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Futuristic The Return of the Primarchs (Warhammer 40k RP/PM for Interest in joining)

Clause flew back, rolling to his knees. For a moment his mind ran wild with emotions, thoughts. Strings of logic battled the malignant taint of the warp emanations of the blood god that set them selves upon his mind.

Blinking the blood out of his eyes and wincing at the pain as his own warp touched body fought off the assault of his brother's taint.

Elsewhere.

The bubbling, popping, smoking wreck of the daemon engine as Oldwain powered down the C-beamer, the screech of the helldrake circling over head caught the elder dreadnought's attention and he tilted his frame up. Letting his targeting auspex do the math, he raised the auto cannon and fired. A stream of heavy caliber slugs streamed out at the beast, impacting it mid turn, with direct hits tearing in to its hide while the near misses detonated near by, their proximity fused warheads making sure it was showered in puffs of shrapnel and smoke.

Mean while, the Twins were putting good work in with their father's war-chariot. The line of Defiler dreadnoughts fell as they attempted to charge, titan scale weapons felling the half mad blood beasts before they could muster an answer, before Diocletian's Fist rumbled along to aid the defenders at the Primarch's boulevard, its timely arrival to anchor the defense along side the reinforcing tanks.


Back upon that dark tower...

Clause stood. His mind, for the first time in ages. Was Calm. The malignant whispers of his brother's patron, banished from his mind. The Rampant emotion that he had let trace his movements, gone, quieted.

Locking his gaze on his brother, he swiped the blood out of his eye and let his hand fall to the hilt of his sword. "There was a time when I would have offered you absolution, in every sense. I now know this to be a mistake. You are my brother no more, and I deem you beyond all hope. I deem your sons the same. As for your patron...I renounce him now, and for always."

With a flash he drew the blade, its black edge reflecting no light. The weapon gave a banshees wail as it was reviled, its form oozing the same aura of the anathema as had the one who forged it for him. For Clause, it was an almost comforting feeling, an echo of some one he cared greatly for. For those around him, it radiated pure malice.

He gave no further words. No further sparing of spite. No further emotion. He readied the blade and charged towards Paragon, sword at the ready.
 
The Heldrake was struck and lost much of it's ability to fly. Each swing of its wings generates no lift. And barely does enough to help it glide. What it does do, it give the warp beast a final opportunity to attack in it's dying moments. As it falls from the sky it aims it's trajectory at Oldwain himself. The massive beast falling into the Dreadnought at terminal velocity. The warp energies within the beast erupt in its final moments as the impact tear it asunder. Leaving piles of smoldering rubble in its wake and leaving fates unknown.

Atop the tower, Paragon sneered at a sudden pain in the back of his skull. The Blood God was angry and being refused. And in return sent his emissary pain to be used as fuel. As for the first time, Paragon and his master had aligned goals for this world. Total destruction. If the twelfth would not enter the ranks of the Lord of Skulls, then he and all his loyalist 'children' shall have their skulls joined with his throne. The pain became enrapturing. As if his motions and movements were no longer his own. Paragon's eyes changed color, to a vile citrine color. Looking as if his sclera has turned to pure flame. More so than ever, the beast before Clause was no longer Paragon Karthaax.

The sword was of concern. Paragon knew of it, and as such so did the Blood God. He would be wary of it. But it would not hold him back. The draconic daemon prince moved with unholy speed. Faster that he had before. Move fast enough that at times light bouncing off his visage hit Clauses eye delayed enough that the twlefth knew he was seeing an after image rather than the actual daemon before him. Suddenly, talons dug into and through the ceramite of Clause's back plate. he became weightless as the daemon prince spread his massive wings and took to the sky. Pulling back after reaching several hundred meters into the air and plummeting back towards the top of the tower at alarming speed. Paragon released Clause just before impact. Letting the twelfth slam into the top of his dark tower as he spread his wings and flew away and landing safely on the roof as well.

The strike was designed more as a mockery than as something to deal damage. Though Paragon was certain it would hurt, the goal was clearly not to kill. But to put his power on display. The power of the Blood God, the Lord of Battle, the Champion of Champions, flowing through him. Clause will know what power he refused before he dies. As is the will of Khorne.

At the same time, the Star Port is beginning to see a notable number of Defilers crowd it's platforms. The plans of Sarn and Gurrosh had spread and now seven total companies of chaos astartes are preparing to abandon the planet that has already been descimated. Rather than continue this onslaught that will end with a null advantage in victory. Even the Captain of the Battlebarge, Relagon the Reaver, is present. Leading his men once more in semi defiance of the will of his Primarch. The captain looks on. Seeing the powers at play atop Clause's tower. The massive amount of energy released by their clashes being visible for miles. Despite his anger and hated at being led into this pointless vendetta, he prays. He begs the Blood God to give his geneseed Progenitor the power to defeat the loyalist to the Corpse Emperor. So that it might free him from the chains that restrain him to such foolish actions as this assault was.
 
Clause awoke.

Groaning, he stumbled, struggling against the rubble as he attempted to pick him self up. Everything hurt, his back was in tatters, blood and suit fluids leaking, his sword was...some where off to the side. He rose to his feet, only for a leg to give out and he dropped to a knee. He had no further weapons...


Defense Gun battery command room
Several levels below the surface.

"Gun captain, augers and vox report enemy is attempting to retreat through orbital means."

"Clarification."

"Defiler assets have seized the orbital anchorage and stormed a docked vessel."

"Clarification?" "Escort weight."

"Shields?"

"Negative, though this installations augers are...outdated. We can only see their reactors flickering to life."

"Load shot, armor piercing, orbital charge weight."

"Gun-captain, I am not sure the installation will survive the power draw-"

"Tech Priest, this instillation is, by your order's classification, an Ordinatus, yes?"

"Yes, Gun captain, but it has not been activated to full potential in-"

"Load Shot, Armor Piercing, Orbital. Charge. Weight."

"Yes Gun Captain."

Above ground, as the battle raged around it, the ancient, monolithic structure moved in earie silence. This cannon was not some grand manifestation of the Machine Cult's god, nor some grand effigy of the glory of the long ago Great crusade. In truth it's origins stretched far, far back, in to the Dark years of Old Night.

As the ship carrying the deserting companies of the defilers finally slipped dock under, its engines just coming to full light, something would happen.

In an instant, the captain of the battle Barge could see the Aegis array around the city flicker for just a moment, just long enough to let something traveling at an appreciable percentage of the speed of light escape with out bouncing along its inner breadth.

In a further moment, the captain could see a pin prick of light lance out from the swirling dust cloud that covered the city and reach in to the heavens. He would be a smart man, and could likely recognize anti orbital weapons fire when he saw it, yet it would not reach out to touch his command, rather the shot would go wide, seemingly missing him and his battle barge. Yet, as he traced its arc, he'd come to a concerning realization as the pin prick of light reached out and connected with the smaller vessel carrying his escaping brothers.

It'd impact with tremendous, silent force, seemingly passing through the forward section of the ship before continuing it's likely endless flight in to the void, either to drift for ever, or perhaps land some where and ruin some one else's day far, far in to the future. For a few moments the ship seemed unaffected by the this near super luminal slug key holing it's way though its forward sections...until a series of rapid secondary detonations tore the ship apart, bulkheads tearing and compartments venting atmosphere as the ship crumbled in real time, its keel broken and with out its original crew alive to even begin to attempt damage control, there was obviously little hope for the escort as it buckled and tore it self apart.

Back on the ground the gun vented gasses and steam.

"Gun captain, shot report is successful, target destroyed. Damage sustained, power levels are dropping. It is unlikely we would be able to muster enough for even a sub orbital salvo."

"Shut the gun down, record the hit for the log book. Anyone not actively attending to the facilities is to be mustered as armsmen and set to defend. IF the city is to fall, we are to be the last defenders."
 
