'Shit, shit, shit, shit, SHIT!' shouted Ball as he steered the Gungnir behind a small hill in the nick of time, a trio of shells embedding themselves into it.

'Four moving towards our front, going to appear in seven!' Jeffers shouted, eyes glued to the scanner.

'HEAT rounds, Crank! All of them!' Gunny commanded, already swivelling the turret back towards the front. Crank rushed to obey and manually slammed the heavy shell into the loader, his arms pulling taut as the old veteran ignored the slightly slower automated systems.

'Twelve behind us, four ahead. Likely three more somewhere. Solar, come in! This is Green three! Solar! Enemy squadron on the right flank! Possibly more! We're engaging but won't hold long!' Sweat ran down Prance's forehead as the heavy tank jostled its occupants. They had been on the far flank of the assault when a Novican squadron had charged them, materialising from God knows where. Green four had taken out two before their armour had given out and they had been blown to kingdom come by a rain of shells. Now they were after him and his crew, but Ballerina wasn't making it easy on the enemy, steering the heavy tank with all the grace of his namesake.

'Gunny, I'm swerving in three!' their driver shouted.

'Got it!'

They cleared the hill and Ball slammed the brakes on one tread, sending the tank into a skid. The very moment they lost the cover of the hill, two enemy tanks came into view and immediately opened fire, realising too late that they were facing the front of the Gungnir rather than its vulnerable flank. Gunny ignored the deafening impacts as the Novican shells bounced off the heavy armour plates and took careful aim, then fired. The other two tanks that Jeffers had warned them for showed up just as the HEAT shell tore into the first Novican vehicle, slammed the lower front plate and detonated, sending the newly created wreck sailing through the air.

Wrecking the gears, Ball shifted the Gungnir in reverse and the engine whined in defiance of the extraordinary stress, but it obeyed and the behemoth began to race backwards as more shells ricocheted from the sloped front. The Novicans rapidly shifted their attack pattern and raced after their foe, the three tanks quickly spreading out in order to get a clear shot on a weaker flank, before Crank managed to reload and a heartbeat later a second enemy went up in flames as Gunny demolished it entirely by shoving the round through the mudguard and into the crew compartment. Add the three kills they had scored when they had started their swift retreat, that meant the Novicans were now seven down. Leaving at least another seventeen tanks out there. If there was only the one squadron.

'Message received, Green three. Sensors show a full wing heading towards us, minus the squadron chasing you. Keep them off our flanks as long as you can. Delay and survival is paramount,' came Solar's reply. Prance cursed. He could read between the lines and it meant that this armoured spearhead was going to raise hell in the Imperial lines for a bit. Well, he thought with a grimace, at least I can make surviving a priority.

'Quick update, we're on distraction duty. Ball, keep us alive, Gunny, cloud us in smoke. Crank, get ready to switch ammo types frequently. Mase, Liam, back up Jeffers and look at the terrain. Jeffers, make sure the bastards don't trap us!'

'Sir!' came the united answer, the gunners abandoning their systems and fought to reorient themselves within the narrow confines until they reached the scanning systems, peeking out to study the terrain and immediately began relaying every bit of information to Ballerina, who was still driving in reverse like a man possessed.

'BRACE!' he shouted half a second before he slammed shut the brakes. Crank barely managed to hug the HEAT shell tightly before everyone was knocked around again. Nobody complained about the rough treatment, as a powerful shockwave made the tank tremble and they knew how close to death they'd come. 'Get that bastard off my flank!' the driver yelled, more annoyed than afraid.

Crank crawled back to his feet and shoved the shell into the loader, still beating the auto-loader to it, before slamming the hatch shut and diving back down towards the rest of the shells. 'Loaded!'

'One HEAT, Smoke three!' Gunnery shouted, relaying the next load order as he steadied the barrel on the rapidly moving Novican tank on their flank. Between the high speed chase and the erratic movements that Ball was doing, aiming wasn't an easy task, but that didn't deter the young soldier. A moment later he unleashed a vitriolic barrage as he narrowly missed the centre of his target, the round instead removing the left treads of the enemy. As well as part of the turning mechanism. 'Dammit!' he howled, earning him a mad grin of Prance.

'He's out Gunny, good shot.'

'I aimed for his cen—' he began before another sudden swerve shut him up. Crank fell forward, but managed to control his fall just enough for the shell to land in the loader as opposed to the floor, but hit his head against the mechanism.

'And that's why we wear helmets, Crank,' Prance joked, trying to relieve some tension. The veteran grumbled something most unkind in response.

'Four more on our tail! They're gaining!'

'This thing can't go fucking faster!'

'Dip to our right!' Liam shouted, followed by a sharp lurch as Ball made for it.

'I'll hold her stable, take the shot!'

'Hold just a... There!' Gunny let out a sigh of relief as the last of the four targets turned into a heap of scrap. From this close and with a direct line of fire, the Novican tank didn't stand a chance against the heavy shells the Gungnir was spitting out.

'Distance to closest?' Prance demanded.

'Six hundred, but I only see four! Rest is flanking!'

'Smoke rounds on marked coordinates!'

'Crank!'

'On it!'

