flood.
Two of the Guardsmen barely made it behind the barricades of Tunnel One before the firing
started. The third Guardsman was cut down by Captain Toria’s men in Tunnel Three, because the
tyranids were too close at his back. He died screaming at the Guardsmen to wait, never realising that
his execution saved him from a more brutal demise.
Suddenly, the four chokepoints erupted in simultaneous firefights, the screams and reports
peppering the vox-comm channels.
The tyranids jammed into the tunnels, and into the line of fire of autocannon and heavy stubber
nests, and the las discharges of staggered firing lines. When one soldier depleted all his magazines,
he tapped the leg of the man standing behind him, or the shoulder of the man kneeling before him.
He then swapped out of the line with a fresh soldier, while he rearmed himself.
At every tunnel, there was at least one heavy gunner, a member of Nubis’ squad with a flame
thrower, melta gun or plasma gun, vaporising any of the fast runners that managed to close the gap
quickly. Elsewhere, the dull thud of detonating mines reverberated, claiming a snake or large tyranid
that thought of burrowing through the collapsed tunnels. Still, while the chokepoints poured on a
steady stream of fire, they realised they were losing through the attrition of centimetres.
The tyranid weren’t merely suicidal, they continued throwing every breed and type of tyranid at
the chokepoints, providing just enough cover to drive forward by the barest of margins. Even when
they approached the lume-circle marks on the walls and Nubis’ men triggered the shaped charges,
the tyranids filled the holes in their ranks within seconds.
Nisri’s men had seen the tyranids attack and regroup before, but the prize of the cave drove them
forward with unparalleled frenzy. They had an objective in mind, and nothing would deter them
from that goal. The Guardsmen weren’t the goal, they were the obstacle.
Occasionally, an armed tyranid survived long enough to fire back with its bio-weapon.
Sometimes the round splattered against the tunnel wall or the sand bags, and sometimes the shot
struck a Guardsman. When that happened, the wounded Guardsman was pulled from the line and
replaced, while medicae did their best to stabilise the patient. Unfortunately, most tyranid
ammunition continued inflicting pain and incapacitating their targets, and the medicae could do
nothing for the screaming soldiers that bucked and writhed in the crippling throes of agony.
Nisri knelt on the front line, shoulder to shoulder with his best Guardsmen, the ably trained men of
E Platoon and the orphaned soldiers of Sergeant Raham. Corporal Magdi Demar now led the
platoon that was assigned to protect Tunnel One. But only he felt like he was filling Raham’s large
shoes until someone better came along. Still, Raham had drilled his men well, and E Platoon fought
with the same ferocity as though their beloved sergeant stood behind them, shouting orders in their
ears.
“For Raham!” someone shouted for the fiftieth time, and for the fiftieth time, the squad
responded with renewed fervour, filling every centimetre of the tunnel with punishing fire.
The tyranids seemed to be growing smarter with each salvo, however, and they skewered their
own dead on their talons, scythes and spike-claws, propping up the injured and dying to act as
shields.
As they passed one of the lume-rings indicating where the shaped charges were hidden, Nisri
shouted, “Blow them apart!” The shaped charges, angled away from the Imperial skirmish lines,
exploded, shredding the shield wall and forward lines of tyranids. The heavy stubbers opened fire
and flamer units followed up the attack, washing the exposed corridor with generous gouts of flame.
The tyranids shrieked under the promethium blast, their exposed flesh wilting, and their carapace
armour blackening. Their numbers seemed to dwindle for a moment, before they swelled forward on
another suicidal surge.
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It was just enough for Nisri to see what was happening. The chokepoint was a stoopway, which
forced the tyranids through on their stomachs. It was narrow enough for some bipedal tyranids to get
stuck as they squeezed under. After a while, only runners and leapers ran through, and they pressed
forward, obscuring the chokepoint. For a brief instant, however, Nisri could see the stoopway again.
Snake tyranids were eating through the rock, widening it and allowing more creatures to stream
underneath it.
“For Raham!” Nisri shouted, and the volley of fire intensified. Nisri tapped the puttee wrapped
leg of the soldier behind him and swapped out. He moved down the rough-surfaced tunnel, past
soldiers waiting for their turn at the firing line, and around a turn in the corridor. The noise was
staggering, the tunnels amplifying the thunder of weapons dozens of times over. Nisri activated the
noise filters on his micro-bead and switched to the command channel.
