Pete quickly re-braces at a more advantageous angle and fires of a quick shot to get the thing's attention.
- proven 3 = 8 damage
Since there actually is cover close enough to reach the commissar sprints over there instead
E, Pen:2
Liam scores a superficial hit at the left leg of the Ork with the heavy weapon that seems to anger it, more than deal considerable damage.
I, Pen:0
The lasgun shot is followed by an explosion against the chest of the monster - Pete's grenade has hit remarkably well again...
As some of its crude leather clothes burns away you notice the olive green colors and unmistakable shapes of guardsman-issue flak armor underneath it that seems to have absorbed most of the damage of the direct hit!
Aurius shot misses the Ork's head by a few inches as it takes one step back from the force of the detonation.
"Jhaa kids need moar DAKKA! to 'nish Dakkadan off!
'Ere take sum of dad, ya kitzz!"
The low gothic of the creature pains your ears, but not so much as the continued of its monstrous weapon.
This time, the Ork targets the still standing Liam with his long fully automatic salvo:
But again, the Ork manages to miss his indented target by a couple of meters.
Nevertheless, the sound and passing-by of fist-sized solid projectiles at ridiculous speed is enough to chill the bone of most man, and the medic feels the primal urge to get into as solid cover as possible as fast as possible...
Behind the towering Ork with the ridiculous big gun, you can see the second chimera finishing its flanking maneuvre, the turret-mounted multilaser swinging around to target the Ork, quickly moving shadown emerging from the boarding ramp...
Unwilling to let even a moment pass without bringing the flame of the Heavens down to cleanse the filthy Xenos Bolus sprays and prays, literally in both cases.
Finding himself somewhat covered from the orks wild spray the commissar finds
the nerve to take a short peek and fire back
The commissar's aim is on the mark but once more the burns make him flinch off-target, reminding him that he just jumped into the mud with some nasty burns
Pete smiles when the Ork ups the ante. He gladly calls the bet.
The mostly full clip of frags drops from the gun and another clip snaps into place. Pete calls out, Your wish is my command, xenos mother******! and a krak grenade sails toward him.
With heavy-caliber rounds still flying overhead, Anatoly opts to remain under cover. Of course it is simply a choice.
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Ich...look at the dental hygiene on that one, better not get close, the halitosis must be MONSTROUS!
Ergo....um...RUN AWAY!
Feeling terribly exposed in the open, Liam dives for the nearest cover.
Seeing the Ork start unleashing fire upon his squad, Aurius takes quick aim and fires off another shot from his hellgun.
Energy Damage, Pen 7 to the Body.
Another series of attacks is thrown at the towering Ork, several shots miss, others find their mark - only to anger the beast some more.
Even the Hellgun blast of the Storm Trooper leaves only a small, blackened crater in the huge chest of the Ork...
Pete sends another grenade at the beast, this time though, his aim is off the target ...
... and hits the side of the bunker with its condensed explosive payload, leaving a double-fist-sized crater in the concrete.
The guardsmen that have just disembarked the flanking chimera opens up with a flurry of lasbolts, joined in with the onslaught of the chimeras multilaser - wrapping the Ork in a corona of lasfire.
One of the soliers goes down, his lasgun all but melted in his hands, but his comrades are well on target, scoring half a dozen hits within a couple of seconds.
Even after getting hit by such a massive amount of firepower, the Ork remains (mostly) upright, even taking a couple of steps towards the guardsmen - to their visual horror - firing his weapon at the new threat practically at point blank range ...
This time, there is no denying that the salvo finds targets ... or better: victims.
You see at least four of their number going down under full-auto attacks of the monstrous weapon, the rest scramble for cover behind the thick armor of the chimera.
Bolus emerges from the dirt like an avenging angel.
And his burnt face becomes a mask of horror as the dirt from this cover jams the flamer.
EMPEROR FORGIVE MY SINS! he shouts as he yanks the misbehaving canister out to put his last one in.
Still not daring to stick his head out more than necessary the commissar fires after a quick look once more.
Deciding that discretion is the better part of valour, Liam remains in cover.
If I survive this, I am requisitioning something with more punch for these situations.
His shot having been rather ineffective, Aurius attempts once again to shoot for the Orks head.
Still unwilling to expose his barely-armored body to the direct fire of the crazed Xenos, Anatoly brings his Lasgun to bear in a quick shot over the top of his cover. The pistol mounted at the end of his true-arm also snaps a quick shot off at the Ork.
The lasgun, still in agony from its rough treatment in the hands of the Ork, fires wide. The Omnissiah's sacred gifts, on the other hand, work completely according to specification. The highly pleasurable sensation as his own blessed potentia coil feeds the small, powerful weapon turns into a sense of satisfaction and awe that he was entrusted to such exquisite spirits.