As the Cobra Destroyer, carrying nearly two hundred Defilers, detonated into a small star as its plasma reactor went supercritical. The Defilers around the starport dispersed rapidly. The Legion, the Defilers, the largest core of the original Legion that had been led by Paragon for 10,000 years, was now fragmenting. Bands of warriors broke off, some just several marines, others entire companies. Relagon, gathering up fifteen hundreds of his fellow Defilers, soon joined by entire companies, broke off their offensive on the beleaguered Imperials and made for the southern outer districts.

Despite this it took hours for the effects to be noticeable until eventually entire sectors of the front reported a sudden absence of traitor astartes and the determined, psychotic, assault from the Defiler's mortal cultists melted away. Leaving a sea of red corpses about the streets, in buildings, and strewn across fortified positions as traitor cultists broke off and fled into the cityscape.

However, some of the most bloodthirsty and fanatic of the Defilers, led by First Captain Aggravax, and second in command after Relagon, led his Goresworn, some three hundred Astartes, into a determined assault on the Cathedral Basilica of Saint Elia. Within minutes the outer fortifications were overrun by the ferocity of the assault. Entire PDF platoons annihilated, and fighting initiated along the Cathedral walls and adjacent buildings. By the eleven-minute mark the Icon of Khorne was raised bny Cultists in the outer buildings near the walls of the Ecclesiarchal cathedral. Eleven thousand Cultists rallying to Aggravax's assault.

Thirteen minutes fighting lashed up and along the walls of the Saint Elia's perimeter wall and pock marked the upper structure. Stained glass shattered in brilliant rain showers as the Lamenters joined the defense while the Sororitas prepared ambush kill boxes along entrances to the main complex.

The fighting outside of Saint Elia's became a whirlwind as a determined Imperial Guard counterattack by the Cadians and Mercians turned into a chaotic retreat and loss of over seventeen AFVs and a thousand guardsmen. Sergeant Ashuba of the Defilers Goresworn breached the outer stone walls with a well-placed plasma charge and met the Lamenters in the outer courtyards and auxiliary structures in a chaotic short-range fight and then melee around the breach. The Goresworn surged and both Imperial and Traitor Astartes fell in gory ribbons as both sides fought with a savage tenacity.

By minute twenty of the assault Aggravax himself burst through the main gate to lead more of his sworn warriors through along with throngs of Cultists. The Lamenters were caught between two sides and fought a rearguard action into the rear garden gate before falling back into the Basilica annex. There they joined the sisters in firing from windows and balconies as the Defilers struck the building with rockets, plasma, and even began to melt the thick ornate steel doors with a melta gun. A third melta blast and the molten slag of the doors blasted into glowing chunks. The atomical integrity of the metal alloy of the ornate door with its carved caricatures depicting the life of Saint Elia blasted to ruin. Aggravax was first through the door and crossed blades with Sergeant Andrax of the Lamenters in a furious duel. The former burying his chain axe into the throat of the noble Lamenter before howling with victory. The Lamenters and Sisters engaged the Goresworn in the main floor of the Cathedral, but it was swiftly seen to be a losing fight. The Canoness herself slain before the altar and her decapitated body nailed by a steel rebar to the stonework of a statue of the emperor upside down. The skull of which was slammed onto one of the shoulder spikes of Aggravax, her face still contorted in agony and horror.

Then the roof burst and through the top came figures in black and white as Chapter Master Shrike led a rapid counterstrike into the face of the enemy with the full force of the Raven Guard he had brought with him.

Aggravax bellowed with rage and charged as Shrike landed and swiped a Defiler's helmeted head from his shoulders in a fell swoop. The Lord of Ravens answered the challenging warcry with silence and the cackle of his Raven's Talons. Power claws and Chainaxe blades clashed in crackling arcs of energy and showering sparks as the two warriors dueled over destroyed pews and over collapsed statues and along pools of shattered stained-glass shards. Thrice Aggravax's chainaxe came to within a hair of the Chapter Master's throat. Thrice Shrike countered with a deft parry and sweeping low to high strike. Around them the Ravens and Lamenters fought tooth and nail against the maddened frenzy of the Goresworn and the once finely cut tiles of the floor became slick with blood and ichor. For even the mortal soldiers of both sides joined the fray that rapidly grew into a ferociously close, melee strewn, battle throughout and around the Cathedral.

Outside Guard and Astartes AFVs put shells, las beams, and rounds at point blank into buildings, windows, and into the few traitor vehicles that had followed. While Blue Hats, Cadians, Mercians, and Harakoni fought a whirlwind war of attrition with the thousands of cultists. The Outer Baths of the Cathedral Complex collapsed as its gutted smoking structure fell into debris ruined pools. The Library of Saint Elia burned as Cultists armed with flamers intent on destroying the works were engaged by Harakoni drop troops.

Inside Shrike and Aggravax dueled, and the latter managed to bat a claw away while delivering a powerful kick that put Shrike through a broke window. The Chapter Master undaunted activated his jump pack and grav chute while pulling a plasma pistol from his side and in a shot that would be seen as expert even from an Astartes was placed right in the face of the traitor captain.

Shrike hit the ground and left a shallow trench in his wake as he watched Aggravax jump down with roaring rage. Coming straight for him. The right side of his helmet gone and face blackened and burned down to the muscle and bone. Shrike fired again but Aggravax dodged and as the two were about to cross blades the Raven Guard warrior lunged, activated the power surge dial on his pistol, and slammed it onto the Defilers power pack before rolling away. Aggravax lunged but his axe missed and only when he saw Shrike jump away did, he realize what had happened. Looking back, he saw the pistol's plasma chamber glow red hot before detonating like a fiery orange star. Turning his skull and upper power back into melted slag.

The fall of Aggravax was a boon to the defense as the Goresworn howled with rage but were now leaderless. Their maddened blood lust without direction or orders and so those that could shephered themselves and their brethren away in retreat or fell to the guns and blades of the Imperials.

Shrike looked about the field from behind his helmet lenses and at the fallen traitor. The latter giving a sense of disgust in his mouth as he trudged off. The Lamenters had lost half their number while the Raven Guards reported fourteen fallen to approximately one hundred Defilers. Of the Sororitas only four sisters remained alive while the Guard and PDF were still tallying their own casualties. Of the cultists it could be speculated to be several thousand.

Later During the Night

As the duel had concluded Shrike and the other Imperial Commanders had returned to the Bunker to await the Primarch when an alarm sounded. Coming from the sub-levels were the civilians were held in segregated, hermetically sealed, vaults. Shrike was first to descend with a squad of veteran Raven Guard in Terminator armor when they were met by a Blue Hat lieutenant with a small human girl.

"What happened, why is the alarm raised, Guardsman."

The Guardsman knelt, "My Lord, we found her wandering the stairs and she just pointed down ward to the lower Vault. Vault 16. We had put twenty-thousand people there. But, when we went down we..."

As the guardsman trailed off Shrike waved his brothers forward and the Raven Guard moved rapidly down the hallway and down the stone steps into the lower vault. Vault 16's door was open and there several Blue Hats stood with their helmet lights on, peering down the hallway or into the vault which was pitch black.

"Report."

The blue hat sergeant looked, jumped, and then knelt instinctively, "The Emperor's Angels. My Lord. I--."

"Speak." Shrike's tone no longer neutral with hint of politeness but not curt and tense.

The blue hat sergeant stumbled the words, "We were patrolling above, having just finished our patrol down here, when we heard the hermetic seals on the vault door open and there on the stairs came up a little girl."

Shrike turned to one of his Terminator guards, "Notify the Inquisitor to begin examinations of the girl and take her into Inquisitorial custody. The Librarians will be arriving to assist."

The Terminator nodded and stomped off. Vox would be useless down here.

Shrike advanced with the other Raven Guard and peered into the gloom. His helmet preysight easily bringing the interior into view for him. It was empty. Just bedrolls, cots, tables, chairs, knick knacks from the civilians, there was no one. No blood on the floor or on the walls. Just as if the entire vaults sheltering population had vanished. Then he saw it on the opposite end off to the left. The wall had an outline.

