Chapter 47: The Retreat to the Hornburg
Things didn't look too good for Helm's Deep. The Uruk-hai continued to enter through the wall that they destroyed and tried to break down the gates, with their battering ram… and was beginning to make dents within them, slowly losing its integrity. Trent, Dustin, and Max despite their extraordinary skills and speed, were starting to get tired after all the intense fighting.
The fighting at the breach in the wall was furious. The Uruk-Hai relentlessly continued to fight against the Elves. Seeing the increasing dilemma at the gate, Anton knew he and the Elves couldn't hold back both incoming groups of Uruk-Hai at once, and that their only hope… was inside the Hornburg.
"Trent!" Anton called down from the inner wall, " pull back to the Keep! Get your men out of there!"
Trent then shouted his commands to the elves, "Na Barad! Na Baraad! (To the Keep! Pull back to the Keep!)"
"Ryan!" Trent called out to Ryan, who was still fighting at the outer wall "Na Barad!"
Ryan nodded at him and called for the others around him. Max, however, wasn't too happy about that and is being carried away against his will by Dustin and another Elf, kicking and struggling as he goes…
"What are you doing? Argh! Stop it!" Max muttered in protest.
"Na Barad!" Ryan cried out, turning to make sure everyone was on their way into the inner keep, fighting every step of the way, continuing to hack at a few Uruks as he turned towards the gate…
SLICE!
An Uruk surprisingly came up to Haldir… and stabbed the Elf from underneath the arm. Trent saw Ryan's predicament… and gasped in shock…
With a grimace… Ryan killed the Uruk and knelt down, looking at his wound in seeming disbelief. He then gazed at the ground toward the fleeing Elves making for the keep. Ryan stood up, reeling from the blow made by the Uruk, trying to rejoin his comrades, then… another Uruk-hai comes up from behind him unnoticed…
SLICE!
And sliced Ryan on the back of the neck…
"RYAN!" Trent screamed, charging to his aid, killing as he went…
As Ryan went down once more… he eyed his fallen kin among all the dead Uruk-hai, with flickering eyes…
Trent ran up the steps to Ryan's side and caught him… but he collapsed… and the fallen Elf's head rolled back, his eyes empty and unseeing. Trent bowed his head in grief… and laid his hand gently on his fallen ally, before laying him on the ground.
There was no time to mourn, Uruk-hai were everywhere, and with a bellow of anger and pain… Trent grabbed one of the siege ladders, punched one of the Uruks off… and jumped on it, pushing it away from the wall.
Trent rode down on the ladder he jumped on, amongst the milling Uruk-hai below. Just before the ladder hit the ground, Trent jumped off of it into enemy, where he began laying waste with his sword. Unfortunately… more of the Uruks closed in on Trent, nearly surrounding him…
Trent nodded… and he began to plow through the creatures to join everyone else, fleeing towards the keep…
"Brace the gate!" one of the soldiers at the front gate yelled out… as the soldiers were once again bounced off by the battering ram, which cracked and buckled the gate heavily…
SMASH!
And they plunged a hole into the doors, butting one of the Rohan soldiers. As they retracted the battering ram… the Uruks pulled out their crossbows and shot at the defenders.
"Hold them!" a soldier called out, as the Rohan defenders retaliated with their bows and shot the Uruks through the breach that the beasts made into the gate.
"…To the gate," Anton ordered as he and his commanders drew their swords, ready to assist the men at the gate, "draw your swords!"
Trent ran up a set of stairs, knocking down the Uruks that were behind them, making for the keep… with the Elves providing some cover fire with their arrows to assist them…
Anton and his commanders came to the gate, which was now under heavy attack. The Uruk-hai continued to knock down the gate, hacking through the broken wood. Some of the men, including Danny, stood at the gate to fight the Uruks through the hole their battering ram made. Then, one of the Uruks grabbed Danny at the throat… and Anton hacked off the arm that held Danny, releasing him. The king then stabbed at another Uruk-hai…
…And, in turn…
Received a lance underneath the arm, only to be blocked by his armour. Grimacing in pain, Anton continued to stab at the Uruk… until led away by Danny.
"Make way!" Danny called out as the troops met them, and battled to keep them from gaining anymore ground.
"We can't hold much longer," Danny said gravely to Anton.
The gate to the fortress was about to give out, as the wooden bean that barred the door… began to break in half a bit. Trent and Max came racing towards the gate, seeing the desperate, almost futile battle there, with the gate nearly broken down. Trent tended to the king before heading to the breaking gate.
"Hold them!" Anton cried frantically, short of breath.
"How long do you need?" Trent asked Anton.
Anton then grabbed a sword as he replied, "as long as you can give me."
"Max!" Trent gestured for Max to follow him to a small side door.
the defenders poured in, with spears in hand, valiantly holding their own ardor against the Uruk-Hai.
"Timbers!" Anton called out to his men, assisted to bar the door, just a while longer, "brace the gate!"
As the soldiers were busy setting up the blockade…
Trent and Max followed through the small doorway, which took them around a curve in the wall… and stood on a ledge just to the side of the main gate, with their backs to the wall. Trent then took a peek around the corner… and saw the large band of Uruk-hai storming the gate. After seeing the Uruks, Trent glanced at first, then glanced down at Max. Max's eyes met Trent's, as he too glanced around the corner, at the Uruk-hai trying desperately to get into the keep.
