“Drive! By the God-Emperor, drive!” Commissar Julius Ertelt screamed as his Chimera transport vehicle bounced over the next hill.
The poor Commissar, who most definitely did not get promoted, clung onto the rim of the open hatch as he stared at the green tide behind him.
The orks had quickly began taking the planet, especially since the artillery of the Costea 301st had been all but destroyed in the initial attack. The infantry of the Imperial Guard, while numerous, was not strong enough to staunch the flow of the orks. The planet was all but lost.
“Drive faster!” the Commissar ordered, screaming as a squad of ork attack bikes roared behind them.
“We can’t go any faster, sir!” the driver said, as he double checked the Chimera’s systems with his co-pilot.
“I said, drive faster!” the Commissar said.
“Sir, we can’t—”
The report of a bolt pistol rang in the Chimera’s driving cab, and the co-pilot was then covered in a thin paste of his partner.
“I said drive faster.”
As the secondary driver suddenly found himself promoted to primary driver, the orks behind them were howling in joy. “Waaaagh!” the leader cried, the bikes bearing down on the retreating transport.
Among them was Blooddagga, riding on Scootaloo’s bike, with the pegasus riding behind. “Now remember,” she yelled, as Blooddagga continued to fire from his bayoneted slugga, “if you ruin my bike, I’ll kill you!”
“Roight, Boss, roight. Ah remembah,” he sighed.
Scootaloo began to position herself, climbing up along the back of her seat, and getting to its top. The wind rushed past her as she stood on her back legs, and her eyes narrowed as she looked down towards the fleeing machine.
She smiled.
And then she opened her wings.
They caught the air, and she quickly gained altitude, falling temporarily behind the bike squad as she flew up into the sky. She climbed the air, before leveling out to fly along with the bikes.
Humans just weren't prepared for orks to have a silent, incredibly agile flyer.
She dove, reaching incredible speeds as she began to catch the Chimera.
She slammed into the metal hull of the infantry transport, and slammed a hoof into the man screaming man on the top of it. His chest crumpled under the blow, and he fell back into the carriage below.
She leapt in after him as the Chimera ran through the debris and rubble of the city, and found herself staring at a gore-covered human driving, but staring at her with wide eyes.
“Sorry, Humie,” she said with a smirk, “nothing personal, it’s just you all have to die.”
The human spun, leaving the controls as his hand grasped for the long, green metal thing that hung on the commissar’s side. Scootaloo threw a punch that could take the guard’s head off, but he did not survive the entire campaign just to die to a single punch.
He dived under her, grabbing the thing, and pulling it free of the dead man’s belt. He held it up, and let it rev in his hands, revealing the hundreds of razor-sharp adamantium teeth of the chainsword.
Scootaloo gave a low, appreciative whistle. “Now that’s proper orky.”
The guard swung the whining blade wildly, trying desperately to save his life as the chimera jumped and bounced as it careened through the ruins of the city.
Scootaloo ducked under the blade, even as the transport bucked underneath them. Panicked, the guard swung again, aiming low this time, only for the left track of the runaway vehicle to catch on a collapsed wall, sending them up and around, and spinning in the air.
The chimera capsized, landing on its roof before bouncing, and smashing head on into a massive rockcrete pillar.
The Chimera finally came to a rest.
The bikes pulled up, surrounding the dying machine, and Blooddagga quickly crossed the difference to pry open the hatch. “Boss! Boss, ya in dere? You still livin’?”
“Ow…” came the weak reply, before Scootaloo slowly began to crawl out. “Yeah, I’m alive. I’m missing a hoof, but I’m alive.”
“Yer missin a what?” the Kommando asked.
Scootaloo rolled her eyes before lifting her left foreleg, revealing the black and red ichor that oozed from her stump. “My hand, Blooddagga.”
Blooddagga stared at her open leg. “‘Ow can ya tell? It’s still flat.”
“Well, other than the fact that it's shorter than my right leg, and the bone sticking out it, how about the fact that I’m bleeding all over the dumb trukk! Now stop gawkin’ and help me out of here!”
Blooddagga pulled her up and out of the wreckage, while Scoots nursed her severed leg. “Can you see my hoof down there?”
The kommando peered down into the ruin carriage, and at the figure of the human impaled on a chainsword, yet there was no orange hoof in sight. “Nah, can’t see it.”
Scootaloo groaned. “Great. I’m gonna hafta go to the Mekboys now.”
“Alright den, let’s go, Boss.”