Pete's trusted launcher chooses that moment to go haywire. The tube utters its throaty clunk, but nothing comes outand, after a moment, nothing explodes.
After recovering from that minor heart attack, Pete doesn't reload. He just drops the traitorous weapon and brings out his, or rather the commisar's, Melta.
In a very strong déjà-vu, Anatoly places a perfect hit at the arm of the Ork, knocking its right arm useless to the side and sending the creature reeling to the ground where it has no time to rise again, before the multilaser of the chimera finally incinerates the thing.
Just as everyone emerges from cover, the previously downed Ork that was fighting with the Commissar raises again! It stumbles forward with pure killing intention in its eyes, but don't get into melee distance before getting put down by the crossfire of the two squads and the APC.
Rising for another shot the commissar blinks as all targets are downed and very much out of the fight.
After standing up he looks around while already handing out orders on the combead.
Squadnet: "Trooper McGregor to the wounded. Everyone else report status."
Launcher jammed, sir. Attempting to fix it. Pete reports and he gets to work.
Bunker has gone and stayed silent since the first Orks emerged.
There's lots of vox chatter on the different squad nets and some on the command net.
- The squad of 'Bracer' is double-timing towards your position, having abandoned the immobilized Chimera, you can only make out four different voices on their channel
- The squad near you is chatting the most, many panicked curses, screams from wounded and their comrades, as well as a (slightly shell-shocked) squad leader that tries to restore order and get a good overall picture and status reports from his men
- The command net replays curses and different sentences that all filter down to "How many hits can that thing take?!" Or "How should you hit something that does not even know were it will go next itself?"
Bolus kicks the wrenched out canister before loading his last tank of flame into his flamer. The Foul Corruption of the Xenos Gods seeped into the canister of my weapon Commisar. I have replaced it one with more worthy Emperor be praised
After listening intendly on his microbead the commissar starts switching frequencies and talk
"This is commissar Ansley. All immidiate dangers are gone and everyone hearing this is very much alive. My Medic is en-route to make sure you stay that way but I would appreciate it if you help him out by any means, especially keeping an active watch for new dangers coming close. The emperor protected your lives, prove worthy of it."
"Trooper Thantus with the medic. Trooper Gerring, Enginseer, with me. We're ensuring the bunker is empty. Father feel free to join us."
The commissar keeps his pistol trained on the bunker entrance while waiting for Pete to catch up. (Overwatch, single shot on emerging greenskins)
"This is commissar Ansley, one bunker cleared, second bunker waiting for confirmation of clearance. Statusreport on the speeder, whats the current plan and why isn't it working?"
"The plan...", growls the voice of a very obviously angered Lt. Harker, "... is to hit it with all
we got while staying away from its ridiculuous chain-weapon and hope like hell that the Emperor blinds those
gunners af efficiently as he did the last minute. They have flattened pretty much any cover around us by now.
And its not working because the thing is damn sturdy and even more difficult to hit with the big guns."
The chatter dies down nearly completly as soon as the Commissar starts to speak on their frequency.
A forcibly-clamed, female voice answers after two seconds of silence. "This is Ensign Laya, leader of
squad Parrot, Sir. We have three man down, two walking-wounded and a frakked track on our APC.
It can still go, but slow and not in a pretty straight line anymore."
A careful rush of the bunker prooves that no enemy is left. Behind a shut door (helpfully blasted open by
MacVyger) you find some looted equipment from various sources: standard frak grenades, a
det-pack, several boxes of various SP-ammo, a ripper gun and three sets of (superficially damaged and heavily
bloodied) flak wests and helmets with the local PDF ensignia printed on it.
As you get over to the idling Chimera, you have to pass a place of slaughter, where the giant gun of the Ork had ripped through the flanking squad.
Three guardmen are obviously dead, their bodies blasted apart by the four-finger-thick bullets of the weapon, parts of them lying around at over a dozen places within an area of 5 meter. The sight alone rips at your composure, even more so as you now that this could have easily been your destiny as well.
Behind the chimera, two wounded are leaning for support against the tank.
One is a young boy with yellow hair and a very pale, wet face. His body armor is shredded at the left side and blood is pouring from a half-conceiled wound.
The other is a women in her mid 30s with killing-intent in her eyes, not totally different from the Orks you just killed. Her left hand misses two fingers and is blackened from some intense heat. She looks down at her hand with disgust an d greets you with the words: "Can you take it off and get me a metal-one from the Ad-Mech? Can't shoot without fingers, dammit!"
Bolus hums to himself as the last of his canisters click into place. We have cornered the beast Commisar. But I fear flames are not what will bring it to the ground.