"Come on!" Max cried eagerly, "we can take 'em!"
"It's a long way," Trent told him.
Max then took another look around the corner, and realized the walkway they stood on ended well short of the causeway into the keep. Until now, there were many things that Max didn't like to do but in times like this… he'll have no other choice but to actually do one of the things he didn't like…
"…Toss me," Trent said so suddenly. He didn't like the idea of being tossed while in Moria, but now… he actually agreed to be tossed.
"What?" asked a perplexed Trent looking down at him in surprise.
"I cannot jump the distance so one of you is going to have to toss me!" explained Max,
Trent nods and reaches down to Max's back. Max closes his eyes.
"Ehhh…" Max said, staying Trent's hand, "don't tell the elf…
"Not a word," said Trent, giving his word to the Dwarf.
Then Trent threw Max across the distance… and landed on the causeway. There, Max began laying about him with his axe, killing and knocking Uruk-hai off the causeway. Trent then joined him, jumping onto the causeway to join Gimli. When Sanosuke landed, he grabbed two Uruks at their heads and bashed them together, knocking them out.
And between the two of them, they pushed the creatures back from the gate, so Anton and the others behind the entrance could complete the barricade…
"Shore up the door!" Anton ordered as soon as the way was clear.
Soldiers then came with wooden beams and planks.
"Make way!" cried out one of the soldiers, "follow me, to the barricade! Watch our backs!"
While this was going on… The Uruk-Hai from outside the castle started to load their giant crossbows with giant grappling hooks, in which they intend to shoot over the wall above the gate…
"Throw another one over there!" a soldier, called out to other soldier, d other defenders, placing the planks over the gate.
"Higher!" Anton ordered…
The Uruks patted the wires that held their giant bolt hooks, making sure they were nice and tight upon the sappers, ready for firing…
ZZIIIIPP!
The hooks were fired over the battlements… and super siege ladders were pulled up towards the wall, with hundreds of Uruk-Hai holding onto them. The Super-ladders locked onto the edge of the battlements with their steel grips. The Uruks climbed onto the battlements, and began fighting the Rohan troops. Dustin took aim as another ladder was being pulled up…
SWOOP!
And shot away one of the ropes, making the ladder stumble and wriggle a little… before slowly falling back onto the ground, into the Uruk-Hai army, with a loud crash, crushing the Uruks who were on the ladder.
At the gate…
"Hold fast the gate!" Danny cried out to the men… as they were nearly done with the barricade, using hammers and nails to brace the gates with the wooden beams and planks that were quickly used to repair the gates, while Max and Trent fought desperately to keep the Uruk-hai away.
Before the last board was about to be placed, Anton called from the opening, "Max! Trent! Get out of there!"
Trent and Max responded to Anton's command… and was nearly tackled by an Uruk.
Dustin was on top of the battlements, with a rope ready to throw down to Trent and Max.
"Trent!" Dustin called down to Trent, as he threw his ropes down to them.
Trent glanced up, seeing the ropes provided for him and Max. Trent grabbed Max as he took hold of the rope that Dustin provided with one hand, and hooking Max with his arm. They all swung out off the edge of the causeway, as the Uruk-hai surged forward to the gates, paying Trent and Max no due attention.
Dustin pulled their comrades up. Trent hung onto the rope with one hand and the Dwarf with the other arm as Dustin slowly pulled them up.
More Uruk-Hai reached the walls above the gate, using their super-ladders being hoisted up by the grappling hooks, shot towards the battlements by the sappers. One of the hooks landed just at the edge of the wall. The defenders tried their best to unhook it, but…
Another hook hit one of the Rohan soldiers, killing him instantly. A third hook that was fired… was easily cut…
As Dustin pull Trent and Max over the wall. There were just enough Uruks over the walls to overrun the troops regardless, cutting them down with their swords, and bludgeoning them in their faces with ball-end shield manifers fitted over their fists…
"Pull everybody back," Anton ordered to Danny, assessing that the repairs to the gate would not last long, "…pull them back!"
"Pull back! Pull back!" Danny hollered out, relaying the order…
Then the gate bursts open… and the Uruk-hai surged through, immediately storming the fortress…
"They've broken through!" one of the soldiers cried out in despair, "the castle is breached! Retreat!"
"Retreat! Retreat!" Danny added his cries for retreat, continuing to make for the inner keep.
Once Dustin had pulled Trent and Max over the wall, they along ran to join the retreating soldiers, fighting their way toward the inner keep.
"Hurry!" ordered Trent, "inside, get them inside!"
"Into the Keep!" Danny cried out once more.
There was no time to talk or think… everybody had to run for the inner keep. The Uruks have penetrated Helm's Deep, something that Anton thought would never happen, but sadly… it did…
Dustin fired more arrows into the Uruk-hai army as they go, trying to give the Rohan soldiers some cover as they ran inside the main hall. Trent waited by the doors to make sure that the others, as well as all the defenders that could be saved, were inside the main hall of the keep. The Uruks were closing in fast to the main hall, and feeling that they could not keep the doors open any longer…
…Trent immediately closed the doors… and began setting up a barricade…