Shrike didn't turn his head to speak, "This Vault has a second entrance."

"There is a second door, leads to a maintenance shaft to an old bunker in the outskirts of the city. But it was decommissioned and sealed off centuries ago."

Shrike advanced into the darkness with his guard. And true to his intuition the outer vault door to the maintenance shaft lay ajar. "Re-seal the door and trap it with tripwire plasma charges. Set traps in the vault and seal the main door. Use fusion cutters to weld it shut. The citadel has a breach."

* * *


Command Bunker

Shrike arrived back at the command center and ignored everyone, only moving to the vox system and ordering the servitor there to notify the Primarch, "Notify Lord Clausewitz. We have a problem."
 
Chain axes whirl to life repeatedly. Echoing through the tunnels of the maintenance shafts as the lay into the bodies of the forgotten and unfortunate. The first eight to be slain are kept, mostly, intact. Defilers place their bodies in a specific fashion. Using them to form the mark of their lord Khorne. Four bodies form each leg of an X, with a fifth laid across the intersection. Two bodies are laid at the top of the X, branching off each leg of the X. And the final 8th body lays between the two legs on the bottom. Connecting them and forming the Mark of Khorne. The bodies are saturated with blood as they slaughter more helpless civilians, eight at a time. draining their blood and offal onto the mark. Imbuing it with hate, rage, and most importantly, blood. The sacrifices bear fruit. Cracks in reality itself begin to form. connecting and forming a gate through which the Defilers begin to walk through. Escaping to the warp, and living to fight another day.


Meanwhile atop the spire, Paragon grins with victorious folly. He spreads his wings, launching himself forward to deal a final blow on his former brother. But just as he is about to reach Clause to deal the fatal blow he feels a painful resistance. A burning emanating from his lower right torso. A burning that is growing, spreading. Being fanned into a sear. He looks down and sees that his advance was stopped by Clause's sword. He doesn't know how he retrieved it. He was so zeroed in on getting the final strike that he never saw Clause even move.

The pain enrages him further. He thrusts his fist upwards into Clauses chin. The bones in his hand fracture, as does the jaw he comes into contact with. The strike is enough to make Clause release his blade again. Falling back and vulnerable once more. But then the blade is yanked from Paragon's torso with speed and power. The slice on the way out stings even worse. His wound glows. As if the warp itself was leaking from within him. Clause wields his sword once more. The bastard called it to his own hand somehow. The how matters not. All Paragon sees in the enemy. The prey. He rears up to launch at Clause again. Determined to never stop. His life, his goals, his humanity. It was all freely given so that this moment might come. The moment he can pull Clause's soul from his body and consume it himself.

That moment is not this one. As a tear in real space is sliced open behind the Daemon. Multicolored light begins to consume Paragon. Pulling him, no dragging him towards the portal.

"I will not go! He must die! HE MUST DIE!" Paragon roars. But he is powerless against the will of the god who granted him his power. He flied back through the tear and it seals behind him. Disappearing from real space and into the warp. Dragged by his master away from this fight. The reason why is not immediately clear. But with Paragon's absence from the battle, a sudden stillness begins to spread. The cultists fight with less fervor. The Defilers loyal to their genefather above all continue to slaughter, but do not do so with the same vicious success. The tide is turned. Even if the damage is already done.
 
The other fronts.

Lord Dunn was getting old.

With a flash, his force sword was drawn in a arch, cutting down the heretic trooper that had charged him with his bayonet, his rifle having done nothing to his powered armor with his stubb rifle. As the man fell dead, nearly cut from groin to neck, Dunn sheathed his sword and took up his bolter, slapping a fresh magazine, he turned to see his retinue recovering how much they could with the lagging of the latest assault.

His Retinue had swelled, from the paltry 50 or so Cadian orphans and Harakoni platoon to a force of nearly 300, though most were effectively flash levied from the various piecemeal units he'd picked up during his movement's through the city.

A mix of Cadians, Harakoni, Blue hats and even a few scrappy bands of armed civilians, mostly retired veterans and shrine guard of the Cathedral of St. Elia, and his own little squad. He turned and enter the former Hospital. Finding Valina tending to the wounded, Lucretcia, their daughter aided her, both armors stained in blood and scorched. She was performing some type of surgery on a wounded guardsmen. Valina seemed in her element, whispering comforting words to the trooper, a blue hat lad who looked to be the same age as his daughter.

Speaking of which, Lucretcia seemed...troubled. She held the lad's hand as her mother went about mending his leg. She whispered prayers to the God-Emperor as her mother worked. The last few days had been hard on his daughter. She had only recently undergone the activation of her latent Psychic powers, and her training was still incomplete. She had held up well in combat with the enemy, not faltering and only hesitating in moments he could give her the benefit of the doubt.

Moving on, he made his way to the front, bolter in hand.


The Twins had, through smart positioning and ample use of ordinance, repelled several of the traitor assaults. The giant form of the Primarch's personal tank rumbled through the massive armor shutter doors at the base of the central spire to rearm and refuel. In doing so they take a moment to return to the Command center, only to see the Raven Guard Commander addressing the gathered Command staff. They didn't know much of their brother marine, but they knew enough.

"Commander." Spoke Castor, approaching and saluting the Astartes. "Our Gene-Father is currently engaging the arch traitor at the summit of the tower, last we were in contact he was locked in battle along side several of the Emperor's Companions."



Macharious Oldwain awoke with a groan. In a moment, various warning ques and flashes as his suit began to register the alarming level of damage he had sustained. It was only then he noticed the form of the helldrake laying atop him. As he attempted to maneuver the beast off him, it seemingly moved, and in a moment of pure instinct, he opened up on its underside with his chest mounted weapons, furthering singing the thing apart.

Of course after a moment he realized the creature was already properly dead, but the old man thought it better to make sure. Armor creaking and servos groaning, he managed to lift the beast off his form and took stock of him self. His autocannons still functioned, though he was low on shells, as did his chest mounted battery and other offensive systems. His armor was breached, though not his inner sarcophagus.

Attempting to run a power up routine on his C-beamer returned and error, and he angled the weapon just enough to look at it, seeing the impact damage. He cursed. The C-beamer was easily his favorite weapon, and a grand equalizer of forces given very few things in existence could withstand its beam of perdition.

Getting to his feet, he was greeted with the realization his right leg actuator was busted. He could still stand, and even limp along, but his titanic weight and size meant he would effectively be crawling along. Muttering again, like many old men do when minorly annoyed, he set out for the Command spire.



The Duel of brothers...

Clause knelt as his brother opened his wings to sweep in for the coup de grace, and for a moment Clause was readying him self for the inevitable end...and then something happened.

A voice, a presence really, in the back of his mind made it's self known. This was not the violent, blood lusted taint of the arch enemy...this was different. Calming...and...familiar.

In the moments between moments, it's words became clear to him.

Rise, son of Neoth.

In a moment he felt his spirit rise, his aching muscles and bruised body felt lighter, his aches calming, mothered by this odd force. In a moment, as time began to flow as it was supposed to, his mind was already forming a counter. He held his posture of submission as his brother neared and in a moment of transhuman speed, reached his hand out, willing the armor to fallow.

His sword, linked to the gauntlet it was tethered to via a magnetic relay, flew to his hand in a snap movement, he speared his brother through the middle with it, its anathema filled edge cutting though even the demonically reinforced armor and hide of his lost kin.

It was only as the blade sunk in did he raise his gaze to Paragon's, a smile on his lips, the light of defiance in his eyes. Yanking the blade free he rolled with the blow, letting it send him back and away. Getting to his feet he prepared to continue the duel when the portal opened behind his wounded brother. He stood, guard ready as his brother was yanked back through the air and in to the warp.

Only when the portal closed did he lower the sword, taking a moment to breath for perhaps the first time since he started the duel. He sheathed the sword, taking a moment to collect his rifle and pistol and made to move for the Custodes.



Across the City...

