“Ready!” Kirk shouted, peering from a half-ruined cover on the bridge. A burst from his shardgun forced the approaching raiders to duck into cover.
Kalaisa decided it was funny. Her brother stammered when he talked to her directly, but in the heat of battle, animosity between her and her family was taking a backseat, and they worked together, saving lives where they could. The last of the APCs sped past Kirk, their engines roaring, from an underground tunnel opened by the miners. Holes and dents covered their sides, their anti-personnel rotating auto-cannons long since destroyed, and terrified civilians huddled closer together inside the vehicles.
The packs had repeated this dance for over a day, sending convoys to safety and waiting for the technicians to patch what they could, then providing cover for the returning vehicles, trying to push back the hordemen as the APCs returned underground to receive maintenance and more civilians to carry over. The Horde closed in, securing their siege perimeter, and their squads fired on the convoys from a distance. Several APCs had been downed, their wreckage still smoking on the cratered road.
Burned trees, wrecked cars, and corpses littered the entrance to the bridge leading into the woods. The Horde had not used their excellent heavy artillery to smash any resistance for fear of destroying the structure they had fought so long for, but Kalaisa’s ears picked up the loud clanking and stomping of advancing walkers. Precise and powerful laser cannons had already left their mark on her pack, and she wanted to have nothing to do with them in the open field anymore.
“Got it!” Her finger pressed a remote, and a mushroom grew at the underground entrance, sealing it for hours. Militia and miners led thousands of refugees through the underground tunnels as the Wolfkins retreated, surrendering this side to the Horde.
The retreat was in full swing.
Guttural commands barked through the chaos of combat, and a crescent of explosions tossed tons of concrete into the air. Electric currents danced over the destroyed surface, fired in arcs by the hordemen’s analog of mine clearance platoons. Shots landed against APVs, widening the cracks and sending two spinning. Sensing exposed prey and a shift in the battle, the enemy leaders sent their horde on another charge to claim their prize.
Unfortunately for them, their opponents were Wolfkins. Grenades whistled over Kalaisa’s head, and she somersaulted backward, abandoning the front line. Heh. Never thought I’d ever be the first to break from a fight. She graciously landed next to the first stuck APC and grabbed it as it was about to tip over the edge. The servomotors whined as she pushed herself to the limit and pulled the vehicle back onto the bridge.
“Thank you, Miss!” She blinked at wide-eyed crimson eyes peering at her through the gash.
“Do you want to lose those blinkers?! Step away from the breach, dolt!” Kalaisa snapped, and the boy’s parents drew him away. “I mean, don’t mention it, thanks, little squirt.” She readied her grenade launcher, guarding the vehicle. “You two really don’t know how to fight?” she asked without a hint of sarcasm.
“Never held a gun in my life,” said the mother.
“Cool! Safe journeys,” Kalaisa told her, and leapt back into the fray, firing at the approaching group of hordemen.
The grenade flew in an arc and landed on them just as they stepped into the first of the prepared pitfalls. Their heavy plates saved the idiots from getting skewered upon the sticking sharpened rebars, but the shockwave from the explosion and the shrapnel it unleashed splattered the hapless idiots against the wall, shattering their visors and sending splinters into their faces, blinding and crippling if not killing them.
Strange. Kalaisa’s paws reloaded the launcher, her voice giving orders to Eled and her own pack, guiding them along the retreat, and her mind clung to the woman’s words. What was it like to live a life where you never had to lift a weapon or train how to kill? Clearly not the most efficient way to live. She decided, landing a grenade on another group and sending men and women flying down the chasm. But also kind of cute. I wish we had a chance… Familiar screaming filled the air, and she snapped out of her fantasies.
For the many to live in peace, the few had to serve.
“Stay alert, people; riders incoming!” Kalaisa warned. “Incendiary rounds, fast!”
As one, the soldiers in the front row dropped to their knees and replaced their ammunition. Grenade launchers fired deadly munitions as the first hoverbikes pierced the smoke, approaching the group and firing their pulse rifles. A Wolfkin died as an energy ball impaled her between the eyes. Another fall on the ground, hissing and pressing paws to the missing temporomandibular joint. More bodies dropped, gasping for air, their chests full of holes.