"Does it evade your gunfire at will? Or more specifically, can you _guide_ its path by forcing it to dodge into a certain direction? Or by blocking its route into a direction?
It is not necessary to make it do sharp turns but I suggest having the smaller, more rapid firing guns force it into a corridor by firing left and right of its current path, then fire with the big gun once the path becomes sort of stable"
The commissar smiles while addressing father Bolus: "I doubt any of our guns is powerful enough to bring it straight down. We'll have to augment their strength with a bit of inspiration from him on earth. But we'll have to know what we have to work with for that to happen."
"Enginseer, quick assesment of the chimeras. Is it possible for any of them to have their combat effectiveness improved quick enough for it to matter in this fight?"
"Good work keeping your squad in action, Ensign.
Bring the chimera forward, we'll need its guns against the contraption."
This is Commissar Ansley, Status report - on your men and your transport.
Anatoly glances at the Chimeras and the jammed launcher before following the Commissar to clear the bunker. Though he aches to tend the wounded machines, he knows that their position must be secured first.
Once it has been secured, He nods in acknowledgement of the Commissar's next order, "Sir. Assessment of damage will reveal answer. Answer provided forthwith." With that, Anatoly walks over to the nearest Chimera.
The left track of the first Chimera is all but blasted - it looks like it run over a mine. It has to be replaced or carefully refitted.
The first version can be done within hours (even less with a skilled crew and a capable driver) - if the necessary supply is available.
The second one ... will take days, likely weeks or more to complete, while requiring a fully fitted forge.
Otherwise the APC is intact, beside some scratches and dents in its armor.
Walking over to the second one, your spirits sink. This one is probably lost for the foreseeable future.
It has taken a direct rocket hit to its side-armor, that damaged the motor and many other internal systems - mostly those of the motion system, as well as several close-by detonations of heavy explosives that destroyed most of its lasgun-mounts and the boarding ramp.
Its weapon systems run on fall-back circuits (which tends to be less reliable) and the fuel-tank of both heavy flamers are leaking (small amounts of) promethium.
Following an idea, you check the tracks of the second chimera, discovering that both are fine and can be quite easily used to repair the first one.
"Brazer here. I've got three men left, beside myself.
Our ride is done for, if I am any judge. Took a hell of a beating from rockets and those frakked 'xploding squiggs they have for hell-know what reason.
Lost two men to the crossfire and squigs.
Everyone left standing has bite wounds and several near-hits to show.
Shotgun ammo is low on everyone as is the explosive count.
Promethium tanks are near empty. Maybe three uses left for Jimminey."
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After his inspection of the Chimeras, Anatoly's voice comes back over the squad net, <<Commissar Ansley, Chimera S1C-4397 suffered multiple explosive wounds. Severe injury to armor, powerplant, and several internal systems. Promethium tanks are leaking. S1C-4397 requires services of repair yard to be restored. Chimera S1C-6319 in much better condition. All systems functional, but left track suffered 83% damage. Requires replacement or a repair yard. With assistance from squads Blazer and Parrot, intact track from S1C-4397 can be used to effect field replacement of damaged track.>>
"Easy there, let the doc work his magic and we'll see what can be done and not."
Seeing as the woman is holding up much better, Liam moves over to the boy first, unsure if he might be suffering from shock.
He then moves over to the woman, making a "tch" sound as he looks her over.
"You'll not be getting that kind of surgery in the field soldier. You'll need a proper equipped MASH unit for that."
"Sorry, doesn't look like I have the equipment to treat you at the moment."
While treating the wounds of the blond youngling, you notice some signs that may be withdrawn symptoms, but they are overlain with the symptoms of shock so you cannot be sure.
The woman grunts at the words of the medic...
... and hits the side of the chimera with her damaged hand in a show of incredible disregard of pain and barely contained rage and anger.
She turns on her heels and climbs the turret of the chimera, taking the position of the pintle gunner.
"Jarr, tat should work. Holding down the trigger of 'tat can be done with the other hand 's well."
Liam steps away from the soldiers for a moment, feeling it's time for a private report to the commissar.
"Commissar, this is trooper McGregor, I've patched up the wounded as well as possible here.
One would require an amputation and replacement hand, which is impossible at the moment, the other one has had his bleeding stopped."
Liam hesitates for a moment.
"The young male trooper displays symptoms of either shock, which is understandable, or possible early withdrawal from some form of chemical.
It might be worth keeping an extra eye on him."
Even an elite trooper like Thantus, due to his relative freshness for actual field duty, is affected by the horrors wrought by bloody combat against the foul xenos enemy.
