IV
Sniper squads and plasma ballistae had been set on the cliffs which formed the anterior of the pass, their arms cocked and ready to fire. The kolkpravis assembled in a phalanx formation at the mouth of Nkremos itself, shoni spears and szat shields at the ready.
Sheelal himself was in the front line.
Their silence stood in direct contrast to the noise that the Yam'rii artillery made as slugs and plasma bolts slammed fruitlessly against the pass' particle shield.
The bombardment lasted for an hour and then silence.
At once, the kolkpravis heard a noise they all knew too well.
It was an incoherent, ungodly sound.
A sound that could only be described as a simultaneous hissing, screeching and screaming.
It seemed to come from everywhere.
The sound of the charging Huk army.
Particle shields would not stop them. Their tough exoskeletons were capable of weathering through without so much as a scar.
The Kaleesh were counting on that.
"HOLD!" Sheelal commanded over the noise of the furious swarm.
And at once, the chitinous bodies of the first wave of Yam'rii oppressors slammed into the szat shields of the Kaleesh infantry.
The noise was maddening.
The Huk clawed and slashed.
They fired with alien blaster weapons.
Some of the kolkpravis were either maimed or killed by the initial Yam'rii assault.
But the Kaleesh phalanx held.
The Huk continued their attempt to break through their reptilian adversaries and seemed to succeed as they pushed the kolkpravis deeper and deeper into the pass. The Kaleesh themselves were offering scant resistance outside their impenetrable shields and thrusts and jabs from their spears.
Halfway through the narrow mountain pass, the khan gave the command.
"BREAK RANK!"
As one, the front lines of the Kaleesh phalanx suddenly moved backward, sending multitudes of Huk tumbling over one another in their haste.
"FORWARD!"
Then it was the Kaleesh infantry on the offensive, slicing and stabbing at the Huk with swords and spears or bashing the insectile aliens with their shields.
It was then that the Huk realized they had been suckered. Just as the Huk horde was about to regroup, Sheelal gave another signal.
Projectiles and plasma bolts suddenly rained down from the clifftops onto the retreating Huk and their vehicles.
Explosions and carnage ensued.
The hail of the Kaleesh artillery stopped as suddenly as it had started—only to be followed by another offensive from the kolkpravis infantry.
Again and again, the Kaleesh used shield, spear, sword and shot in that manner, decimating whatever survivors who managed to evade the onslaught of the artillery stationed on the clifftops.
Slowly, but surely, the Kaleesh battered back the Yam'rii.
Through sheer numbers, a sizeable legion of surviving Huk managed to reach the mouth of the pass in full retreat, their bowels releasing their contents in sheer terror.
They would have escaped had Sheelal not ordered a small battalion of his troops to sneak behind enemy lines for a special assignment while the Huk pushed themselves into the pass.
The charges which they had laid went off just in time, their explosions blasting the cliff face around the mouth of Nkremos.
The insectoid aliens who were the first to make it to the mouth of the pass were crushed into paste and shredded meat by the veritable mountain that had collapsed on top of them.
The final survivors of the once innumerable Huk horde saw that escape was in vain, and in a fit of madness charged their reptilian adversaries.
The battle was not over yet.
Khan Sheelal was among the first to break the frontline of shields—the phalanx was no longer necessary at that point.
He dropped his own shield while drawing out his second lig sword.
Before he even managed to fully unsheathe his second blade, a Yam'rii warrior was suddenly a hair's breadth away from him, sharp shearlike appendages ready to rend his head from his shoulders.
He caught the insectoid alien's claws with his already-drawn sword, using his second to sunder his assailant.
The surviving Huk madly fought against the Kaleesh warriors, lig sword and shoni spear clashing with vibroblades and the natural claw appendages of the Yam'rii.
Just after he had slain the first Huk, three more rushed targeting the young khan at the same time.
He fought the three monstrous insects all at once, deftly dodging or blocking the wicked strikes from the claws of two of his assailants or the vibroblade of the third.
Fellow Kaleesh warriors who witnessed the final stand of these Huk would note of how their khan effortlessly danced around his assailants as they attempted to press on him.
Indeed there was a smile beneath the mumuu skull mask.
He then decided to end the farce.
Too easy...
He dodged the first Huk warrior's claw strike effortlessly, his attacker's momentum carrying it into an inevitable forward dive. He jabbed his twin swords into the ground as he grabbed the falling Huk warrior and spun it around just in time to catch the vibroblade of the second, the blade splitting open the chitinous head of the first.
Just as the second and the third attempted to attack, Sheelal grabbed his swords and propelled himself into a rolling jump.
He swung both blades as he spun through the air.
A moment later, the cleaved heads of two remaining Yam'rii warriors landed with a crunch onto the sandy ground as viscous, sickly yellow blood fountained out of their decapitated bodies.