“Cook them!” Kalaisa roared eagerly, and her soldiers fired, covering the entrance to the bridge in hellfire.
They immediately heard screams accompanied by bursts from the hoverbikes’ generators. Her theory was correct. After reviewing the records and consulting with Ignacy, Kalaisa concluded the hoverbikes sacrificed protection for maneuverability and speed; their riders relied on pulse rifles and grievous blades to swiftly mow down the opposition. The incendiary grenades spread a flammable liquid designed to damage battleplate alloys, and it now had a stunning effect, driving survivors away in panic and detonating energy cells.
Not every hordemen perished in the fire, and several broke through, straight into a hail of incoming shards. One calmly tossed his rifle aside, maneuvered through the projectiles, and closed in on Sheeren, the wolf hag of the late Eled.
Long blades nearly caught her at the waist as Kirk jerked the woman back as their sister fired into the hoverbike’s engine, detonating it. The hordeman jumped off it and spun in the air, evading projectiles with uncharacteristic agility. He landed, sweeping their brother off his feet; an elbow dropped their sister face down, and the man’s arm reached for a shardgun, raising it to fire at Kirk.
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Kalaisa wanted to be there, to take a shot for her family. She owed them that and more. But it wasn’t her zone of responsibility, and the wolf hag took over Sheeren’s command, barking orders to grab the injured and keep firing at the hordemen.
She wasn’t alone. It was a rather difficult lesson to learn, and a cry of exultation left her lips at a kick that sent the shardgun spinning skyward. Rage and hatred still tugged at her heartstrings, reminding the wolf hag of the monster she was, and she indulged that impulse, stomping blindingly fast on the hoverbike approaching her troops. Its nose scratched the ground, her paw closed in on the rider’s head, tearing it off, and then she tossed the stupid toy and it blew away from the front. Strong. Stronger than anyone here. The desire to rend and feast throbbed in her mind, claiming that she alone had the strength to turn the situation around.
But she had grown accustomed to relying on and cooperating with others.
Sheeren closed in on the raider, paw against hand, and the raider punched her in the head, rocking the wolf hag and utilizing all the agility his lighter armor granted him. Sheeren tilted back, one leg off the ground, her paw still glued to his right hand, and the man wrapped his left arm around her shoulder, preparing to slam the wolfkin to the ground. A sudden pain under his shoulder blade stopped him as the wolf hag clawed at him, and he broke the grip, retreating in vain as the jaws closed on his visor, biting through it and taking his nose.
A single leg moved the wolf hag back upright from a horizontal position, fast enough so that she would be able to deliver a bone-shattering kick with another over the hordeman’s elbow, crumbling the softer protection. Sheeren shared her late grandmother’s personality, occasionally bursting into fits of unyielding rage, but she took her fighting style from her older mother, combining planning and skill rather than trying to overwhelm her opponent.
The hordeman’s working hand moved to a pistol on his belt and twitched as the previously kicked shardgun fell into the wolf hag’s paws, and she fired thrice to topple the enemy, then tossed it to Kalaisa’s brother.
“Thanks,” Sheeren growled, her claws slipping from the paw as the shocked Kirk shook it. “Name’s Sheeren.”
“K-Kirk. At your service, Wolf Hag!” He glanced nervously as the claws snapped in front of his nose, twisting left and right to catch the dim sunlight shining through the surrounding smoke.
“Don’t scratch my brother!” Kalaisa’s brother stood and fired in the smoke. “It was my fault, not his…”
“Shhhh,” their sister placed a paw on his shoulder and glared at Kalaisa. “It’s not that.”
“But… What? Oh…”
“Stop talking and worry about your hides, idiots!” Kalaisa roared from the opposite side of the bridge, forcing them to duck behind a rubble. “I can’t kill everyone myself! So do your part!”
“Yes, Wolf Hag!”
Lucky devil, eh? Best of luck to you, Kirk. Her kicks hurt. Her ribs still pulsed a little after their domination match for supremacy. Sheeren was too quirky for her taste. One second, she was full of grief, ready to push ahead and die, and after losing shamelessly, she joined the planning as if nothing had happened. If she breaks your heart, I’ll break her.