“Lieutenant-Colonel Iban Salid, respond!”
Turk manned Tunnel Four alongside B Platoon, one of several orphaned platoons, the one that had
answered to Captain Anuman. Like Anuman, his men were gamblers, and quick with their knives.
They were rough in an urban sense, loud drinkers and brawlers, and they loved getting their hands
dirty by jumping into the middle of fights. They were perfect for the close quarter, execution style
action of their chokepoint.
B Platoon protected what Captain Toria had referred to as a chimney. It was a vertical cut in the
rock between two tunnels. In the tunnel above, the floors had partially collapsed, revealing the
corridor several metres below. Nubis had used explosives to seal one end of the lower tunnel,
funnelling the tyranids into a dead end.
Turk and B Platoon stood on the ledge above, firing down at the tyranids as they streamed into
the pit. The fighting was intense, the fast-moving enemy often got through the tunnel passage and
scaled the walls before anyone managed to draw a bead on them. Regardless, Anuman’s men did
their work with ruthless efficiency, standing firm, wearing their best scowls, and firing down a
steady hail of punishment.
“Lieutenant-Colonel Iban Salid, respond!” Nisri’s voice called over the micro-bead.
Turk stepped back from the ledge and let another Guardsman slip into his spot. “Yes, sir,” Turk
responded, cupping one hand over his ear to hear better.
“What’s your situation?”
“Tunnel Four is secure for the moment. We’ll run out of ammo before they gain any real
advantage.”
“Don’t underestimate them,” Nisri said. “They’re widening the chokepoint. I’m not sure how
much longer we can last after that. Make sure they don’t find a way around you!”
“Understood!” Turk turned in time to hear the screams. A leaper managed to leap up to the ledge
and grab a soldier’s leg. It pulled him down into the pit. The platoon killed the tyranid under a
pounding onslaught, but the Guardsman was already dead, impaled through the chest, stomach and
neck on the spiked backs of the enemies.
“Fill that gap!” Turk ordered, but a fresh soldier was already on it. He took his place at the ledge
and began firing down with his lasgun.
“Captain Nehari,” Nisri said over the micro-bead, “respond.”
Captain Lakoom Nehari and F Platoon protected the chokepoint of Tunnel Two. It was supposed to
be the easiest job of the lot, the chokepoint a “squeeze”, a tight tunnel that the Guardsmen jokingly
called “the birth hole”. At least they thought it was funny, until the tight hole birthed a steady stream
of small tyranids, leapers and runners mostly. Nehari and his men thought they had a handle on the
situation up to a moment ago, when snake tyranids tunnelled through and suddenly, two more “birth
holes” opened in the wall.
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Now the horde was squeezing through three holes, and Nehari wasn’t blind to the steady
pounding of heavy stubbers and las-fire that further chipped at the walls surrounding the chokepoint.
“Captain Nehari, respond,” Nisri demanded.
“I heard, sir. The snakes are widening the chokepoint here as well. We now have three — damn
it, four, four holes!” Nehari screamed as a snake smashed through another portion of the wall and
scrambled up the tunnel towards them. The hail of blasts tore it to shreds, but it was too late. The
damage to the chokepoint was done, the rock peeling away in large chunks.
“Our chokepoint won’t last much longer,” Nehari responded into the micro-bead.
“Hold your position for as long as you can,” Nisri responded. “Commissar Rezail, are you
listening?”
Nehari returned his attention to the fight. It was becoming frantic. The Guardsmen of F Platoon
realised they would be swarmed the moment the chokepoint collapsed.
“Blow the third and fourth rings of shaped charges!” Nehari shouted.
“…are you listening?”
“Can barely hear you,” Rezail responded. He fired a bolt pistol, having swapped out his laspistol
in favour of something with more kick. The tunnels shook from two distant explosions rattled off in
quick succession.
“For the Emperor!” Rezail shouted in Tallarn.
The forces of Captain Toria’s C Platoon and Sergeant Nubis’ A Platoon shouted out a cheer at
the commissar’s near-fluent mastery of their tongue. Tunnel Three was, by far, the most heavily
contested section. It was wider and higher than the others, with a chokepoint that split the
passageway to the left, towards Toria’s Platoon or to the right towards Nubis. The crossfire was
whittling the tyranids down considerably, but the passages were clogged with their bodies.
