COMMISSAR II
"Men, on every world, on every
day," Urik called to the guardsmen, "there is a valiant servant
of the Emperor. They serve in their destined way. Adepts, arbites,
preachers. But none are as privileged as you, here. None have the
gift of giving their lives to the Emperor's cause. Now ready
yourselves, and your weapons.
"Now is your time to shine."
Commissar Urik raised his chainsword and gunned it. The teeth
spun in a fury. They were hungry. For greenskin.
The orks were coming ever closer. Soon, the commissar was able to pick out his nemisis with his naked eye. Grobnik. The massive horror was running full speed toward the Imperial Guard fortress. Their surety alone was unnerving.
Boom! Boom! Boom! came the thunder of artillery. Even such massive guns could do little to stop such a menace.
Urik checked his bolt pistol. Again. Throne, he thought, that's the third bloody time! He was nervous. He had seen Grobnik in battles before. The brute had torn apart a Chimera by himself, with that hydraulic pincer-handed arm of his. Urik was checking his pistol too frigging often. Commissars werent' supposed to be nervous.
It felt strange, the nervousness. He had fought and killed hundreds, nay, thousands, of enemies in his seventy and five years in the Commissariat. Gad, had it been that long? Seventy-five years? He was old. Too old. He coughed at dust in his throat, an all-too common occurance in this desert backwater world, and snapped back to reality.
He waited for the signal from Colonel Japlin. He would know what to do and when to do it. Urik looked up to the Colonel's post. He could see the man, relatively young for such a high position, looking out into the green tide. He was a powerful man. Urik was impressed by few, but this Japlin; he had been one of the few. The tale of how he sustained the scar that dominated his face was quite exhilerating.
Urik looked back to the tide. It was much closer now. Throne, they're moving fast, he thought.
Another thundering of artillery. But, it sounded much farther away. Urik looked closer at the orks. A basilisk, a frigging basilisk, had fired at the Imperials. The greenskins had a basilisk.
The artillery shell whirled through the air. Urik was striken with the thought of being shot at, seeing the bullet attack you in slow motion. But this was not aimed at him.
The Colonel's position exploded in a fiery blast, flames cascading down to rest on the sand. Urik's mouth was agape. He just looked on into the fire. The Colonel. The Colonel was gone, in a flash. So quickly, he was gone. A large, flaming chunck of debris fell down and landed, rolling over one of the troopers, crushing him before he could make a sound.
Their leader gone, Urik took up the responsibility. And those orks were really close.
"Yaaah" he cried, running over the trench toward the enemy, his men following faithfully. Urik's bolt pistol would soon need checking.
Las-bolts were fired into the green tide. The aliens seemed to shrug off the blows. But some guardsmen were not as tough as their foes. The befouled bolters carried by the aliens tore down several guardsmen and took the arm off of another. Suddenly, like the wrath of the gods, the two sides clashed.
Blade met flesh as the world was torn asunder in a violent torrent of bloodshed. Urik's chainsword cleaved a greenskin in two, and then proceeded to disembowel another. His bolt pistol opened a third's face. He stopped as the throat of a fourth was being devoured by the teeth of the chainblade. He stopped because he saw the moment he had been dreading. He saw it. He saw the moment throw orks out of the way just so that it could occur.
Big Boss Grobnik, as he was called, literally threw two orks into the air to face Urik. He never saw the two land. His eyes were transfixed on the hulking mass of muscle and fury that stood before him.
"Captain..." Urik managed to say into his comm-link"send out the armored vehicles. Now"
He never recieved a reply.
Grobnik emitted a bellow of rage and broke into a run toward the commissar. The hydraulic arm was pumping. The red eyes burned deep under the thick brow. The yellow teeth beckoned to him, whispering tales of the flesh they had tasted.
Urik sidestepped the massive brute, looking back as Grobnik ran past him, stopping soon to turn around. Grobnik raised his gun and fired, missing Urik, but killing instead three men. Their newly-opened bodies fell to the ground, but were not heard over Grobnik's roar.
The warboss came again for another go. This time, as Urik leapt again out of the way, he swung his chainsword blindly. It bit into the metal arm, doing virtually no damage. Urik fell to the ground, the tail of this greatcoat being torn off. The great ork stopped once more and turned around, seeing that this would get him nowhere. And then the climax.
A great rumbling, only just then able to be heard, grew over the sounds of battle. Tearing through the ork line, a Hellhound, the turret spewing fire into the ememies. Seeing the warboss, they started to turn. But the ork's attention was momentarily turned to them.
As the machine pivoted, Grobnik caught it with the hydraulic pincers. The joints worked and the ork tore a gaping hole in the left side of the tank. Urik caught a glimpse of the crew, terrified at this new threat. Grobnik crawled inside the tank, cutting smaller gashes in the armor as he eviscerated the helpless crew. When he had finished his grisly endeavor, he broke through the top of the vehicle, breaking the fuel tanks, and spilling the promethium onto the ground.
Urik saw his chance. He raised his bolt pistol, not checking whether it had any shots left, and fired at the growing pool of fuel. The bolt sailed through the air, and, realizing his mistake, Grobnik tried with all his might to intercept it. But, alas, he was too slow.
The bolt exploded in the promethium, setting it ablaze in a deafening blast that engulfed the warboss, tearing him apart, and sending Urik through the air, shrapnel cutting and embedding itself in his legs.
Urik hit the ground hard. But alive.