Raknor squinted as the Trukk broke through the tree-line and daylight streamed in to the cabin. This was it - time to chop up these humie wretches and make Gorblud proud.
The trukk skreetched to a bone-jarring halt, but Raknor and his squad were used to the exuberance of ork drivers and needed no time to regain their balance before leaping over the front and sides of the cabin.
Big shootas opened up to the left and right of the hulking Warboss as his boots hit the dirt and he broke immediately in to a run. Belcher, his attack squig, squeeled in annoyance as he was thrown off his perch on Raknor's shoulder guard to swing briefly on his chain before scrambling back up again.
It was only after he'd taken several steps that Raknor realised something was wrong. The Imperial lines were still a hundred yards away - the Trukks had stopped too soon! Almost as soon as this thought had gone through his head enemy fire started whipping around him. It was panicky and poorly aimed, but Raknor could already see the enemy forming more organised ranks - it would be mere moments before the ork offence would come under serious fire. Raknor sped-up, urging his fellow Orks to run alongside him.
The Imperial fire intensified and orks began to fall. A large tank straight ahead spat out round after round of large calibre ammunition, mowing down orks wherever the guns were directed. Raknor, began to get worried - there was still a lot of ground to cover and there was a lot of firepower now directed at them.
A huge roar overhead announced the arrival of Mytox and his stormboyz. Raknor looked on in dismay as he realised they had misjudged the jump distance and landed too far in front of the Imperial lines. They were almost instantly being cut to pieces by concentrated fire from a number of Imperial units. Curse those trukk boys, they'd caused this mess!
The death of the stormboyz was sorry loss, but a welcome diversion Raknor realised, as they had probably bought his squad enough time to reach the Imperial front lines. He looked left and right. The losses had been heavy, but not near enough to stop the charge - they could still win glory after all!
He took a large intake of breath and then let loose an almost ground shaking roar.
"WAAAGGGHHH!!!"
With uncontrolled enthusiasm his fellow orks joined in, bellowing and sprinting as fast as their bowed legs could carry them. He noticed with satisfaction as Durog and his bikerz hit the Imperial lines first, driving nearly full-speed into the human infantry while spraying shells and swinging choppas.
Just before Raknor's own unit hit the Imperial lines, a human squad in bright orange fatigues bravely sprayed them with undisciplined las fire as they closed the last few yards. Raknor signalled to his squad to take out the big tank while he dealt with this little annoyance.
The first two humans went down to a burst of fire from his gauntlet mounted shoota - their thin armour no match for his high calibre shells. The next one was cleaved in two by a mighty sweep of his huge choppa which sent the top half of the body sailing a good 15 feet in a beautiful parabola while spraying his comrades with blood.
The next imperial jumped forwards and tried to skewer Raknor with his bayonet, but his clumsy strike was easily parried by Raknor's gauntlet shortly before his head was chopped cleanly off.
Raknor knocked the next human off his feet with the head of his choppa before he could bring his lasgun to bear. Raknor then rapidly deflected the bayonet of another before slicing him from naval to collar in one easy stroke. With each blow he struck Raknor was more invigorated, the power unit of his enhanced choppa seeming to thrum with more energy the more lives it took. He vaguely noticed his squad of Nobs tearing open hatches and lobbing stikkbombs in to the tank to his left, but he was now far too deep in to the thrall of violent combat to pay it much heed.
He only paused when all around him seemed to be dead - orange clad body parts littering the ground around him. He let out a bellowing laugh at the sheer joy of combat.
As he turned to look for new foes a searing pain seared through his chest. Sharply jerking away he heard an awful crunching noise and the pain flared into a brief moment of agony. Looking down he saw the end of a chainsword buried in the armour of his chest plate and broken off at the hilt. One of the orange humans was still alive and had seized an opportunity to attack while Raknor was distracted.
While Raknor was still in shock the human tried slam the broken handle of his sword into the huge ork’s face, but pure instinct made the warboss evade enough to cause a mere glancing blow to his chin.
Raknor quickly recovered his wits, realising the injury was nothing the Doks wouldn't be able to sort out in short order. He took measure of his foe and realised he had nothing further to worry about. The fool had disarmed himself of his most dangerous weapon by stupidly stabbing his opponent with a chain weapon intended for slicing.
In one easy move Raknor knocked the human to the ground with the haft of his choppa before raising it up for the killing blow. He paused briefly to appreciate the kill, giving the human a grim smile as he lay sprawled in a small furrow of mud and dirt.
Just as Raknor started the final downward swing a blindingly bright flash appeared to his left, instantly followed by a searing pain at his neck. His vision blurred and he felt a huge wave of disorientation as the sound of the massive explosion reached his ears.
A moment later his world stopped spinning and his vision slowly came back. The pain at his neck had gone away as quickly as it had arrived, and even the pain in his chest seemed to have abated.
He could see the massive wreck that had been the heavy tank and a couple of his nobz staggering away from its recent cataclysmic explosion. Nearer he saw a human in orange fatigues struggle to his feet under the shadow of a hulking ork figure. The human gently pushed the ork and the body toppled helpless and headless to the floor.
A grim realisation came to Raknor as he recognised the armour and weaponry of the felled ork. Well, no wonder the pain in his chest had gone – his chest was now several feet from his head. As his vision blurred and he drifted in to unconsciousness all he could think was ‘I really hope there is a bluddy dok nearby . . .’