Ten seconds later the first of the smoke rounds went off, covering the entirety of Green three's left flank in a massive smoke curtain. 'Well, there goes our communications,' Prance remarked as the compounds in the smoke evaporated and threw up a spectacular amount of blanket jamming. 'Fire the second, Ba—all!' Prance began, before being thrown about again as the driver reoriented the tank in order to drive forward again, letting them go just a little bit faster. Not that it would matter too much. The Novican vehicles, albeit slightly slower, were spread out and with every manoeuvre he pulled they gained on them. In a few moments the tanks behind them would start opening fire again and Gunny could only return it so quickly. 'Try and keep her steady and as soon as Gunny fires the third, take us to the north-east, through the smoke. With a bit of luck we'll throw the bastards off.'

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'Won't that take us even further from our forces?' Jeffers asked.

'Yeah, that's the plan. Drag them as far out as possible so the boys in the back have one squadron less to deal with.'

'Last smoke...' Gunny began, waiting for his turret to swivel, his seat holding him tightly in place as Ball performed some spectacular manoeuvring to prevent the enemy from drawing a clear bead on them. 'Away!' Gunny let out a sigh of relieve as the smoke covered every direction except the front.

'Gr—' Prance began, before a round tore through the air and slammed into their side armour. The explosion rocked their tank, but the multiple layers of armour plating held. 'Damage!' he shouted.

'Engine is damaged!' Ball reported, a mote of panic sneaking into his voice as his hands darted over the controls. 'Rerouting power, but I'm losing speed! Taking us into the smoke now. Still got control over the treads. Assessing... Damn, main motor is shutting down, auxiliary one coming online. Output is... What?' Ball's brows locked into a deep frown as he saw the energy levels spike well above their supposed limit.

'I fiddled with it!' interjected Crank. 'Output should be equal to the main engine, but it'll burn everything to a crisp in an hour!'

'Crank, you magnificnet bastard!' laughed Ball, switching the Gungnir onto the back up propulsion system. A moment later the entire crew was either bowled back or pressed into their seats as the heavy vehicle shot forward and darted into the smoke.

The crew shared a brief moment of peace, laughing as they slowly came to the realisation that they had nailed thirteen tanks in the campaign so far. 'Right, that settles it guys. We have to survive this now, just to shove the new record down Luke's throat. He only ever got to eleven.'

'Sir, seeing the edge of the smoke,' Mase commented.

Prance looked at his crew. Mase and Liam, the youngest of the two, were showing signs of mental exhaustion, which wasn't strange given that this was their first actual campaign. They weren't showing any signs of panic or fear though, which was good. They were promising kids. Then there was Crank, who was an old, weary veteran who had seen more battles than the rest of them put together and was one of the select few men in the Empire who could actually beat the auto loader of the tank. Prance wasn't worried for him. Rumour had it that you could drive the tank off a cliff and his only reaction would be giving a few choice, sassy remarks on the way down. Next you had Gunny, a bit overeager and enthusiastic, but also one of the best gunners Prance had ever seen, especially given that he had yet to miss a shot, which was no mean feat considering how irregular Ball had been driving. He turned his attention to Jeffers, who was of middle age and seemingly more panic prone, but that was merely how the man was. He seemed eternally nervous and fidgety, but nothing escaped the man when his eyes were glued to the scanner and Prance had long ago discovered that Jeffers just was one of those people who seemed eternally nervous, but really wasn't. He gave the man a thumbs up, which was returned and turned his attention to Ballerina. Quinten, as his real name was, was an insanely good driver. Before he had joined up with the Imperial military he had been a rally pilot for one of the trader Houses. Which one, nobody knew and the man wasn't keen on telling, but stuff had happened and he had been forced to run, as the House had been out for his blood. Given that the Imperial Military was the only authority who could tell the Houses to sod off, the man's choices had been rather limited. Not that Quinten had ever had cause to regret it. He lived to drive. Didn't matter what, didn't matter where. The more difficult it became, the more he enjoyed it.

It was a good crew and Prance was proud of them all. They had nettled the Novicans enough that they had sent a full squadron to wipe his tank out, rather than commit it to the main attack or whatever it was that the rest of the armoured wing was doing. He was about to give them a short speech, now that he still had the chance, because he knew they were just playing for time, given how far out they were from reinforcements, when both Liam and Mase screamed and Jeffers paled. He was about to ask why, but Jeffers beat him to the punch.

'SHOCKWAVE INCOMING!'

Prance looked at the scanners and saw a clear white line approach a location several kilometres in front of them. Its energy signature was so overwhelmingly powerful that it burned through the concealing effects of the smoke with ease and Prance glanced in disbelief at the readout. A fucking Paris had just shot a mass round at that spot. Their smoke cover was about to be fucking evaporated.

'Ball! Take us through the smoke! Get us as far to the north-east as you can! Best possible speed, just dodge the shots, don't care about anything else! They'll know where we are in a few seconds anyway! Floor it! Go go go!'

As Ball complied and the Gungnir shot out of the smoke curtain and back into sight of the enemy, Prance wondered why, God in heaven, WHY? the Imperial Navy had shot such a powerful weapon at an empty spot of land.