Scootaloo grumbled as Blooddagga began carrying her heavily wounded body away from the crash.
---=][=---
“Zoggin’ git!” Scootaloo said as she stumbled again.
The Mek Boys had taken one look at her now-shorter leg, and instantly split into smiles at the thought of giving her a power klaw. The large, three-taloned claw could easily replace her hoof, and with its sheer crushing ability would be more than enough to add some choppiness to her mostly shooty arsenal.
Scootaloo asked how she would walk with one.
They went on to say that since she is, in her own way, a nob, then it would be perfectly fitting to give her this status symbol weapon, and they wouldn’t need to worry about any politking.
Scootaloo asked how she was going to walk again.
Combining the vicious power field that would surround her new klaw, she would be able to destroy vehicles with perfect, orky strength. She could even use it as an actual hand if they put a activashun switch on it. The only downside they could properly see was that Scoots was actually one of the weaker nobs in the Waaagh! so a smaller klaw would be required.
They had already started putting it together before Scootaloo aimed both barrels of her kustom shoota directly into a mekboy’s face to get an answer.
“How am I gonna zoggin’ walk?”
A quick redesign later, and a short, stocky klaw with wide spines, and articulating joints for the talons was made and cybernetically attached to her stump. As a foot it did well, but it was much like what she imagined walking in high heels would be like.
Using her wings to stabilize herself, Scootaloo then continued to walk down the rough corridor to Nobgobba’s room, where she had been summoned to after her latest mission. Her new claw clanked against the floor as she moved.
“Dat’s pretty loud, dat is,” Facehacka’s voice noted.
She looked around, and quickly spotted the large metal panel that wasn’t actually riveted to the wall. She walked forward a bit more, before she knocked on the panel. “Yeah, that’s why I’m going to be flying when we sneak.”
Facehacka moved his camouflage aside, a smile on his face. “Did aye evah tell you how cunnin’ you is?”
Scootaloo smiled. “A few times.”
“Good, Ah’d hate ta forget somfin’ like dat.”
Scootaloo and her Kommando continued on their way to Nobgobba’s office, which did make him the only ork Scootaloo knew that needed an office, and knocked on his massive door.
“What is it?!” The warboss yelled.
“It’s me,” Scootaloo said.
“And whadda you want?” Nobgobba growled.
“You called me,” Scootaloo answered.
“I did?”
“Ya did.”
“Den stop wastin’ time an git in here!”
Rolling her eyes, Scootaloo stepped into the large room.
Nobgobba sat on a massive throne made of the same twisted metal that formed all ork structures, a massive goblet sitting in his hand. Gretchin ran across the floor of the room carrying anything from pages of parchment to plates of meat, all providing everything they could to the warboss in some vain hope that he wouldn’t kill them. A priest of Gork, or possibly Mork, stood nearby, holding his big stikk and looking important, because that’s apparently all they did.
“Dere ya are, Shootaloota,”
“You called, Boss?” Scoots asked.
“Ah did. I’s got a job for ya.”
“What’s the job?”
“I need ya ta start puttin’ a ship togeder,” Nobgobba said, before taking a long drink of black mead.
“What now?” she asked.
“We’z doin’ good. Too good. I don’t want all dis good mojo ta go ta waste. I need you ta find us pieces of a ship, and get da Mekboyz ta start puttin’ it togeder. We’z need ta keep da Waaagh! movin’.”
Scootaloo blinked. “You want the Mekboyz to build a ship.”
“Loot one if ya can, but I’m not waiting for anoder ‘ulk ta pass by. We’z gettin’ off da planet as soon as we can!”
Scootaloo blinked again. “I guess I’ll get on that.”
---=][=---
It took the Mekboyz eight months to build a ship, and another six to create a machine that would launch the 470 metric tonnes of metal and fuel into the upper atmosphere.
It would take a lot, but Scootaloo would eventually admit that it was kinda terrifying.
Ork rocket science followed the basic idea that whatever you wanted to launch needed at least as many pounds of explosives to move. So the mekboyz had only one option.
Scootaloo had never seen so many explosives in her life. And that was saying something for living with orks.
Missiles, rockits, barrels upon barrels of promethium, anything and everything that could explode in a thousand mile radius all brought to this single point, and stuffed into the back of a massive metal dish at the back of the ship.
The Burnaboyz were not allowed within seventy feet of the base, and anyone with an open flame was throttled by a nob on sight.
Scootaloo wasn’t entirely sure it was a good idea. At all.
However, the Mekboys said it was going to work, so it was most likely going to work.
