Warsong (Hunter-Killer #2)

Chapter 37 - Pest Control

"On our way," Brackenshaw replied. A wrenching turn of the skiff confirmed that her pilot had gotten the message. With the Scraegans taking some of the pressure off, the Vanyr's elite tanks accelerated out of the melee, cannons blasting at the fresh groups of Crawlers that came spilling from the tunnels around them. The Hunter-Killers raced along in their wake, pairing off to shepherd individual tanks as they charged.

The vanguard of the human force pressed on relentlessly, and all the while the Mammoths grumbled along unheeding, crushing abandoned equipment and Crawler corpses beneath their tremendous mass.

Sweeping her own detachment into a screen in front of the tanks, Brackenshaw fired over, and over, and over, her shoulder beginning to ache from the constant recoil of her rifle. The colossal forms of the Crawlers flashed by her, snapping and snarling at the fast-moving skiff. She ducked as one lashed its tail at them, ripping a deep gouge in the flank armour. The skiff rocked, but mercifully remained upright.

As they spun around for their reverse pass, however, she spotted that the lead tank in Vanyr's formation had become isolated, its Hunter-Killer escorts bogged down with more Crawlers as the vehicle barrelled onward. Her eyes widened when she saw a trio of the creatures converging on it from all sides.

"Drown me, Rankil, get us over there!" Brackenshaw ordered, before yelping out a warning. "AC-1, you have incoming!"
"Copy that."

There was cold anger in Brigadier Vanyr's voice, but no trace of fear or panic. She might have been a northern officer, but she'd led the tank battalions through a baptism of fire in the southern campaign. She knew how to fight, and knew how to adapt, and Brackenshaw saw the proof up close with her own eyes.

The turret of the command tank twisted to the left, even as the machine's thick-toothed treads churned, ripping up rock and dirt to spin in the opposite direction. The short, broad barrel flashed once and the Crawler encroaching from the rear had several legs shattered, the shell ripping across the thing's flank and tearing through its armoured exoskeleton like paper. The Crawler went down, shrieking and leaking thick grey blood onto the torn earth.

Swinging violently to the right, the driver gunned the engine to disgorge a deep throated bellow as the heavy tank accelerated, and ploughed into the second Crawler head on. Taken by surprise, the creature didn't have time to react, and after a few seconds of scrabbling helplessly at the sloped front armour, the arthropod was dragged beneath the churning treads. Ninety tons of mechanised death rolled over it, leaving a bloodied, broken, twitching mess behind.

The third Crawler leapt high, arcing vengefully down towards the tank. The turret traversed with desperate speed, swinging to bear on the new threat with just seconds to spare. The monster fell; the barrel rose to meet it.

The cannon fired.

At virtually point blank range, the blast blew the Crawler in half, its thick carapace disintegrating as the high explosive round struck it dead centre. Limbs and gore splattered in all directions across the gully floor, and the tank rumbled forwards, crushing the remains carelessly under its bulk.

"All units," Vanyr snarled over the wide-band. "On my lead."

*

The comm chatter in his ears was driving him mad. Inside the Mammoth, Ryke and the other Dreadnought pilots had no choice but to wait, and trust their companions, but he didn't know how much longer he could sit still, knowing what was happening outside.

The whole Mammoth shuddered as the guns on its lower decks fired; Ryke could see gunnery crews racing back and forth, wheeling fresh magazines and bellowing orders at each other. A battering thudthudthudthud reverberated through the interior of the mighty vehicle. It felt like he'd been stuck inside this Mammoth forever, with no eyes on the outside world, forced to keep his reactor dark to conserve every scrap of energy for when it was needed.