The air changed. The blood lusted fervor and rage that seemingly permeated the very atmosphere it self seemed to wain and wither. Not many knew what it meant, but those that did took action. All across the city Loyalist units, seemingly finding the momentum behind their foes falling, took the initiative and countered with renewed vigor. Scattered PDF and guardsmen, battered bands of Astartes, even the mauled shrine guards and Civilian Militia felt the shift and with renewed vigor countered their enemy. They took losses, even drastic ones as mortals attempted to charge and rout out traitor marines, but they served their purpose to pin their enemy in place while the more armored, or transhuman, elements could join the fray and bring the needed fire power to put them down.

The Cathedral of St. Elia, despite suffering damage and seeing the tragic death of the elder Canoness, quickly became the focal point of Loyalist operations, with Raven Guard reinforcements joining the battered bands of Battle Sisters, Lamentors, Raptors and even some lost elements of the Burning Scrolls.

Things seemingly started to swing in to their favor...
 
Coronet City

The fighting had largely died down by the time the clouds became spotted once more with various black dots falling like comets. Trailing fire and followed by heavier, bulky, aircraft with whining engines. The Iron Hands had arrived; three entire Clans: Raukaan, Vurgaan, and Dorrvok; arrived on the outskirts of the city and immediately assailed the meandering hordes of Paragon's adrift mortal soldiery. It was a bloodbath but not to the Khornate cultists preference. Thousands of red and crimson garbed soldiers of the God of Battle and Slaughter died like cattle in a meat factory. The ranks, once disciplined and full of frenzy, melted away beneath the surgical, cold, methodical assault of the Iron Hands. Many squads advancing in lockstep, measured, advances across the fields around Coronet City. Their war engines, for they took to the field with their Clan Dreadnaughts, and vehicles: Predators, Land Raiders, Rhinos, and Land Speeders carved a bloody perimeter around the city.

The first Iron Hand to enter arrived via the northern gate and held aloft the banner of Clan Raukaan from atop a Land Raider as the black armored warriors began to take the gateways into and out of the city.

Abandoned Bunker D57

Relagon watched as the next batch of eight captives were sacrificed. Their bodies held upside down by the iron grip of Defiler gauntlets. Feeding the blood pools as more Defilers and mortals of value stepped through the portal. The portal only remaining open by the continual sacrifices. The sound of ceramite clad boots filled the air as out of the flickering torch light came the form of Sarn.

"You live." said Relagon matter of fact.

"Gurrosh is less lucky," replied Sarn. Indicating Gurrosh had perished on the captured Imperial escort.

"Gurrosh was a fool," shot back Relagon and Sarn gave no response. Merely coming to take a seat and lean back against the rockrete of the bunker. Red dripped from his side.

"You are wounded?" Queried Relagon as he watched another squad of Defilers go through the portal. Noticing the crack in Sarn's ceramite plate along his left rib-cage. "Raven Guard, one of their snipers caught me in the side. The Medusans are also here."

"The Iron Hands...no doubt more to follow. The failure of Paragon to...," Relagon noticed Sarn stiffen at the remark and Relagon continued with a slightly more polite tone, "...our genefather to best the Lord of Scrolls has left us no choice but to retreat back to the Eye."

"All the way to the Eye?"

"The Red Corsairs and their allies in the Maelstrom are not our friends of late. In our disorganized state I opted for the solution to reorganize the Legion."

"How many of us live?"

"I gathered five thousand six hundred and seventy-four."

"I still have my warriors, and the surviving Goresworn have arrived." Sarn cast a thumb towards the entrance down the hall which led to a lift to the surface. Heavy stomps sounded now as a pair of Dreadnaughts moved into the portal followed by a Helbrute. The long column disappearing into the swirling colours of the warp echoed the cries of another eight being sacrificed.

A third Defiler came by and stopped before the duo, "Captains Aburoth and Sherren have arrived from the northern districts. Ninety-eight and Ninety-six warriors accounted for their companies. The Iron Hands have taken the gates and established a perimeter around the city."

"Bring your warriors down here. They can go next." Around them the Defilers continued to march into the portal, but the bunker was emptying. Some hours ago, it had been packed shoulder to shoulder. Now only those which had evaded the Imperials to arrive at the rendezvous point were trickling in.

The ground above shuttered. The aforementioned captains arriving with their men in toe and moving into the portal. A second shudder and dust fell from above. Relagon spoke into his helmet vox demanding a report from the sentries above. The chirp of the vox was filled with static, <<Imperial Armour moving down main boulevards and causeways. That Super Heavy is leading a column our way via the Primarch's Causeway. Contact in ten minutes. Enemy infantry moving through buildings and alongside their approach.>>

<<Get down here. Leave the mortals to delay the Imperials.>> Replied Relagon as he turned to Sarn, "Your men should leave too."

Sarn grunted and waved him off as he stood to rise and waved a gathering Defilers by the lift. The companies of Sarn, Aburoth, and Sherren tramping towards the portal. A third, louder boom, as the mortal soldiers above engaged the Imperial vanguard. The bunker shuddered as something, likely a building, collapsed above them. Relagon turned to put one last look at the lift and waved the warriors holding the sacrifices to follow him into the portal. Leaving thousands of traumatized Imperial citizens huddled by the vast blood pool to shutter in fear as the bunker went dark.

For hours they waited until a red laser pierced the gloom. Coming from the lift shaft. A hovering servitor skull drifted along and scanned the area. Noticing the civilians and panning a green scan laser over them in a wide cone. Then a dozen lamps shown with red targeting lasers as a squad of Raven Guard had silently descended the shaft and fanned out across the bunker. A single vox message going out, <<Chapter Master, we found them.>>

Nineteen thousand civilians had been saved. But only slightly more than a quarter of those that had been abducted. The sight of so many stacked bodies and a lake of blood in the bunker caused many of the later imperial medicae staff to vomit or feel ill. Inquisitor Lord Dunn himself and Chaplains of the Astartes alongside Librarians were sent down to scour for lingering taint but also to augur the survivors for signs of corruption. A harrowing ordeal.

+++

Silence had permeated the city as the Imperials hunted down the stray mortal cultists that had been stranded. A game of cat and mouse but when the hunters were oft Astartes a terribly one-sided match. Silence, permeated by short bursts of bolter fire every now and then. Hours became days, days became weeks. Until the skies of Parsarius darkened as dozens of Imperial warships took up low orbit over the planet.

The Sun Angels Battlebarge, Red Tear, descending through the clouds as thousands of Space marines descended and arrayed themselves in parade. Dozens of guard regiments formed mass blocs. Titans adorned with banners and Knights at their knees and hips played their trumpets. The red robes of the Mechanicus Magi and contingent of their retinue stood off to the side. While the skies above flocked with parade formations of the Aeronautica Imperialis.


It was awe inspiring and striding into the city the Lord of Angels, Lord Commander of Imperium Nihilus, Chapter Master of the Sun Angels, Dante, walked in his golden armor. His face hissed as he took it off and put it at his hip. Letting his fair face be seen and silky black hair fall along his collar. He was old even by Astartes standards and his eyes showed the wear. But they remained bright and his skin the characteristic youthful porcelain of many who bore the gene-seed of the Emperor's Angel of Death. Beside him stook Shrike of the Raven Guard, and Kaalac Klarg representing the Iron Hands as their representative. The Chapter Masters of various Sun Angel successors that had traveled to aid the Primarch stood behind them. Gabriel Seth of the Flesh Tearers, Azrael of the Dark Angels, Belatar of the Night Lords who had sworn penance for their renegade actions before the Devastation of Valtmar, and many more. Including those of other lineages. A squad of Crimson Fists stood off to the side with their Sergeant, their Gladius frigate in orbit. A Company of the Novamarines of Titus Ironborns own lineage stood off in perfect rank and file.

Upon meeting the Primarch they would bow and rise at his command. Thousands of Astartes and over a million guardsmen kneeling into the dirt and stonework before rising. Even the Titans and Knights bent their knees and tilted in reverence. The Dreadnaughts knelt forward. While from the side representatives of the Ecclesiarchy and Sororitas bowed to prostrate or sang prayers in Clausewitz' honor. The Custodian Hadrian however, merely glanced at the Primarch and the latter knew what it meant. He was heading to Terra. With all due haste...


