The veteran parried an Ork boy's axe with his chainsword. The Ork's guard opened wide, and the veteran twisted aside with the momentum.
Las-fire followed close behind, striking the Ork in the neck and face and knocking down the first boy to charge in.
More Ork boys poured in. Such numbers were beyond what the veteran could handle. Dovell swiftly pulled a frag grenade from his belt and threw it.
The grenade passed through the doorway and landed in the corridor outside. Its explosion sent shrapnel sweeping through the entire hallway.
Several Orks were torn apart by the shrapnel, spraying blood as they fell.
But the first few Orks to rush inside had not suffered much injury.
Four Orks still stood before Dovell and the veteran.
Dovell raised his gun to fire again, but the veteran could no longer cover him. He had been tied up by the other three Orks.
The heavy axes, combined with the Orks' powerful muscles, meant the veteran dared not block head-on. If his arms were briefly numbed by stopping a fierce blow, the other two axes would come down on his head.
Seeing the Ork striding toward him, Dovell gave up on shooting and leveled his gun, facing the Ork boy with his bayonet.
"Humie die!"
An axe came chopping down. Dovell rolled aside, making the blow miss completely. He grabbed a handful of radioactive dust from his pocket, ground from rubble near the cores of those ruined generators.
The stuff worked well—enough to burn an Ork's eyes. He had done it plenty of times before. Since there was already a gap in strength, he could only rely on dirty tricks to stay alive.
He threw the powdered dust at the Ork's face. The radioactively contaminated dirt coated the Ork's wide-open eyes in gray