Regardless, he does his best to help Liam get the injured troopers to a safer location and provides overwatch as he works on getting their wounds healed.
"Whatever we do, we need to get moving to take that ork-thing down as fast as possible."
A few moments pass before the commissar answers, taking his time to make sense of the raw facts heaped upon him by the Enginseer.
That's as good as we could hope for, Enginseer. As you have left my question unanswered whether this can be done quick enough for it to matter in this fight you have volunteered to make sure it will. Get to it.
Your sense of duty is noted, Medic McGregor. Be my eyes and ears here, you are tasked with tending to his medical needs anyway. If it turns out to be something that will impede his duty to him on earth notify me. If it does not then I never heard about it.
"One more thing, Enginseer. Our own Chimera fell into a... sinkhole. some 3 to 5 meters deep. Does the field-repaired chimera have a way and the necessary power to get it back out?"
"Rest of the squad with me. Take the explosives from the bunker we're taking a look on how the fight with the contraption is going"
The commissar takes 2 frak grenades from the bunch in the bunker, waits for the rest of the squad to form up, then they leave towards the sounds of the vehicle fight - hugging close to the large building in the center to keep cover between them and the contraption as long as possible
For a moment you question the chances of winning the endless wars of the Imperium - if even one hostile Xeno, outnumbered 15-to-1 is capable of such a destruction.
The moment is brief and quickly over, but it leaves a tiny stain on your resolve.
"It is ignoring most of the small-arm fire - including bolters.
And its sluggish movements combined with sudden turns of the driver makes solid hits with the battle-cannon nearly impossible!"
Nodding to no one in particular, Anatoly responds over the Vox, <<Acknowledged, Commissar. Will update with new data.>>
Switching his micro-bead to the close proximity mode, he begins organizing the repair, <<Blazer, to me. Rally on S1C-4397. Parrot, bring S1C-6319 to S1C-4397. Spacing 3 meters. Be gentle with her; she is in pain.>>
While they execute his instructions, he will review what he knows of Chimeras to rig a way for S1C-6319 to extract .. accessing files .. Serenus 1st Guard Regiment .. Battlegroup Gamma-12 .. MTOE .. file accessed .. S1C-1837 from a 5m hole, while beginning work on removing the track from S1C-4397.
As he works, a thought occurs to him and he activates the squad net once more, <<Commissar, target power couplings and cables that connect turbines to operator's position. They are weak spot for abomination.>>
Using the winches of the remaining two operational chimeras, it should be possible to extract the chimera after collapsing some of the surrounding area to something like a ramp.
You have a quite clear idea, containing a couple of det-packs, bulldozer blades and entrenching tools.
Probably a matter of two to three hours of joint effort from men and machine.
Flamer-Refueling should be no problem - considering no one is shooting, smoking or using another source of heat and sparks in the general vicinity of that particular operation. As you think about it, its probably a good idea to NOT replace the track right beside the wreckage, since the probability of causing some sparks while working is pretty high in the 90's...
As the chimera has more or less become something of a temporary basecamp, and more wounded might be on the way, Liam decides that this might be the only chance to see if there are any supplies worth recovering.
Thus he takes a few moments to see if any of the dead has not been stripped of resources yet, paying special attention to medical supplies, ammunition, explosives or weapons.
With the order to regroup to make a final attempt at destroying the orkoid technomonstrosity, Aurius takes the time to properly reload his Plasma Pistol with the only Plasma Canister his requisition came with as well as shoving a Frag Grenade into his underslung launcher. While he didnt have Krak grenades like Pete did, shrapnel into an air intake was likely to do some damage regardless.
"Roger that, sir."
You note that Squad-Parrot follows your orders ... with less than supreme efficiency, but you didn't expected them to in the first place.
As you start to digg through the fallen, you quickly recognize that no one seems eager to help and that the order to help the Tech-Priest with the repairs of the disabled chimera is taken ... bad by the squad.
Only the fact that the order came directly from a Commissar, seems to keep them following it at all.
The quick search-through reveals few lasgun charge packs, a grenade and a lasgun with half the stock missing from the shot that killed its former wielder. In addition there is an emptied injector in the possession of the soldier (ID reveals the name: "Gerrin - S").
Hmm, not much I can do on my own. I guess I'll get the gear and the ID's and move on.
The injector does interest the medic however.
This could be evidence of wrongdoings, better keep it for now.
Liam will then follow the others, to make sure nobody else needs his services.
Quietly, he is pleased to be out of the line of fire for a moment, his las gun had proven less than effective so far, and he quietly hoped to eventually requisition or scrounge a long las or hot shot las gun instead.
Since it is only a minimal of the substance left you would need to do some careful tests to identify it.