"Hey, Sarge. How long did command say til we leave this skad pit? I mean we already wiped out all the xenos here." Trooper Vilona asked while kicking over a headless gretchin corpse with a look of distaste on her face as it rolled down the stairs and into to the lower level. All the while, Goose simply observed the rest of the squad piling up the orknoid corpses outside to be burned.
"...Not like I'm speaking out against orders but we've been here for nearly a day. Don't you think we'd be more useful somewhere else?" She asked the still silent Sargeant. After a few more moments he lets out a sigh and turns to face the overly eager guardswoman.
"If xenos were to take a strategic position under our control, what do you think we should do next, Trooper Vilona?" Taken aback by the sudden question, the guard in question scratched the back of her head and gave her honest opinion.
Well...obviously gather a force and take it back from their filthy hands. "Exactly. The xenos are bound to make a counter-attack soon to try and take this position back." This raised concern within the once gung ho guardswoman. With good reason, they only consisted of 10 Hellhounds plus the Sargeant. They wouldn't stand a chance!
"Throne's golden plates! We'll be wiped out!" Goose only raised an eyebrow.
"Who said it would only be us?"As if on cue, a pair of
Taurox APCs plowed through a pile of rubble and destroyed road wheelers from the east road and made a beeline to the residential hab block junction Goose and his squad had secured. The wheels of the transport vehicles screeched to a halt as soon as they reached the front of the residential building Goose was. As soon as the Hellhounds saw the lion insignia, there was a unanimous groan as they realized that command had sent the Leonin Highborn to support them against the inevitable ork counter-attack. To make matters worse in their perspective, the vox broadcasters atop the vehicles began to blare out the Leonin's planetary anthem as the guardsmen proper exited their vehicles and did their routine 'parade' around the perimeter of the area before finally toning down the music and positioning themselves properly in front of the Hellhounds and proclaiming in unison. "
Praise the Emperor's name for you miserable mongrels have been graced by none other than the 15th Leonin Highborn!" They then perform a perfectly synchronized salute. Goose rubs his temple as he could already feel his blood pressure rising.
"Sarge. I changed my mind. I think we can fight the orks alone. Please, just not them..." Trooper Vilona says whilst covering her face out of disbelief.
"I'm sorry, but orders are for them to help us keep this position. But let's look on the bright side. Who knows, maybe they'll die honorably when the attack comes?" Goose says semi-sarcastically before heading down to meet their reinforcements.
The Leonin Highborns, as obnoxious and insufferable as they may be, were the best shots by a long shot when compared to the other regiments present on the planet. Despite their mutual distaste for one another, their roles simply synergized too well for command to ignore.
"The xenos-" Goose was interrupted by a glove slapping him across his mouth as the Leonian speaks.
"Let your betters speak first, mongrel." Goose's mechanical arm whined audibly as he did his best from braining his 'better' with his prosthetic. The rest of the Hellhounds looked at one another, confused and at a loss to what to do in response to the open disrespect. Though as the noise of the whining servos and motors faded away, they knew that the Sargeant had gotten his temper, and the situation, under control.
"Oh good, the mongrel leader knows how to listen. I am Lieutenant Crispin DeSalvo, commander of squad three and four of the 15th Leonian Highborns. You are quite lucky that command deemed your insignificant unit worthy of our attention. Now that I've spoken, you have my permission to speak." Goose forced himself to thank the asshat before reporting that he and his team managed to take out the ork defenders with the help of the element of surprise. Before explaining when and where he expected the counter-attack to originate from.
The Highborn nodded in understanding before commanding his troopers to take vantage points in the surrounding buildings. He ordered others to man the gatlingcannons on mounted on their Taurox APCs and have orders to riddle holes into any and everything that was a shade of green and was moving.
"Sargeant? I do hope you plan on getting ready. We don't want your incompetence dragging the Highborn's good name in the mud now do we?" If Goose didn't have the patience of a saint, he'd have dragged HIM through the mud. That and the sanction, and likely summary execution he'd face if he were to do so. He'd like to believe he chose the moral high ground when he swallowed his pride once again and simply instructed his squad to take care of any of the stragglers that manage to break through their defense.
