Tales of the Amber Vipers Chapter 27

Shining blasts of energy flew by his head, each one a deadly bolt that could have obliterated his skull. They were coming in tight bursts of fire, from multiple angles and every shot chewed up the road before him. Reddam gritted his teeth as he jinked from left to right, the random manoeuvres all that was keeping him alive.

The source of this fire was a cloud of floating drones, each one with a pair of pulse rifles slung underneath. They were chasing the bike squad as they dashed up the road, firing at the backs of the Amber Vipers. Thankfully the simple machine minds could only fire in predictable patterns, which gave the squad the advantage of randomising their paths. Unfortunately this also had the net effect of slowing them down, meaning that the rebels themselves were catching up.

The encounter on the road seemed to have come as much as a surprise to the Heretics as it had to the Astartes. The rebels had been thrown into panicked confusion by the rapid counter-assault which had bought the Space Marines a fleetingly small window to withdraw. Reddam hated that fact, retreat sat ill with him, but the odds were against them, on open ground they were too badly outnumbered and they were far from safe yet. Another burst of fire blasted over his shoulder, charring the light ceramite pad and Reddam snarled, "Take those damned things out!"

From beside him Glord had detached his Heavy Bolter from the sidecar's rail and was firing backwards as he yelled, "What do you think I'm doing?!"

Reddam heard the chugging boom of the weapon and an electric whine as a drone was clipped, the incoming fire slackened slightly but the rest pressed on. Reddam focussed upon his evasions but as he did so Kazao shouted, "They're gaining on us!"

Reddam's lip curled but he spat, "At least have their attention and we need to keep it. They didn't see the Deathstrike and we have to lure them away from it."

Onwards the squad raced, struggling for speed but slowed by their evasions. The circling drones swooped around them like a carrion birds over a corpse, flitting about as they let off shots that chewed up the ground and ripped furrows into the mass of their bikes. Reddam snarled as he felt a round hit his thigh, punching through the meat to leave a bloody hole that wept blood. Pain lanced up his leg but he ignored it, the shot had ripped muscle and sinew but missed the bone, he could still function and nothing else mattered.

The culprit weaved in front him, angling for another shot but Reddam triggered his bolters and a hail of mass-reactives chased it off, making it fall behind the dashing bikes. It joined its compatriots to the rear, following with mechanical relentlessness. Another burst of fire nearly took out his rear tire but Reddam still heard Joffel calling, "This isn't working!"

Reddam knew he was right, the drones were manoeuvring to catch the squad in a crossfire, it was only a matter of time until they landed a fatal hit. The Sergeant accessed the situation and determined that defeat was certain, but experience told him that when in a no-win scenario one must change the scenario. Reddam shouted over the roar of his engines, "Squad, crazy adder manoeuvre on my mark… three two, one, mark!"

On the count they all slammed on their front brakes and swung hard to the right. Their bikes lost speed but their inertia sent the back tires skidding around, spraying mud and gravel everywhere in pluming arcs. In a heartbeat the bikes were sent into mad spins, sweeping around and so bringing their bolters to bear. As he held on to the careening bike Reddam twisted his aim upwards and as one the squad fired. Instantly a thunderous barrage of bolt-shells erupted, filling the air with flying death and creating a web of destruction.

Only transhumans could have performed this manoeuvre, only they had the reaction speed to adjust their aims and the sheer strength to hold their juddering bikes upright. In one second the squad had spun completely about and lashed the air with so many bolts that the pursuing drones were obliterated. Momentum kept them going, turning them three hundred and sixty degrees and at the perfect moment they gunned their engines and raced away from the carnage. This had taken three seconds, only three.

Reddam saw that Glord had almost been thrown from his sidecar and was pulling himself back upright with one hand. He heaved himself into his seat and spat, "Fang-rot, I see why its called 'crazy'."

Yet Reddam only barked, "Status on the rebels?"

Glord peered backwards and cried, "Closer than ever!"

Tersely Joffel called, "We should take them in melee!"

Reddam spat back, "Negative, this ground's too open, we would be overwhelmed. We need an advantage of our own!"

With that he gunned his engine and raced onwards, the muddy road flashing past under his wide treads. The surface was hardly suited for high speed but his reinforced bones took the shocks and were untroubled. He could have ridden for days like this but the rebels had no such concerns, their skimmer vehicles smoothly pursuing as if they were on a straight Ferrocrete road.

Suddenly Reddam saw a fork in the road ahead, one path headed right and level the other left and plunging down the mountainside. He wrenched his handlebars to the right and roared past, the rest of the squad following but it was heartbeat before he saw that not all of them had made the turn. A flash of umber told him one of the squad had gone left and was headed down the slope, it was Joffel and he was racing away from them.

Reddam hit his vox and called, "Dammit whelp, where are you going?!"

Joffel called back, "I'll lead some of them away from you!"

Reddam spat back, "This is no time for solo heroics, think of the squad."