Of course, when it came to going into space, orks tended to fail a lot, so…
Finally, after a little over a year, they were finally ready. Nobgobba piled everyone in, and after the teeth-clenching hours of apprehension, they launched into the void.
The launch itself was a year-and-a-half ago, now, and the resulting drift through the Warp was nothing incredibly exciting. Oh, sure there were a few daemon intrusions, but they were dealt with by more than a few eager orks, many coming away with new wounds that would make amazing scars. However, beyond that, there was nothing to really speak of.
That’s what made their landing all the more exciting. Almost as exciting as the launch.
And it only got better when they got outside.
---=][=---
“What is that?” Alard asked as he sat on the back of his large reptilian steed.
“It’s an ork ship,” Mesria, the female ranger next to him said. “We’ll need to let the king know. We will be beset by nightfall.”
“Have you faced many ork?” the younger eldar scout asked.
“A few times, they are brutal, and dangerous. Yet simple. Be warned though, this will be no easy fight.”
As the two, almost tribal, Eldar disappeared into the dense underbrush, the orkish tide slowly emerged from the wreckage of the ship.
Scootaloo and her small squad of Kommandos were one of the first ones out, and the former was pleasantly surprised to find how well the idea of ramming the planet worked.
“Alright, boyz!” she said as she stepped into the sunlight. “We’z got our mission! Go in there, find the people who own this planet, give ‘em a ripe kick in da teef, and get back here and let Nobgobba know.”
“Roight, Boss!” Hellspitta said with a toothy grin as he glanced at the very burnable landscape. “Quiet in, and Waaagh! out.”
“Sounds loike fun, dat does,” Blooddagga said, twirling his choppa.
“We’z gonna give ‘em a proper surprise, we are.” Facehacka agreed, tuning his scope.
“Then stop waistin’ time and move ya lunks!” Scootaloo roared. “Move!”
And with that, the four disappeared into the jungle, their purple and blue bodies disappearing perfectly into the wood and underbrush.
Somehow.
---=][=---
The Exodite Eldar, those who abandoned their civilization before She Who Thirsts was born, stood in their massive Tree Home, standing in the council room at the foot of the Chief’s throne. They surrounded a large stump, sliced flat by a powerful blade, and a map, they pointed at it carefully, and spoke to each other in hushed whispers as they did so.
They stood in their psycho-plastic armor, decorated with primitive paints, feathers and bones, while they held stone spears and shuriken pistols.
Finally, the chief spoke. “What is it that you have found, my scouts?”
Mesira, dressed in the Alaitoc colors, re-colored in the same tribal paint as they others, spoke up first. “It is the Ork incursion foretold by Wayseer Alivae. Luckily, we already have a plan in place to deal with them, we must simply cut them off at the pass.”
Another Eldar spoke up, pointing to the map. “As you can see, they’ve landed here, which shall provide our Dragon Scouts a great advantage, further, we can send…”
As the Eldar spoke, in their strange, musical language, Scootaloo watched from the ceiling.
She had heard of these things once, Eldar, they were called, taller than the humies, skinnier and weaker too, but far, far faster. And from what she could see, that was only the start.
The way they moved seemed...wrong. They were too graceful, too refined, too purposeful. It was like everything they did was free of mistakes and flaws. Every ounce of their demeanor spoke of creatures of perfection, and who knew of that perfection in themselves.
Scootaloo did not like them.
Her Power Klaw flexed, as they spoke in that strange music-language, and from her perch she could see the other kommandoz carefully positioned around the room, hidden by thick foliage and their own camouflage.
Scootaloo clung to the ceiling, her form fitting snugly between two large cords of wood, while her eyes searched the room below. The Eldar pointed and murmured, almost singing in haughty tones as they moved tiny wood and stone pawns around the map.
She looked around the room once more, and saw the eyes of her kommandoz staring back, waiting for a signal.
“Well, if they want a signal,” she thought, as she began pulling pins, “then this will be loud and clear.”
“So,” the Ranger said, continuing in the Eldar language, “all we need to do from here is—”
“Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaagh!” Scootaloo cried as she suddenly dropped from the ceiling, wings spreading to reveal several bouquets of Stikk Bombs.
The grenades hit the floor, and Mesira’s eyes went wide as she saw them bounce. “Get dow—!”
Explosions ripped through the air, followed by the roar of another three orks. Bullets flew through the air as the orks began unleashing their fury into the room. More stikk bombs flew in, splattering Eldar blood and organs across the walls and floor. Shrapnel rained in the room, and within seconds, almost every single Eldar in the room was dead.