Scraping of treads against the concrete alerted Kalaisa as their packs reached the middle of the bridge, entering a narrowed line that was dredged by a shell in a recent bombardment. Kalaisa had spotted this route in advance, and the surrounding wreckage provided a modicum of cover from the burst of gunfire coming from the western side.
They loaded their wounded onto the stuck transport and pushed it out of the crater. An armored personnel carrier drove out of the smoke, its broad hull silvery and bristling with guns that sang, spewing projectiles that drummed against the Wolfkins’ power armors, throwing her soldiers back. The intensity of the streaking bullets knocked three of her soldiers off the edge in front of her eyes. Cracks spread across her soldier’s suit, and it burst like an eggshell, spilling the body inside.
“Aim for the cannons!” Kalaisa snarled, shoving a male into the cover. In the tribe’s tradition, this was considered heresy, as the lives of the males were to be put first so that the females would not be harmed. Also, the value of the wolf hags exceeded that of the humans in the transport.
And she didn’t care. They would get out of here together and let the shamans kiss her ass if they wanted to complain. Kalaisa was sick of letting others die because of her.
“ETA on our reinforcements?” she asked, taking aim and firing at the cannon. Her grenade exploded next to the weapon, bathing it in searing flame, and the rotating doomsday song stopped with a creak. On her HUD, the icons of the soldiers who had fallen into the canyon blinked and went dark.
Curses. She hoped they would survive the impact and crawl to safety. But the main caliber did too much damage to their armors.
“Pack Anissa is approaching our position; the artillery will be in place in two minutes,” Kirk reported.
“Good! Keep retreating; we’ll see them dead yet!”
Explosions covered the Horde carrier, several blasts merging into a large fireball that engulfed most of the cannons and enveloped the machine in an orange sphere. Noises of detonating ammunition rang out briefly, and then a single, loud, skull-splitting scream silenced them as a projectile flew past Kalaisa, shearing a chunk of metal from her pauldron and snapping the arm of a Wolfkin behind her.
The carrier’s doors opened and a bareheaded woman stepped out, swatting at the nearest tongues of flame with her long sword. Dreadlocks of her short, raven hair dangled in the wind; she easily matched Kalaisa in height, and the cumbersome combat plate helped her dwarf any wolf hag in width. In her arm was a heavily modified gun, and she squeezed the trigger, writhing in pleasure at the resulting cacophony of noise.
“Let’s make some widows!” she roared.
“Widowmaker! Widowmaker!” a battle cry thundered as the carrier disgorged dozens of soldiers.
Each wore a full suit of heavy battle armor covering them from head to toe. No two were alike. Gold and deep blue paint in bizarre patterns adorned the chest plates; rubies, diamonds, and jade necklaces hung from arms, necks, and even legs. They carried tower shields in one arm and crackling morning stars in another, eagerly charging at the Wolfkins.
The two forces collided in an eruption of violence. Shards ricocheted off shields, gouging dents in them; morning stars slammed into bodies, shattering plates; claws slashed, shredding steel and flesh. In a whirlwind of battle, Kalaisa found Widowmaker and parried a fatal blow aimed at the base of her brother’s neck. Widowmaker whirled, firing at her from close range, and the wolf hag stepped back, striking instinctively and feeling something hot run down her cheek. The helmet saved Kalaisa’s life as the bullet bounced off it but still tore a third of it off, exposing the wolf hag’s left eye to the world and lacerating hide.
“Shit…” Widowmaker glanced at the ruined gun in her hand and tossed it aside. “I liked the toy. Don’t be so gloomy. I merely put us on an equal footing, honey.”
“Trust me.” That bitch almost killed her brother! Callously, casually, mercilessly! And yet Kalaisa spoke in a reasonable tone, noting two approaching hordemen, registering every twitch and movement of the woman before her. Something deeper and more ancient than she had ever imagined touched her, frightening the wolf hag to the point of heightening her senses. Usually Kalaisa tensed in such moments, but now her body was relaxed. She dodged the shot. She blocked the strike. Widowmaker wasn’t stronger than her. “You don’t want anything I am right now.”
The Wolfkin with the broken arm was behind her. There could be no retreat.
“I beg to differ.” Widowmaker exhaled, opening her eyes wide. “That look of yours. It’s thrilling!”