expect you to cover me at all times. If I move, you move, understood?”
“Understood, sir,” said Stavin plainly. As usual, there was no hint of disrespect or resentment in
the young trooper’s tone. Karif was almost disappointed. There had to be more to him than the
diffident exterior he always presented.
“Sergeant Grodolkin,” said Karif, “let’s move it out.”
“Right behind you, sir,” replied Grodolkin.
Karif drew his chainsword with his right hand. With his left, he drew his laspistol. He faced
Grodolkin’s squad and thrust the chainsword into the air, shouting, “With me, Firstborn! To glory
and honour!” Then he turned and led the charge towards the square.
Shalkova.
The name of Trooper Zavim Sarovic’s beloved rifle was Shalkova.
Sarovic had named her after the first and only Vostroyan woman he’d ever bedded. There had
been women on other worlds since, but none of them had ever made such an impression on him as
Shalkova.
He’d been a teenager at the time, freshly graduated from basic training, and released from duty
for the last few days he’d ever spend on his home world. It was extremely rare for the firstborn sons
of Vostroya ever to return. Just like the other graduates, Sarovic had been given a roll of notes and
told to go out and find himself a willing partner. He was supposed to give the gift of his seed back to
the world that had raised him.
It was a Firstborn tradition that Sarovic’s drill-sergeant insisted he keep.
Sarovic had always considered himself a fumbler where the opposite sex was concerned. With
no real idea of how to secure a willing partner, he’d attached himself to a group of troopers that
were going to one of the more notorious entertainment districts not far from the base.
He hadn’t had much luck at first. It was getting late. Most of the others had paired off with
women who seemed very keen to accept the honour of Firstborn seed. Sarovic’s lack of confidence
was letting him down. The only thing he was confident about was his skill with a sniper rifle. He’d
already been singled out for special training. He’d almost given up on meeting anyone, when a
skinny girl staggered drunkenly through the door, tripped on her own feet, and spilled her drink over
his good, clean uniform.
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He’d been livid, and had chewed her out immediately. But rather than cower before his anger,
the girl, unremarkable but for her big brown eyes, had shouted right in his face, telling him to shut
up, sit down, and get over himself. Sarovic still didn’t know why he’d done exactly that. Maybe
basic training had conditioned him to take orders on reflex.
A few moments later, she reappeared from the bar, slamming two drinks down in front of him.
Without waiting to be invited, she dropped herself into the chair next to his, and began to ask him
about himself. Sarovic couldn’t remember even the smallest snippet of the conversation, only that
he’d thought over and over again that her perfume smelled nice. Before he knew it, they were back
at her scruffy little hab, thrashing around on the bed together as if every second counted.
In the morning, when Sarovic woke up, he’d been confused by his surroundings. Then he’d seen
her standing over a blue flame, cooking breakfast. He’d thrown her a smile. She didn’t smile back.
Shalkova: cold and silent and deadly. She never missed.
He racked the slide, chambering his next bullet.
He’d never understood why the girl had turned nasty on him. From the moment he got out of her
bed, she’d attacked him with a vicious critique of his efforts at love-making the previous night. Her
taunts were cruel, and her laughter, more so. The breakfast she cooked was hers. He could buy his
own or go hungry. She didn’t care. She’d chased him from her door, his uniform stained and in
disarray, her taunts following him along garbage filled alleyways as the Vostroyan sky brightened
overhead.
Did she bear me a son, he wondered? A daughter? Anything?
He’d asked himself a dozen times, but he supposed that it didn’t really matter. He would never
know for sure. She represented a single wonderful, terrible night in his life. Her touch had thrilled
him. Her words had been as cold and cruel as bullets, fired to inflict maximum damage. So, he’d
named his rifle after her.
He pressed his right eye to the scope and adjusted the zoom to bring his target into clear focus.
Range, about six hundred metres. Wind, negligible.
Snipers from other companies tended to favour the long-las. It was a fine weapon, highly
accurate, but its bright beam gave the shooter’s position away. On the orders of the late Major
Dubrin, Fifth Company snipers employed hand-crafted, Vostroyan-made rifles that fired solid
ammunition. It was a harder weapon to master than the long-las, but a sniper with good cover could
take down target after target without giving himself away.