Unfortunately, after an hour of fighting, the tyranids had managed to break down part of the wall
between the two split tunnels that formed the inseam of the chokepoint, widening it considerably.
Now tyranids filled the tunnel like a living plug, their numbers scrambling on the floor, scurrying on
the walls and scampering along the ceilings.
While the creatures were no longer caught in the crossfire, the two passages were wide enough
for the four heavy stubber nests to spit out thick ropes of tracer fire, while the firing lines of
Guardsmen were staggered three deep. One group was on their stomachs, the second on their knees,
and the third standing. Occasionally, the sharp crack of an explosion filled the corridor with a
deafening snap, pasting tyranids against the wall and splattering viscera on the men. How many
explosives Nubis had planted played on everyone’s curiosity, but they were definitely taking their
toll on the enemy, and adding the stench of fyceline to the already heavy aroma of ozone, cordite
and tyranid entrails.
Commissar Rezail and Tyrell stood with the men of the last row, firing their bolt pistols and
shouting encouragements at the troops. The commissar also carried his chainsword, waiting for the
moment when he would need it in close quarters combat. Nubis also took his share of the line, firing
a heavy stubber with cycling barrels, and an ammunition chain fed from the pack mounted on his
back. He cycled through his store of hollow points, delighting in the shrieks of his enemies, the near
solid stream of tracers cutting the enemy in half.
Kamala Noore stood behind the left stubber nest, biding her time, which naturally set the
gunnery crew on edge. She appeared dazed, unfocused as though the battle was an echo to some
greater truth. She was waiting for something, her fist clenching and releasing, the small sparks of
bio-electricity sheathing her wrist with each flex. That small display of power occasionally found
release when a tyranid ventured too close to the skirmish line. Kamala’s attention found focus, and
she lashed out with her mind, a flare of psychic electricity slamming into the beast and bursting it
open. Then she returned to waiting.
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The desert seemed empty again, the sand scored by millions of tracks. The sound of screeching
tyranids was loud, the host of beasts clustered at the cave mouth, eager to get inside. A brood of
tyranids each with four legs, a scorpion’s tails and the armoured snout of a war hound, ventured out
further, sniffing about here and there, but the fighting quickly drew them back to the tunnels.
On a ridge of dunes that overlooked the surrounding desert and the pillars of rock, a small
section of sand shifted and spilled away. Two Guardsmen, members of Nubis’ anti-armour squad,
quietly crawled out from under their blankets. They’d been watching everything, waiting for their
time to strike.
One of the soldiers pressed his micro-bead twice, generating a burst of static that squawked in
his earpiece. A moment later more static bursts rang back, each unit reporting its readiness, seven in
total. Everyone was in place.
The soldiers retrieved their portable missile launcher from the pit and unwrapped it from its
swaddling cloth. It was a heavy device, a shoulder mounted weapon that required a gunner to handle
the tube-like launcher, and a loader to carry three spare missiles strapped to his chest via a weight
distribution rigging. Both men belly crawled to the lip of the dune and gazed down at the cave
entrance.
The swell of tyranids was staggering. They seemed to number in the thousands, the swarms
restless and eager to get inside. Some were huge, larger than the smoking ruin of a Chimera that had
been flipped over near the tunnel mouth, apparently larger even than the tunnels. The two soldiers
exchanged glances, but said nothing. Instead, they quickly searched the desert for the three other
anti-armour crews, but with their tan and orange uniforms and camo-painted launchers, they would
be difficult to spot. That was for the best.
Both men quickly shook hands and embraced. There was never any illusion that they would
survive this thing, and there was no lingering on their fate. What came, came. The gunner set about
making himself comfortable and acquiring targets through the launcher’s scope. The loader removed
two pressure plate mines from his rucksack and buried them on side of him and the gunner. He
planted a small twig to mark their positions. At no time did he stand, instead shifting around on his
belly like a snake, careful to avoid being seen over the dune’s crest.
A static squawk sounded over the micro-bead. Slowly, over a matter of minutes, seven static
bursts filled their earpieces. The two Guardsmen were the last to sound theirs. They followed it up
with a four burst squawk. Nobody replied. They didn’t need to. They were too busy firing at will.