"I am," Joffel declared, "I can split them up and tip the odds in your favour, we fight and die for our Brothers, you said."

Reddam cursed to himself, of all the sodding times for the blasted idiot to start listening. Yet his auspex told a different tale, for a pair of Devilfish and a Piranha had indeed veered off to chase him. Joffel had just cut the pursuing force in half, Reddam judged his chances of survival to be nil but he had just changed the odds for the rest of them. The lone warrior had sacrificed himself to save the group and as their leader Sergeant Reddam had to let him do so.

Reddam drew in a breath and said, "Fight hard, die proud."

"The only way I know," Joffel called and then he disappeared from view around a bend.

Reddam had no time to dwell for the remaining Devilfish accelerated after them, Burst cannons gleaming with deadly potential. The squad had survived so far through daring and the random fortunes of battle but that wouldn't last. So Reddam fled ever faster, climbing a steep rise before turning a hairpin corner to double back. He skidded around it at breakneck speed but then he spied something ahead. The road before him was levelling out, moving away from the sharp drop, now to the right, but to the left was the promised plateau he had been told about and it was covered in pine trees.

Instantly Reddam jerked his bike to the left and roared, "Get off the road, move into the trees!"

Larus argued, "They will slow us down."

Yet Reddam yelled, "Speed will not avail us but skill will!"

With that Reddam led the squad into the shadowy glades, his bike lurching as it rode over protruding roots and crushed tangles of underbrush. He gunned his engine and rode into the narrow confines, turning his world into strobing slats of sunlight and dark shadow. The ride became unbearably rough, threatening to shake him loose as the bike shuddered over fallen trunks and piles of leaves but Reddam relented not, pressing on as fast as he could.

He jerked to avoid a free-standing tree and called, "What are they doing?"

Glord looked back and shouted, "They're following us in but the trees slow them down, those idiots will never catch us under here!"

Tebes asked, "Then we shall withdraw?"

Reddam's lips pulled back over his teeth and he growled, "Negative: now we hold the advantage. Turn and engage Amber Vipers, broken formation, exploit the cover and make them rue the day they chose to tangle with us!"

With that the squad split up, each warrior circling around on his own path. Reddam jerked around a fallen bough, his tires ripping up clouds of dead pine needles in his wake as he circled back the way he had come. It was a difficult ride, even for him, he was moving at tremendous speed through the wood and trunks loomed everywhere as did random branches. No mere mortal could have reacted fast enough to avoid a fatal collision but Reddam weaved a path through the gaps, dodging low hanging branches and crushing brush under his heavy tires. The Sergeant ducked under a random branch and felt the twigs scrape at his neck but then he was past and found himself headed right at the rebel's position.

The Heretics were indeed slowed by the trees, the Devilfish unable to weave around the trunks as he had. Instead the men had poured out of their transports and were frantically trying to cover the angles with long pulse rifles, pointing them at every shadow save the one he was closing from. Behind them three Devilfish tried to find enough room to advance while above a pair of Piranhas were pushing into the canopy, trying to get above the forest and sight downwards. In Reddam's judgement the Heretics had made a tactical mistake, they should have circled the forest and tried to cut off any escape but they had become too fixated upon the pursuit itself and chased the Amber Vipers into an environment that offered them all the advantages. A blunder Reddam had not expected but was fully prepared to exploit.

Reddam hurtled at the knots of men and as he did so he saw them looking about in panic, their officer's shouting only causing more confusion. Reddam was mere seconds away now and yet they had not seen him, missing his approach entirely. The Sergeant grasped that the woods were echoing his engine's noise, the reverberations making it seem like scores of enemies were closing from all directions. The rebels were unable to discern reality from phantasm and were wide open for the kill, fear and panic more dangerous to them than any bolter could be right now. The realisation caused Reddam to take his hand from the bolter trigger and draw his spear from over his shoulder, then a second later he was among the Heretics, shining blade flashing.

Reddam tore through the middle of them and his arm felt a weighty impact as he ripped the head clean off a bewildered rebel. He did not wait to see the body fall but instead raced back into the shadows, chased by random pulse rifle fire. He disappeared into the darkness of the wood and yelled over his shoulder, "Death is among you!"

He heard the whine of thrusters and knew burst cannons would be trying to track him but he increased speed and vanished before the awkward transports could target him. Shouts rang in his wake as the rebels prepared to offer pursuit but then he heard the flat crump of a frag grenade going off and fresh screams arose. Reddam grinned, it seemed the rest of the squad were copying his tactic and the rebels did not know which way to turn. Explosions and fire bored in from random angles, each Brother firing into the packed masses of men before dashing away into the darkness. The rebels were the ones outmatched now and they milled about in panic, firing randomly into the darkness.

Reddam swung wide for another pass and as he did so he knew that the Heretics had no idea what they had walked into. They had thought to trap the Space Marines in the woods but in truth it was they who were trapped. Reddam grinned fiercely as he swore to teach them the depth of their mistake, they would soon learn to fear the vengeance of the Amber Vipers.