"Which coward wuz just insultin' me?!"
The roar, amplified by the crude vox-grille the Mekboy had wired around his neck, was loud and clear.
"Step forward, or I'll tear ya to pieces! No, seven pieces! Then we'll make 'em into squig-stew and eat da lot of ya!!!"
Raynor stood atop the wall, a cold smile playing on his lips. He didn't bother with a handheld vox this time; he used the Forbidden Wall's integrated public address system. The sound blasted from dozens of heavy-duty speakers simultaneously, creating a thunderous, surround-sound effect that drowned out the wind.
"Your Boys are all watching you, Guga, and you're hiding like a Grot. How can you expect them to follow a leader who only knows how to yell from a distance?"
Raynor spoke as if he hadn't even heard Guga's challenge, his tone dripping with aristocratic sarcasm.
"I am right here. My cannons are zeroed in on your position, and my soldiers are waiting to harvest Greenskin skulls. Come out if you dare, Guga. Let me see if your fists are as soft as your courage."
Raynor snorted coldly, then continued the verbal assault:
"If you're spineless, then keep your head down for the rest of your miserable life. Let your little brats know they've been following a worthless, gutless coward! Hahahaha!!!"
Guga's face turned a darker, mottled shade of green—almost purple. He realized he was being ignored by a "humie." For an Ork, being treated as beneath notice was more infuriating than a direct physical strike.
The Deathskull Mekboy beside him—an Ork covered in welding masks and looted tools—quickly grabbed Guga's Power Klaw. "Boss, don't be doin' nuthin' stupid! This humie is playin' dirty tricks! There's definitely summat wrong here, ya can't fall for it!"
Guga took a deep, ragged breath. He wasn't entirely stupid. Raynor was so obviously provoking him that there had to be an ambush. Moreover, his preparations were incomplete; he didn't have enough Deff Dreads or Boys yet for a true, world-ending Waaagh!
He should wait. But an Ork Warboss can be brutal, he can slaughter his own subordinates, and he can be thick-headed—but he must never be seen as cowardly. If he backed down now, the Boys would lose faith. And if they lost faith, his head would be the next one on the totem pole.
Guga looked at the Boys around him. Their eyes were wandering, their grip on their choppas loosening. If he retreated today, the internal mutiny from earlier would repeat itself a thousand times over.
He gritted his tusks and let out a bone-shaking roar:
"Ya humie offal on da wall! I'm da Boss here, Guga DA Mountain! If ya got da stones, roll down dat broken wall and fight me one-on-one! I'll tear ya to shreds wit' one Klaw!"
Unexpectedly, Raynor still didn't address Guga directly. Instead, his voice boomed over the speakers again in a mock-confused tone.
"Hmm, what is the meaning of this? Why did you send such a small, insignificant squig like 'Guga' to challenge me? Where is a real Warboss?"
Guga, down at the base of the wall, became frantic, cursing incessantly to drown out Raynor's voice. But Raynor had already signaled his tech-sergeants to turn the wall's output to maximum, entering an "offensive-only" vox-mode.
"Do you even dare approach the wall yourself, Guga? Or are you just here to watch your betters fight? I'd hoped for a challenge, not a coward."
This was the final straw. Guga's massive face flushed a violent red. Lurkner—that fat, ugly rival—had been suppressing him for years. Guga had come to this sector to prove he was more "Waaagh!" than Lurkner, and now the humie was using Lurkner's name to step on his pride.
"WAAAAAAAGH!!!"
The roar exploded from deep within Guga's throat, fueled by the purest, most unadulterated rage. He leaped from the roof of his Battlewagon, his Power Klaw slamming into the permafrost, and his massive body propelled forward like a green cannonball toward the breach.
As he charged, the Greenskin army behind him erupted.
"GO, BOSS!" "WAAAAAAAGH!" "FOLLOW DA BOSS! TEAR DA HUMIES TO BITS!!!"
An endless green tide surged toward the Forbidden Wall, even more powerful than the morning's wave. Even the two gargantuan Gorkonauts began to lumber forward. The Mekboy watched in despair, knowing he couldn't stop the madness; he simply jumped onto the nearest trukk and joined the charge.
On the ramparts, some soldiers turned pale at the sight of the sheer scale of the assault. Leo looked at Raynor. "Governor, this is a lot of Orks..."
"It's better than I expected," Raynor said, his eyes locked on Guga. "If he didn't commit today, our situation would only worsen as they gathered more scrap. Execute the next phase."
Raynor issued the order to the communications officer, his eyes brimming with a cold, predatory confidence.
The firepower from the Forbidden Wall remained fierce, but it couldn't stem the tide this time. After hundreds of thousands of Boys were shredded by the guns, Guga and his armored walkers reached the breach in Sector C8. Guga swung his Klaw, but the wall wasn't as sturdy as it looked. His Power Klaw easily tore through the outer alloy plating, revealing a surprisingly fragile concrete structure beneath.
With another strike, the gap widened. Guga paused for a fraction of a second. So soft?
The Orks behind him didn't care. Seeing their Boss tear a hole in the legendary wall, they rushed forward in a frenzy. Within five minutes, a passage wide enough for the Gorkonauts to pass through had been chiseled open.
"CHARGE IN!!!" Guga roared, though his own pace began to slacken. He wasn't a fool; this was almost too easy. It felt like a trap.
But the Orks behind him were beyond control. Killa Kans, Deff Dreads, tanks, and heavy Nobz were pouring into the breach. They cleared the main wall and saw the secondary inner wall—five meters high, thick, and lined with human soldiers.
"RUSH 'EM!!!"
The Greenskins slammed into the inner wall. The human return fire was oddly weak—mostly low-intensity lasguns and scattered heavy bolters. It wasn't the concentrated wall of death they had faced outside. A Killa Kan propped itself against the inner wall, and the Boys used it as a ramp to climb up and slaughter the guards. Soon, a section of the inner wall was overrun.
Guga stood at the breach, watching his lads tear into the secondary defenses. His reason screamed Trap!, but his eyes saw a collapsing defense. The "humie" traps seemed fragile, and his Boys were destroying them with ease. Even the Gorkonauts had pushed through and were suppressing the wall's gun towers.
Maybe... dat humie wuz just talkin' big, Guga thought. Maybe dat's all da humies got left.
The thought took root. Added to the bloodlust, the smell of cordite, and the deafening cheers of his Waaagh!, his last shred of caution evaporated. His breathing became heavy, and his eyes glowed a feral red.
"FOLLOW ME!!!" Guga bellowed, swinging his Power Klaw as he charged into the "pocket" between the walls. He was going to find the humie who had insulted him and tear him apart with his bare hands.