One Month Later

The custodian vessel had arrived in the Sol System without fanfare or even broadcast of who it had aboard. Silently slipping into anchorage above Terra itself the Primarch would be ferried down with his honor guard to the Imperial Palace. Where he would be taken before the Eternity Gate and waited half a day before allowed entry into the Sanctum Imperialis. Allowed down the sacred halls and antechambers into the vast throne room and there rising like a gilded pyramid the arcane Golden Throne. And there upon it lay the dissected remains of one that Clausewitz would call, 'Father.' The presence in the room was not underwhelming. The long lines of the three hundred Custodian companions, ever vigilant, stood silently. While the presence, that presence in the throne room, a psychic power of immense, incalculable potency, hung in the air. So, when the Eternity Gate doors were shut, and Clausewitz was now before the Master of Mankind. What transpired in their conversation is yes to be revealed...
 
He stood. Silent. Unmoving.

A look of grim, utter determination on his face. He could feel the power in the air. Then he took a step. Then another, and yet more. The soft metallic thumping of his armor, still tattered and barely working, as he approached the throne. He paid the Custodes no mind. He held no malice, no anger, no rage in his steps. Yet his mind what else where...


Ignoring the nature of his tired eyes that betrayed his form, Dante knelt before him. For a moment all was quiet. Then he spoke. "Get up." A pause, Dante spared him a look of question. "Get up, Dante. We have much to do, much to discuss. I know of you and yours, and I will not suffer upon you the indignity of subservience in light of your actions. You have more then earned the right to speak on equal terms."

"My lord Primarch, I-"

""Uncle". You have earned that right. Now stand. As I have said, we have much to do, and far to little time to do it."

He stood before the massive throne. A chair. He could feel it, the tinkering, tottering, putting machine of such esoteric design and nature even he couldn't figure its inner workings. He knew of his affinity with machines. But this? This was beyond him.

He looked up at his father...or what remained. He felt the words leave his lips before his mind could even process their potential results. "Are...you still even in there? Does some...granule of who you were still inhabit this husk?" He meant no ill respect, but his words came from the heart. He had to know. He had to know something of his rather remained.
 
Far from Terra, on a world known as Sordes

"Scumbo, scumbo, scumbo!" The gnarled and jubilant voice repeated over and over. Glee and excitement in tone. Impatience growing with every utterance of it's seemingly nonsensical word.

"Yes my little filthy thing." Spoke a second voice. Once deeper, with an uneven and broken cadence to the words. "The scumbo is nearly ready." The voices emanate from a greasy haze in the center of a dead and decrepit forest. The trees, black and leafless. The ground, greyed and devoid of all natural life. The greasy haze hangs like a dense fog. Making it hard to see more than a few yards in front of you. The sky above is tinted a sickly green. fumes from horrid things bellow up into the atmosphere. The few things that remain flying in the sky fall from the sickness the fumes plague them with.

"Want stones! Want crunch!" the gnarled voice demands.

"There are no stones to add little one." The second voice replies. Though there are two voices there is only one figure in the clear. Standing before a massive cauldron that is only equaled by the figures own massive size. Reinwar Stahl is the speaker. A man once revered within the Imperium of man. Chapter Commander within the Emerald Glaives, under the Primarch Korok. Upon their Primarch's death at the hands of the Traitor Atlas, Reinwar and his chapter began an endless search for any possible method to restore the life of their beloved genefather. A search that lead them down a well which had the corruption of Nurgle at the bottom. Reinwar's search continues. Though it is now tainted by a desire to also see his gene father reborn as a Daemon Prince of Nurgle. He carries with him, the glaive of his Genefather. Called the Providence Oak it is a weapon of great power. It is also a weapon that remains pure. Despite the vile appearance that Reinwar has taken on, his right hand as well as the Providence Oak itself both remain pure and untouched by Nurgle's corruption. It shines, as if it were a beacon of the Emperor himself, through the greasy haze. Shining light on the tentacle like vines that wrap around Reinwars deep green power armor.

"Want STONES!" The gnarled other voice calls out yet again. The voice comes from a gaping maw that opens up along Reinwar's torso. Crossing it from arm pit to hip. With a singular eye popping up where his nipple would normally be. A minor daemon of Nurgle has possessed Reinwar's armor. One he has named Lurge. A gift, granted to him from the Plaguefather. One that grants him more power. As well as a companion for his journeys.

"I do not know if these blue beings function like humanity, Lurge. They are fish like. There are no stones within the kidneys to add!" Reinwar explains as he cuts open a Tau gallbladder and pours the bile into the cauldron. The concoction within the cauldron bubble slowly. The viscous liquid looking black as death and smelling of durian fruit pureed with vinegar.

"Bahh! Want stones!" Lurge cries out once more.

"We shall have stones for our next meal, Lurge. Patience. All good bowls are filled in time." A Tau eye slowly floats to the top of the thick liquid. Popping into a blue splatter across Reinwar's armor. A massive purple boil covered tongue glides across the armor from his stomach maw. lapping up every drop of the Tau blood and gore that covered him.

"MORE." Lurge demands.

"More you shall have. That pop means it is finally ready." Reinwar fills a large bowl with the liquid and holds it in front of Lurge's maw. The daemon armor lapping it up with gluttonous glee.

"My Filthlord!" A third voice calls out from beyong the haze as a green plague marine steps through it, carrying a data slate in hand.

"What cause do you have for disturbing my meal, Osgar?"

"Apologies, Filthlord Reinwar. But there are two pieces of news that you must be made aware of."

"OUT WITH IT, HUNGRY!" Lurge interrupts.

"The first is that we have encountered scouts of the metal ones. They have been dismantled, few as they were. But They forbode of a grander coming force."

"And the second news?" Reinwar says with a nod of understanding?

"A clue, my filthlord. To the location of the Bright One."

Reinwar turns, his eyes narrowing in determination.

"Are you certain?"

"I cannot be certain that the information is accurate. And the location data is vague. Merely the name of a system. But we have verified that the Metal Ones believe it to be genuine."

"Muster the chapter. The Necrotic Shears shall be the first to greet our genefather's sister. And through her, we shall find a way to return Korok to life."
 
"Beautiful on the surface, but rotten underneath. Don't ever, even for a second, doubt that this is the most dangerous world in the galaxy.... Danger does not always come in the shape of Orks with bolters, Ragnar. This world is where the elite of the Imperium have gathered. We are talking now of the most ruthless, ambitious, unscrupulous collection of rogues ever culled from a million planets. This is the place they have come to realise their ambitions, and on Terra they can, and will not let anything stand in their way. Not me, not you, not their own kin if need be." — Torin the Wayfarer, Wolfblade to House Belisarius of the Navis Nobilite, speaking to Ragnar Blackmane.

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Coldness and Time. Infinite and yet still. The days and nights stretched off into eternity as Clausewitz Parsarius had passed beyond the gilded perfection of the Eternity Gate. Spirited to the Imperial Palace by the Adeptus Custodes without a word or fanfare. Placed before the Gate that rose high enough for the top to mist with cloud condensation. A pair of Reaver Titans stood on each side and before him two rows of Custodians stood ever vigilant. The Gate itself from thrice forged pure Adamantium, alloyed with Ceramite, and decorated with purest gold measured by the tonnage. The Emperor was young here. Depicted triumphantly skewering the Serpent Horus and flanked by His pantheon. Clausewitz could guess who some of the faces were. Some were his own siblings. Korok off to the corner, Titus on the other side. A menagerie of Saints and Heroes of the Imperium from the Apostasy and Great Crusade. Only after what was apparently hours did the great Gate yaw open, and the Custodes allow him through.

