Each impact was a localized earthquake, a thunderclap of collapsing architecture that vibrated up through the grille of the street and into the marrow of his bones. Dust, ancient and suffocating, billowed in great rolling clouds from two new points of impact, mingling with the acrid smoke of the vaporized tanks.
Through the haze, monstrous silhouettes began to coalesce, their forms mirroring the first two-legged, cannon-armed, and utterly devoid of mercy.
They were not just reinforcing the line; they were sealing the tomb. One had punched through a cross-passage to the east, cutting off the defenders retreat. Another had sundered the main support column of a hab-spire overlooking the battlefield, whose groaning, slow-motion collapse promised to become a third wall of the killing box.