And just as expected, the xenos came back to retaliate with a significant force. Over two dozen Slugga Boyz. A dozen Shoota Boyz. Six Burna Boyz. And a damnable looted Leman Russ tank converted to have a catapult of some sort in place of the main turret. A mek boy cackled madly as it launched the first attack, sending one of his gretchin assistants into their position. Normally, this would have been a great disadvantage for the little goblinoid, but there was something that gave it a deadly advantage.
The ludicrous amount of rokkits haphazardly bolted into its little frail body.
The massive ball of fire that ensued instantly claimed the lives of two Leonins and a Hellhound. The Leonin Highborns wasted no time and returned fire. Managing to cut down two-scores of the charging orks before they had to refocus on the other Boyz and the exploding grot launching tank. That left a little over a dozen Slugga Boyz for Goose and his Hellhounds to deal with. The orks in question didn't even try aiming while shooting at them with their sluggas, opting just to enjoy the feel and noise it made as it launched death at supersonic speeds indiscriminately.
One boy even accidentally shot the one in front of it, displaying that despite the poor accuracy, it was still enough to blast apart an ork's skull wide open. It cackled as he stepped over the corpse of its former comrade.
The rest of the Hellhounds had readied themselves to meet the force with laspistols and serrated sabers in hand. Luckily, they were better shots than the orks; landing hits on their centers of mass. Unluckily for them, the hulking green xenos took severe punishment better than anything else. Even at maximum power output, there simply was too much flesh for the laser to vaporize and within moments the xenos had come into melee range. A wild swing of a choppa easily bisected another Hellhound before a lucky shot evaporated the vile creature's skull in one hit. Things were looking grim for the remaining Hellhounds as the Slugga Boyz began to swarm at them. That is until a gout of burning promethium shot out from Goose's hand flamer as he waved it across the mob. Dousing at least half of the charging orks in nigh inextinguishable holy flame. The flames successfully halted the charge. And from the intense flames and acrid smoke of burning ork corpses lept forth the Hellhounds. The hounds made short work of the dazed orks with what Goose taught them. Lopping off hands and fingers to prevent any further attacks and hewing the tendons and major muscle groups of the legs to prevent any chance of escape.
The Leonin Highborns did their fair share of the work as well. Vaporizing the heads of distant ork and Shootas from nearly thirty meters away with pinpoint accuracy with their laslock rifles. The weapons of both their Taurox APCs made swiss cheese of the Burna Boyz who got too close for comfort. Though despite their best efforts, over a score of them were dead from either a Shoota getting a lucky hit, burned alive by a Burna Boy that managed to get too close, or was unfortunate enough to be caught within a gretchin explosion.
Goose didn't need the command to realize that their allies were having difficulty dealing with the grot-a-pult tank and took initiative to help them. While the orks were distracted by the Leonins, the Hellhounds maneuvered around the ork's position and flanked them. While the rest of his team went for the remaining Shoota Boyz, Goose went for the grot-a-pult tank and the mekboy. Just as he swung his chainsword, the mek tossed one of his assistants to block the blade. The small humanoid managed to do its job and save the mek, leading to Goose getting punched and knocked off the tank and flat on the ground. Discombobulated, Goose only managed to roll away before the tank tracked over where he once laid. The mek cursed something in orkish before trying to realign the tank to run over the human. Goose had other plans.
Grabbing a spare canister of promethium, he tosses the canister at the tank and firing his hand flamer as soon as the tank's track ran over the canister and taking cover. A massive ball of flame engulfed the tank and crashed into the side of a residential building. Half a dozen gretchin fell off and ran around as the flames ate away at their flesh. The mek, however, was only halfway out of the tank before the stowed rokkits and stikkbombs detonated. Sending bits and pieces of ork and metal across the street.
"I suppose I do owe you a gesture of gratitude..." Lieutenant Crispin said with disinterest and distaste in his voice.
"No need. The fact that we 'mongrels' helped your asses is a reward in its own right." The Highborn only sneered at Goose. Crispin would never admit it but he was thankful for what Goose did for his team. Though he wished that the Sargeant would wipe the smug look off his stupid face.
After they had repelled the counter-attack force, they reported back to command who gave them orders to hold their position and set up a forward base while the main army moved up to meet them. Though the guard would only repel the ork Waaaagh! a year later, this was a major victory in Goose's book.
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