Shalkova was fitted with flash and noise suppressors. Sarovic enjoyed friendly competition with
another sniper from First Platoon called “Clockwork” Izgorod. Each man had made a wager on who
would rack up the most kills throughout this Danikkin Campaign. So far, old Clockwork was in the
lead, but his numerous augmetics gave him something of an advantage.
Sarovic centred his sights on the target. It was a massive, dark skinned ork in the front ranks of
the charging horde. The monster wore a necklace of severed human hands strung on barbed wire.
Emperor above, thought Sarovic, these beasts are foul.
He breathed out slowly as he squeezed Shalkova’s trigger. There was a whisper of rushing air. In
the scope, he saw the ork’s head jerk backwards. The fiend sank to the ground with a neat black hole
punched in its skull. The other orks trampled over the body, hardly noticing it.
Another deadly word from the lips of Shalkova, he thought. You never tire of killing, do you,
my love?
Sarovic imagined he could smell perfume. He racked the slide and chambered another bullet.
The square was full of them now, orks of every shape and size stumbling over each other in their
eagerness to engage the Vostroyans. Hundreds, maybe thousands more, were still trying to push
their way forward. Retreat for the orks trapped in the square was impossible, such was the crash at
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their backs. Kabanov watched it all play out as he’d known it would. In the course of his career,
he’d seen them make the same mistakes time and time again.
The greenskins just couldn’t control their urge to fight. If they’d landed here on Danik’s World
to find a lifeless rock, they’d have simply fought amongst themselves.
Kabanov leaned from the window and loosed another shot down into the orks. He’d already lost
count of his kills and the battle had been raging for mere minutes. He pulled the trigger of his
hellpistol again, but nothing happened. The power pack was spent. As he drew a fresh one from a
pouch on his belt, he remembered other scenes just like this one. The press of orks out there in the
square was almost as dense as it had been on the bridge at Dunan thirty-five years ago. It had been
the same in the canyon on… where was it again? There had been so many battles.
He slammed the fresh power pack into the pistol’s socket and resumed firing. With the orks
bunched so tight down there, every single shot found a mark. Green bodies crumpled to the ground
clutching the black pits the pistol burned in their chests and bellies. The hellpistol, a House Kabanov
heirloom, still performed with lethal efficiency despite over three centuries of service.
From positions of cover, both high and low, Firstborn troopers fired again and again into the
mass of enemies. There was so much lasfire it hurt Kabanov’s eyes, but the orks were fighting back.
Some began throwing grenades at the windows from which Kabanov’s men fired.
Most of the grenades clattered off the walls, falling to the snow below or bouncing back towards
the orks at the fringes. They detonated noisily on open ground, causing welcome greenskin
casualties, but a percentage of the grenades found their mark, gliding through the openings they’d
been aimed at.
Muffled booms echoed over the square, and black smoke billowed from old habs. Tumbling red
forms plummeted from some of the smoking windows, to land in unmoving heaps on the snow.
“Men are dying out there!” barked Kabanov. “Where are my flanking squads?”
On the colonel’s right, Captain Sebastev was pouring shots down on the horde from a smashed
window, his bolt pistol barking aggressively. There was a feral look on the man’s face as his finger
squeezed the trigger again and again. “We need some fire on those black, battle-scarred ones,” said
Sebastev. “They’re leading the charge.”
Kabanov scanned the green mob and found the individuals in question, three of them standing in
the centre of the horde. These ork leaders bellowed orders to their kin in the inscrutable series of
grunts and snorts that constituted the ork language.
“Colonel,” said Captain Sebastev between shots, “I’d like to send an order to First Platoon’s
snipers to take them out.”
“Do so at once, captain. The enemy is pressing uncomfortably close to the east edge of the
square. I’m still waiting for my bloody flanking squads.”
“They’re on their way, sir,” reported Lieutenant Kuritsin, “but Third Platoon reports contact
with orks sneaking through the backstreets. They’re engaging them now.”
“Sneaking?” said Captain Sebastev. “Orks don’t sneak, Rits.”
“Lieutenant Vassilo was very specific about it, sir. He reported a squad of orks employing
something almost like stealth tactics, sir.”
