Hellsreach - Aaron Dembski-Bowden [79]
‘There’s little choice,’ said Tyro. ‘The dockworkers will die unsupported.’
‘Arm them first,’ Grimaldus said, his vox-voice heavy with finality. ‘Then argue how long they have left to live.’
‘Very well. Our course is clear.’ Colonel Sarren cleared his throat. ‘Dockmaster. I thank you.’
‘We’ll fight like… like… We’ll fight damn hard, colonel. Just don’t take too long getting the troops to back us up.’
‘We have immense stockpiles of materiel in the dock districts.’ The colonel nodded to Cyria Tyro. ‘You heard the Reclusiarch. Arm them.’
She saluted with a grim smile, and left the table.
‘We can hold,’ Sarren told everyone that remained. ‘After all we have done, I refuse to believe this will be the treacherous blow that breaks our back. We can hold. Major Krivus, the movement of storm-trooper squads to the docks is already under way, but I need you to take personal command of that process immediately. Grav-chute them in if you have to. Drop them from the Valkyries that remain. Every rifle counts.’
The major saluted, and moved out of the office with all the grace and speed his bulky carapace armour allowed.
‘The civilians,’ Tyro murmured, staring at the hololithic. Almost all of the city’s reinforced shelters were situated – and sealed – within and beneath the docks district. Sixty per cent of the hive’s population, crowded in civilian shelter bunkers, now no longer away from the front lines. ‘We can’t have that many people left in the direct line of fire.’
‘No? We can’t release them onto the streets.’ Sarren shook his head. ‘There is nowhere for them to run, and the panic would choke the byways, preventing the Steel Legion ever reaching the docks. They are as safe as they can be in their shelters.’
‘The beasts will tear down those shelters,’ Tyro argued.
‘Yes, they will. Nothing can be done now.’ Sarren would not be deterred. ‘There will be no evacuation. We can’t arm them in time, and we can’t protect them if they leave the shelters. They will do nothing but die in the streets and clog the veins of reinforcements.’
Tyro didn’t raise another objection. She knew he was right.
Sarren continued, ‘I need insurgency walkers and light armour battalions riding in from the tertiary arterial roads here, here, here and here. Sentinels, my friends. Hellhounds and Sentinels. Everything we can muster.’ More officers left the table.
‘Reclusiarch.’
‘Colonel.’
‘You know what I am going to ask of you. There is only one way we will survive this assault long enough to flood the docks with tried and tested troops. I cannot order you, but I would ask it nevertheless.’
‘There is no need to ask. My knights will deploy from our remaining gunships. We will stand with the civilians. We will hold the docks.’
‘My thanks, Reclusiarch. Now, we are as ready as it is possible to be, given the nature of this unwelcome surprise. We are, however, placing a great deal of pressure on Invigilata and the bulk of the Imperial Guard. The city will bleed while we divert our elite infantry to the docks, and this fight… it’ll take days. At best.’
‘Let Invigilata hold the city,’ Grimaldus said, gesturing to the map with a black gauntlet. ‘Let the Steel Legion stand with them. Focus on what matters in the here and now.’
‘No grand speech? I’m almost disappointed.’
‘No speech.’ The Templar was already stalking from the room. ‘Not for you. You won’t be dying this day. I save my words for those who will.’
CHAPTER XIV
The Docks
They came as the sun began its downward arc in the sky.
The Helsreach docks took up almost a third of the hive’s perimeter. Thousands of uninspiring warehouses and harbour office towers stood watch over an expansive bay which featured an endless number of quays and piers that stabbed out into the sloshing, filthy greyish water.
The air across the entire world might have always reeked of something faintly sulphuric, but here – at the heart of Helsreach’s industry – the reek bordered on petrochemically unhealthy.