The way to the Golden Throne which rose before him like a vast golden pyramid lay alight with candles. Purity seals lines the walkway and a faded, once brilliant crimson silk carpet was trod under his great armored boots. The presence of the place was thick, as if being under water, but then there He was. Sat upon the throne. Skeletal, corpse-like, sunken and almost indecipherable even for a Primarch's senses on if He were alive or dead. But the Emperor spoke. His words were like staring into a star. Washing away the somber atmosphere and the grief that which bore in the heart of the 12th Primarch at seeing his father in such a state.

With words of light and fire the Emperor spoke to Clausewitz Parsarius, conferring with His second returned Primarch, one of His last of a pantheon of most fine creations. Creation, not a son. A heavy weight bore on Clausewitz at the moment of this meeting. As time and the coldness of the environment melded and melted away in a wash of pure psychic eminence.

The Emperor when He had walked among Man and strode the stars with His Primarchs had been an artful being, as skilled at hiding His thoughts as He was reading those of others. That what remained of Him was powerful beyond comprehension, incalculable, and there was little wonder if what truly sat before Clausewitz was indeed a God now. Yet, the subtlety was gone and unlike that of when He walked with Men. It was like staring into the heated fires of the hottest Martian forge. The words burned Clausewitz. But it was that which went unsaid would burn the deepest.

LOST. FOUND. BETRAYER. REDEEMED. BURNED. RISEN. NUMBER TWELVE. MURDERER. AVENGER. ELEVEN AND TWELVE OF EIGHTEEN. VICTORY.

Clausewitz was not greeted like a son returning to the doorstep of a Father. But as a blacksmith receives a well forged tool. A returned hammer or chisel thought lost and now retrieved. The emotion which did pass to the twelfth Primarch was more akin to that of a prisoner in an iron cage being given a spoonful of water. And Clausewitz was the water in the ladle; of that there could be no illusion.

While the Emperor walked the paths and gardens of the Imperial Palace in those bygone days, He had wrapped His manipulations and schemes in the garments of love. He had let them all, even the lost and forgotten, call him Father and He had allowed them to call themselves His children. Clausewitz, like Titus before him, now realized like the flash of an entire life's memory before him that the Emperor had said such familial terms so rarely back at them. And when He had said them, it was without sincerity. This psychic realization buffeted Clausewitz mentally like a hurricane wind blowing over a sandy beach. Unbridled and raw the vast power of the Emperor had ripped the stage curtains from Clausewitz's eyes, just like his brother years before.

The Emperor had allowed them all to love Him, and to believe that He loved them in return. He had not. He does not. His Primarchs were weapons, nothing more and nothing less.

The supernova that was the Emperor's presence before the Twelfth Primarch was immense, perhaps greater than before internment, but the humanity of the being before Clausewitz was gone. The cost of ascension. No longer able to mask His thoughts with a human face. The Light of the Emperor was all encompassing, bathing, and now finally---finally, after all these long years---the being which Clausewitz had thought to be his father could hide nothing from him.

The Emperor did not love His children. They were things. Tools. Instruments of His grand plan for Humanity. Titus, Vasilisa, Clausewitz, and the rest. Nothing but a means to an end...

Holy Terra

The meeting with the Emperor had been a secret affair orchestrated by the Custodian Guard. Only after did the pomp and reception begin. Staged and meticulous. The Primarch of the Burning Scrolls would parade from the Inner Sanctum and the Hall of Heroes which lay before the Eternity Gate and out onto the Royal Ascensor onto the Gilded Walk. Reaching the Ultimate Wall and the Ultimate Gate. Crossing the threshold from the Inner Palace into the Outer via the Lion's Gate, the mighty starport of the same name off to the side, and the ring of bastions all of which were famous. Bhab, Aurum, Cydonai and so forth. Mighty towering edifices of barracks and gun platforms. Crossing through the great Lion's Gate and its rearing statues which give it its name the Primarch was led down the Avenue of Eternal Remembrance. Forged from the hulls of defeated Traitor Titans the one-hundred-kilometer avenue stretched out in a straight line through the Outer Palace. Dividing the Hive City-like hyper-urban lanscape of the Sprawl Magnificans and its golden spires from the golden and silver topped pyramids and buttressed cathedrals of bureaucracy that is the Nexus Administrata. Beyond them, further, lay the Victoris Absolute urban zone and the Vigilatum Gun Battery. All enclosed within the vast, 1,100 Meter high and every hundred meter placed gun citadels, Eternity Wall. The Eternity Wall itself was wide enough to allow entire tank regiments to drive along its battlements. The interiors of the walls filled with barracks, mag lev networks for ammunition and transport trains, hydraulic lifts capable of hoisting Titans, and more. The walls of the Imperial Palace housing the garrison of millions of Guardsmen from vaunted Regiments like the Lucifer Blacks and Palatine Sentinels.

The fanfare was immense. Imperial Adepts and functionaries in the millions lined the processionals and causeways. Confetti like rain and scented papers fluttered amid the air. The Palace high enough that the weather allowed a sense of coolness. Above the omnipresent smog and gray clouds of pollution which blanketed much of Terra. Here the sky still shown blue but it was a pale imitation of the sky of Terra that Clausewitz would remember during the Great Crusade. Cheers and chants echoed like the voices of mythological cyclopean giants as the Primarch was paraded back to his shuttle. To retire for the evening. For his brother, Titus Ironborn, had arrived in the Sol System to meet his long-lost sibling and would wait no longer than necessary.
 
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Clause winced at the words as the unbridled psychic might of the master of man kind assailed his mind with the force of a storm of biblical force.

LOST. FOUND. BETRAYER. REDEEMED. BURNED. RISEN. NUMBER TWELVE. MURDERER. AVENGER. ELEVEN AND TWELVE OF EIGHTEEN. VICTORY.

The words buffeted and rocked his mind, his temple of logic, reason, and knowledge like a Hurricane of global proportions. His mental library shook, memories became jumbled, emotions ran rampant. He shut his eyes and tried to breath.

It seemed like it would go on for ever...then, at once, it ceased. He caught his breath, realizing for the first time he had been holding it in. All was quiet again, with just the sounds of his haggard intakes of air being the only noise.

"I...understand...at least, I think I do. You never saw me, or any of us, as we saw you. I...know not what you are now, father. I don't think I will ever know, truly, what you have become."

He rose, shakily, casting a tired look up at the skeletal features of his creators skull. "We were tools to you, a means to an ends. What ever fate that meant for us, what ends you made for us..." His voice trailed off.

"No. Not any longer." He reaffirmed his gaze on the empty pits of his near dead father's eyes. "I will keep hope, for it is all that I have left. If Titus is to be your will, your plans made manifest, then I will be the guardian of what little hope we have left. If not for you? Then for them. The unwashed masses outside, the mere mortals who have, through hells more literal then I would have ever imagined during those bygone, heady days, held aloft your kingdom through naught but toil and sacrifice. I will do it for them. This I swear to you."

He straitened, fully. "I know you aren't what you were, who you were, I can only imagine what these year since has done to you. It may not mean anything to one such as you, but if there is any of the man I knew left in there, know that...for all the toil and strife, for all the machinations you held and caused...I forgive you, father."

He turned, making to leave. There was so much else he wanted to say, to ask...but no, this was not the time, nor the place.

Later...

He stood in the passenger hold of the shuttle. He'd finally taken of his armor, cleaned him self too. He hadn't simply stopped working, no, he had an entire chapter to build, and more then a few needing rest and repair. From the first moment he could he had his personal Data cogitator on his hand, swiping through reports, building manifests and list, drafting and issuing orders.

He shifted in his robes. It was an old set, one of the few still around that fit him, a flowing garment not to dissimilar to the garb of a monk. Made of silk and colored a soft off white, it reached down to his ankles and half covered the simple leather boots he wore on his feet and was secured to his waist with a similarly simple leather belt, upon which hung his plasma pistol, dagger, vox link transceiver and personal refractor shield emitter.