Captain Sebastev turned to look at Kabanov and said, “If our flanking squads are engaged before
they get to the square, sir, we’re in a lot of trouble. The orks are still pouring in. We need those
squads here. The crossfire must hold until the sappers are done!”
“We’ve got to be on our way,” said Kabanov. “What’s the word from our demolition squad?”
Lieutenant Kuritsin voxed an update request to Fifth Company’s sappers. The men under the
command of Sergeant Barady of Fifth Platoon had been given a special mission of their own. Like
most Danikkin towns, Korris had been built around a geothermal energy sink. The massive
structures generated tremendous amounts of electrical power. Barady’s sapper team was charged
with denying the orks this valuable energy source. Enginseer Politnov had advised the sappers how
39
the charges might be set to cause a significant explosion, one that would level most of the town.
With Colonel Kabanov personally ordering a full withdrawal, Fifth Company had one final chance
to deal devastating damage to the orks that had troubled them for the last two years.
“Our sappers report a problem, sir. They’re proceeding to rig the charges, but they’re under fire.
Sergeant Barady says he’ll need twice as much time to complete his mission if his men keep having
to defend themselves.”
“Damn it,” barked Kabanov, “it’s all going to hell. There is no more time.”
Just as he spoke, however, the orks began falling back to the centre of the square, desperate to
escape a sudden and massive increase in las-fire from the avenues to the north and south.
“Our flanking squads are here, sir,” reported Captain Sebastev. He began firing again from his
position at the window.
Kabanov saw the full might of Fifth Company hit the orks. It was a wonderful sight, reminiscent
of so many old victories, proud Vostroyan Firstborn marching in ordered rows from the openings on
north and south sides, loosing well-ordered volleys into the desperate alien foe.
The square was being covered, metre by metre, under a growing carpet of dead orks. Ork blood
had turned the snow into a dark red slush.
“Outstanding,” said Kabanov. He turned to his adjutant, Maro. “Now that’s a wonderful sight,
wouldn’t you say?”
“Wonderful, sir,” said Maro.
“Sir,” said Kuritsin. “Squad Barady is again calling for urgent assistance. What is your
response?”
Kabanov quickly assessed the situation in the square. The orks were being murdered in great
numbers. They returned fire and tried to charge the Vostroyans with cleavers held high, but
Vostroyan discipline was unbreakable and, no matter how great the difference in numbers, the
enemy rabble was faltering in the face of it.
“Very well, lieutenant,” said Kabanov turning, “order Squad Breshek to break from the attack on
the market square and divert to the power plant. The sooner we get that thing rigged to blow, the
sooner we can pull out and leave Korris to the orks and their doom.”
Sebastev spoke from his position at the window. “Commissar Karif looks to be enjoying
himself.”
The commissar was down in the streets, alongside Sergeant Grodolkin and his men. The
commissar’s gleaming chainsword was raised aloft, and he seemed to be orating to the squad as they
fired volley after volley at the massed foe.
I’d like to hear what he’s saying, thought Kabanov. I notice Father Olov is conspicuously quiet.
I wonder if he’s wary of broadcasting a reading with the new commissar around to hear it.
At the thought of Fifth Company’s battle hardened priest, Kabanov scanned the square and saw
him almost at once. He stood out clearly in his tan robes, brightly chequered at the hem and sleeves,
yelling at the top of his voice to the men of Squad Svemir. He swung his massive eviscerator
chainsword again and again, hewing apart the luckless orks that came at him.
Half-mad he may be, thought Kabanov, but what a fighter.
One of the squads on the north side, Squad Breshek, broke from the battle in the square and
pounded north, racing to the aid of the beleaguered sappers. The other squads tried to cover the gap
this created, but the orks noticed the absence of pressure from that quarter and immediately moved
to take advantage.
Without waiting for Kabanov’s approval, Captain Sebastev ordered Squads Ludkin and Basch to
spread out, cutting off any chance of an ork pursuit of Squad Breshek. Sergeant Breshek would have
enough to deal with at the power plant without having to worry about orks at his back.
Kabanov felt momentarily irritated by Sebastev’s presumption, but the order was exactly the one
he would have given, had he been quicker off the mark. Sebastev must have sensed his colonel’s
40
irritation, because he stopped firing briefly, turned to his superior officer and bowed. “My apologies,
colonel. It was wrong of me to… usurp your authority.”