Mesira was one of the few that were still alive, and the only one that could still stand. Her left arm was useless, pierced with massive shards of shrapnel, while her right leg was bleeding.
The chief was dead, there was almost no one in the cadre left.
And the fight hadn’t even started yet.
She pulled her shuriken pistol, her long rifle on her back, but useless if she couldn’t steady her grip.
She looked up, trying to find something to shoot at, when the door to the throne room opened.
“What’s going—?”
That’s as far as the newcomer got before Scootaloo landed on the table and roared. “More Dakka!” Her kustom shootas unleashed at full auto, ripping into the unsuspecting Eldar.
The first line was cut down completely.
The second line moved faster, leaping out of the way of the more deadly shots, and ducking to the sides of the doors and out to cover.
Mesira leapt up from the table, and fired her Shuriken pistol point blank into Scootaloo’s hide.
The pegasus roared in pain as the mono-edged disks bit into her tough, armor-like skin, and turned to face the offending Eldar.
Her klaw extended, crackling with energy, before snapping down at the air the rogue ranger inhabited a moment before.
Blooddagga and Hellspitta joined her, firing into the crowd of Eldar in the hallway while Facehacka was slightly further behind. The wild, inaccurate shots were excellent covering fire as Scootaloo leapt down onto the floor to follow the ranger.
“You are annoying me, a lot,” the pegasus grunted.
The Eldar sneered before speaking to her in a language she knew. “As if you creatures had right to talk. The very way you breath, so ragged, and barbaric, is an affront to any definition of the word civilization. Your existence annoys me.”
Scootaloo glared. “Alright, I’m gonna level with you. I was pretty much pushed into this whole kill-or-be-killed thing, and I thought it had helped me appreciate my life, and life in general more.
“But you...well, you remind of a childhood bully of mine. And I still don’t like her. So this time, just this once, I’m going to kill you for me. Not for the Warboss, not the orks below me, just for me.”
“Boss!” Facehacka said. “We’z gonna need mo’ bullets!”
Scootaloo frowned before turning back to the wounded Eldar. “Looks like I’m gonna hafta make this quick then.”
She leapt forward, klaw snapping as she dived towards the Ranger, who leapt backwards, firing shuriken all the while. This time, however, Scootaloo saw it coming.
And so the dance began, the feathered ork pony against the Outcast, flying through the air as the orks behind them kept the hallway suppressed.
They both fired at each other, moving across the floor with a grace that was natural to the Eldar, and surprising to the ork race. Bullets and shuriken flew through the air between them, and all the while Scootaloo’s klaw sat, open and ready.
Mesira, meanwhile, was quickly losing interest. The ork-thing was odd, but ultimately below her. It was a creature that was neither her mental nor her physical peer, and for that alone, it made this matter simply—
She screamed as her leg exploded in pain.
And then just exploded.
The blood flowing through her leg suddenly decorated the surrounding wood, and Mesira fell backwards before the klaw-wielding pegasus.
“Normally,” Scootaloo began as she walked forward, klaw in the air, “I’d tell you it was nothing personal. This time, though,” she said as her klaw wrapped around the Eldar’s head, “it’s very personal.”
And Mesira simply ceased to be.
---=][=---
The Eldar fear losing their own.
As a slowly dying, disappearing race, each Eldar life is thought to be worth whole planets of lesser creatures.
This led to the birth of perhaps the strangest form of warfare in the 41st and 42nd millenia. The Eldar do not appear anywhere in full force. They do not field massive armies, nor do they stand proud under banners and hold the line to the last man.
Such tactics are below them.
No, the Eldar use their farseers. They divine the future, and foresee the strategies and movements of the enemy. Surprise attacks are made known hundreds of years before the attack can even be planed. And with this knowledge, the Eldar create the perfect counter-plan, executing the enemy army with surgical precision and devastating power.
It is not a perfect method, however, and sometimes the sight of the Farseer can fail.
Much like it had on the day Scootaloo and her three Kommandoz assassinated almost every single leader of the Eldar of Ursidhe-ka.
---=][=---
“A weapon cannot substitute for zeal.”—Imperial Thought of the Day
Alright guys! Man it’s been a while.
“Well between the holidays, work and all that other stuff.”
Yes, yes, and now that I’ve made all my excuses, it’s time to get back to work!
“To the keyboard! Write for the Emperor!”
Alright, until next time, guys!
“Bye!”