrived. And when a Warboss charged personally, every Ork around it found a reserve of frenzy it had not previously been able to access. They stopped calculating odds. They came regardless of what was in front of them.
"Boss, what's happening?" Stroud's expression had gone serious. Around them, the soldiers had all stopped moving and were looking toward the south with undisguised unease.
The Warboss was coming in person. The Orks had run out of patience. The main force intended to end this now.
Duvette raised his voice to its maximum volume.
"All units! Consolidate the remaining forces at maximum speed! We are running out of time!"
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