He reached up and brushed the still fresh scar tissue along his face. His physiology meant that there was no lasting damage, his own warp infused being having fought off and dispelled the taint of his brother's claws, and he had been offered some of the best facial reconstruction cheurgeons in the Imperium to remove them but had turned them all down. They would remain, a reminder of this new, dark Imperium he had been thrust in to.

As the shuttle landed he tapped the pad one last time and shut it down, slipping it in to a pouch on his belt before standing. Today, he'd meet his brother.
 
The Bulwark
Segmentum Solar, Sector Solar, Sub-Sector Solar, Sol System

The vastness of the small moon sized battlestation never failed to impress itself upon any who saw it, even the Primarch whose gene-sons the station nominally belonged to. When Titus Ironborn had returned, the great station had been a husk of itself, extensively damaged from action above Terra, as a Daemonic host had tried to claim the station, and then in the battle and evacuation of Cadia. It had sat in orbit around Terra since, still a formidable bulwark against attacks, but seemingly destined to be little more than yet another of the hundreds of defense stations around Terra, a worthy if mundane existence for such a construct.

Titus had ordered that it be repaired as much as possible, its ancient logic engines thoroughly purged of any taint. In a show of solidarity and cooperation, the Shadowkeepers of the Adeptus Custodes had opened one of their Black Cells, allowing the Imperial Wardens access to ancient technologies to help them in their mission to bring the Bulwark back to its former glory and power. Titus himself had departed on the first of his reclamation crusades, dubbed the Indomitus Crusade, as reconstruction efforts had swung into full force, though thanks to the need of the Wardens on the frontline, only a handful of his gene-sons had remained behind to oversee it, much of the work being left to the Mechanicus and mortal hands.

During the Crusade, Titus had had seldom time to return to Terra, and always on some time pressing business, and had only been able to see brief reports on the efforts, but he had been pleased. Since the closing of the Indomitus Crusade, more resources had been freed to expedite the repairs, and now the station was more operationally capable than it had been since the Great Crusade, perhaps even more so in some regards. Although Titus hadn’t been able to return to Terra between the end of the Crusade and shifting to campaign in the Ultima Segmentum in the Plague Wars, much of the vital coordination had been moved from Terra itself to the immense station, for the sake of speed and efficiency. Representatives from every branch of the Imperium were quartered there, from Inquisitors to Arbites, representatives of Rogue Traders to those of the mighty Forge Worlds of the Adeptus Mechanicus. Even the Custodes had a full time representative there.

Most importantly, in Titus’ mind however, were the representatives of the Adeptus Administratum, the Astra Militarum, the Imperial Fleet, and the Departmento Munitorum. Although the other organizations were no less important, it was these that were the spine, the limbs, and the stomach of the Imperium. He had taken great care to ensure that these representatives would work well together, and closely. The quarters of the representatives were located close together, staffers would often dine in the same halls. More importantly, great care had been made that the senior representatives and their more important staffers had compatible personalities with their counterparts. Titus had seen the galaxy consumed by overly egotistical and ambitious beings once before, and all it took was one vainglorious admiral or general to damn a sub-sector.

This microcosm of Imperial bureaucracy was perhaps the most efficient in the Imperium, certainly for such a large collection of the like, it was just that. A small, microscopic segment upon the bloated beast that was the Imperiums bureaucracy. But it worked. Though the High Lords still squabbled, and these departments outside of the Bulwark and Terra were still as ponderous, and sometimes odious, as always, these senior staffers were able to kick their directives down the chain and get things working efficiently, like a stream of fresh water into a ocean of brackish stagnation. And for Titus, for now, that was enough. Perhaps there would be a chance to take a surgeon's knife to the institutions as a whole, but this was not the time nor the place, as such a process would be a monumental undertaking, and no doubt take centuries to correct, and there were far more pressing matters to attend to.

Upon hearing that one of his Loyalist siblings had been returned, Titus had held guarded optimism. When he had heard it was Clause, he had turned guardedly suspicious. Clause had vanished at the start of the Heresy, lost in the Warp, and now he returned? Was he a Loyalist at all, or was this part of the so-called ‘Long War’ that some of the traitors believed in? He had made plans to meet Clause, to ascertain the truth for himself. When he had heard that Clause was being taken to Terra, to stand before the Emperor like he himself had done, Titus had departed for Terra at once for Terra himself, the suspicion replaced with apprehension. Clause had always had a reputation of…provoking various parts of the Imperium and its allies during the Great Crusade, notably the Mechanicum. And given the state of the Imperium now, who knew what trouble he may cause, purposely or accidentally.

Titus had arrived at Terra before Clause by a few days, but made no imposition to disrupt whatever plans the Custodes had in mind, he had simply commanded that Clause be brought to the Bulwark after Clause had seen the Emperor.

Titus sat in his secondary study, deep in the depths of the Bulwark. The room was large, but utilitarian compared to his primary study, located close to the main command center of the Bulwark, where he would normally be, and also where he normally would host guests of importance, or staff meetings to plan new campaigns or operations. But the various command centers were busy with vital work, shifting forces, preparing lines of supply and communication as more and larger forces were diverted to the Ultima Segmentum. It was work that Titus did not want to disrupt. He would show Clause around after they had talked, and after Titus had impressed the situation upon Clause.

Clausewitz…Titus didn’t know much about the man, truthfully. He had been one of the last Primarchs returned to the fold, shortly before Titus’s own censuring by the Emperor, so they hadn’t interacted much. Vasilisa had spoken favorably of him, but then who hadn’t spoken favorably of Horus as well?

He would be cautious. Already encased in his life-saving armor, Orks Bane laid out of reach, but close enough that he could grab it in the event that he needed. So as he awaited the arrival of his brother, Titus busied himself with work, reading over reports and preparing for the next campaign he would have to go off and fight, for the enemies of the Imperium were many and emboldened. He would have to blunt their ambitions ever further to return the Imperium to a relative peaceful status quo. And that was work he would thoroughly enjoy.
 
Clause stood outside the door leading to his brother's study. Thinking. Worrying. Would he be welcomed with open arms? Be chastised for his untimely exit from the...betrayal?

With a curt nod he dismissed Castor and Pollux for the time since arriving, and with out protest the two black clad Astartes left down the hall. Taking one last moment to shave the nervousness from his mind, and failing, before running his hands through his beard and hear. Reaching for the door pad, he opened it, revealing, for the first time in years, his brother.

A step, then another, as he approached. A small portion of his mind, the more clinical portion, drank in the details of the room and his brother in it. Out of everything he saw, every nanometer detail from the direction of the grain of the wood of the desk he sat at to the subtle shifting of the air currents in the room as they both drew baited breaths.

His brother looked like death. Still entombed in the armor that had saved his life. He had seen the reports, even those the Inquisition had liked him not too. He saw the weapon on the desk, laid out with in arms reach, and between it and the look in his brother's eye, it didn't take long for him to garner its purpose. Pausing, he, slowly, gently even, unclipped his belt, with his side arm and dagger and shield array, and slipped it off his waist. He set it down upon the desk, more so near his brother then were he could reach it, and sat down.

He tried, for a moment, to smile, to put on that same warm, gentile smirk he had worn for years when ever he found him self speaking to the members of his..."family". He failed, utterly. In a moment more it broke and so did he, in a fashion. Before his brother spoke, he held up his hand.

"Before you start, whether it to welcome me back or damn me from my failures, know that it perhaps brings me the only joy I have felt in a long, long time to know that I am not alone. That our father's dream may perhaps live on in his sons. That I, what ever you may perhaps deem is appropriate for me, stand ready to do what ever you require to secure that dream for us and humanity."

He waited.
 
13-Zeta-Nu-9
Near the Halo Zone
Segmentum Tempestus

The mass of the vessel drifted lazily in a stable geosynchronous orbit of a dark world. Dense clouds of gray, heavy with rain, swept over the surface. Obscuring most of the sky and the three pale blue suns which dominated the vast if dead worlds of this forgotten star system. The vessel drifted in an extremely slow tilt as it pondered, as it had done countless times, around the world from on high.

A smaller craft loomed across the dorsal spine of the vessel. Dwarfed by the superstructure of the orbiting, silent, vessel by a hundred times the bulk. The corvette bearing the stylized "I" of the Inquisition drifted across and cast illumination lights along the hull.

<Isolate the signal. It is coming from the planet>

<Auspex scans are having trouble reaching the ground due to the planetary storms.>

<Deploy a surface team. Relay to the watch fortress.>

***

Moments later a small thunderhawk in the black and gunmetal scheme of the Inquisitorial Deathwatch thundered from the small bay of the corvette to the planet below. Punching through the stratosphere and piercing the storm clouds and near constant planetary wide rain to see a landscape of oily rock and dark lakes. Moving along a faint signal began to crackle on the auspex augurs. A pyramid rose through the gloom abruptly and the Thunderhawk engines cut out. The pilot throwing the craft in a juke and then gentle curve to hover over the ground as the forward landing doors opened. Four sets of ceramite boots struck the dirt with a crunch. Boltguns across their chests. One, had the pauldron of the Imperial Wardens on one and the Deathwatch on the other. The icons of a sergeant on his armor and helmet.

<<Sergeant Thaddeus, Squad Alpha is on-site. Confirmed. Signal is coming from structure on the surface. Faint, old, imperial codes.>> The Sergeant activated a search lamp on his shoulder and panned it over the pyramid surface closest to him. <<Confirmed, carved from Noctilith. The Inquisitor's guess was correct.>>

A second marine, this time their chapter pauldron bearing the armorial of the Emerald Glaives spoke, << Brother-Sergeant. There seems to be an opening to the structure a half mile from here.>>

<<Roger. We make for the opening and investigate.>>

***

Meanwhile in orbit the Corvette watched as advanced and ancient augur arrays, specially outfitted to this vessel, tracked a fleet of craft entering the edges of the star system. It would take weeks on their present course to arrive. The twin black holes and three Suns of the system played havoc with navigation of the system. Warp Travel was impossible unless dropping out of system outside the gravity wells and then making one's way into the stellar space.

Holy Terra
Imperial Palace
Tower of Hegemon

Captain-General Valoris watched the reports scroll in from the Nordafrik Underhives. The 5th Merican Baronial Levies had returned from Parsarius and was going through a two week re-equip and reformation before being deployed back into the perimeter around the Underhives afflicted by this most unthinkable conflict. A perimeter spanning thousands of square miles across hundreds of levels and a dozen sub-levels beneath Terra's ancient surface.

Valoris blink-clicked a live feed showing patrols of Custodians sweeping galleries and abandoned manufactorums. Then recordings of Guard units at company strength doing their sweeps. The Genestealers were crafty, subtle, and gifted in infiltration. The perimeter was perfect as could be but there was the ever-present threat of some tunnel off maps, some forgotten shaft, or half collapses access way, something to allow the disease that is their presence on the Throneworld to spread.

The effort of containment was no small task. One hundred and twelve Regiments of the Terran garrison had been deployed. From the Merican Hives to the Gyptus Sprawls to the Spires of the Panpacific Ring Hives. Really all of those would be merely districts of the near global city which sprawled across, above, and below, the surface of Humanity's homeworld. Only the Katabatic Plain lay untouched, largely, by the hyper-urban nature of Terra.

He would have enjoyed to mass deploy the Ten Thousand to deal with this threat. But the Second Battle of Terra had cost the Custodes four thousand of their number. To repel the endless waves of Daemons from the Lion's Gate. Even in the century and a quarter since then the Custodes have never been truly able to replace all those losses. There had been new Custodians made of course. But it is a time-consuming affair. Each Custodian a unique and never to be recreated art of the genewrights which labor in the Inner Imperial Palace.

"The Primarch's meeting has begun aboard The Bulwark."

Valoris squinted slightly, the thought of now two of those failed experiments walking about. Failed if still useful one might say. But their King of Ages had spoken, and the Emperor's Will was the only factor that mattered. So, Valoris pushed the thought aside and turned to the voice of the statement. A second Custodian, helmet off like Valoris, stood with his gauntlet hands on his hips. "A respite back here in the Tower, eh? Colquan?"

"The Lord Commander does not need of my services at current."

"Services."

"Term of expression. I only serve the Emperor."

"As do we all," Valoris swept his gaze back to the tidal wave of information before him. Processing it all effortlessly. He had thought of allowing Astartes to operate freely to deal with this threat. The Imperial Wardens, Minotaurs, and now Scrolls were in orbit. To make up numbers that he was unwilling to divest from the defense of the Imperial Palace and other commitments around Segmentum Solar.

A new report caught his eye. Unrest in the adjacent Svoll Hive. Unrest similar to what had occurred in Nordafrik prior to the uprising of Genestealers. "Notify all perimeter commands to prepare the cordon of the Svoll Hive. Close all Via Ordinaria routes into and out of the Hive. Arbites are to evacuate and await Inquisitorial and Guard reinforcements." The serfs around him effortlessly carried out the orders. The bones of their ancestors draped over their fine tunics. A tradition of the serfs which served in the Tower of Hegemon.

"Also notify the Primarchs that Svoll Hive has also been presumably infiltrated by Genestealer cells and the containment perimeter has been extended."

Valoris ran the numbers. He had close to thirty million Guardsmen operating this perimeter. Over two million Arbites and 98,000 Sororitas from the Convent on Terra having volunteered. The Inquisition had deployed hundreds of agents and kill teams. The Assassinorum had every clade operating within and throughout the perimeter. Custodians were present. But this was Terra. A warren within a warren. Quadrillions called this world home and the Genestealers were like the long gone Terran cockroach. They only needed the smallest of cracks to get into the walls and spread their vile putrid filth.
 
The Bulwark
Segmentum Solar, Sector Solar, Sub-Sector Solar, Sol System

Titus watched as Clausewitz entered the study, the methodical look as his ‘brother’ took in every detail of the room, the slight hesitation as he walked further into the room, eyes lingering on Ork Bane for a few scant nano-seconds more than anywhere else. A pause, and his sibling disarmed himself in a deliberate show of non-hostility. He allowed Clausewitz to speak, then took a moment to reflect on his words, and finally answered.

“The Emperor’s dream is nearly as dead as he is.” Titus said flatly. He had never truly viewed the Emperor as a father, a creator yes, but never a father. There had been fondness there, in ages past, genuine or fabricated, but the man Titus had viewed as a father, as a mentor, had died years before he had ever heard of the Emperor.

“Nor is it our place to attempt a revival of it. Our duty now remains the same as it was, albeit with different parameters. Ensure the survival of the Imperium, or failing that, a portion of humanity untainted by the ruinous powers, to our dying breaths.” Titus said, eyes hardening a bit as he recalled the absence of Clausewitz through the Heresy. He did not yet know the reason, cowardice, accident, or planned, but he would know the truth before long. “And I will brook no failure in this regard, not again, not from any of us.”
 
Szarekh's Flagship The Song of Oblivion

The Silent king, true to his name did not great the Phaeron Tut'kan as he strode to meet the Szarekhan dynasty's Triarchy. Faint grinding can be heard as his metallic joints bend with every step. It only barely extends beyond the dull hum of Szarekh's flagship. Every inch of the city sized ship giving off a light green glow that hums a soothing monotone. Every third step is interrupted by the butt of Tut'kan's trident tapping the metal floor below. Stopping as the Phaeron approaches the Triarchs. The three standing together in lockstep. Hepthatra to the Silent King's right. Mesophet to his left. The pair looking similar in appearance to one another. Yet both are noticeably dwarfed by the size of Szarekh himself. And are even dwarfed by the plethora of Praetorians that line the edges of the room. The Silent King rose a single hand. The necrodermis palm facing upward. Causing Heptharta and Mesophet so speak. Both of them speaking as if being mouth pieces for the thoughts of Szarekh himself.

"Tut'kan..." Mesophet says, her mouth glowing green in tune with the syllables they speak in their own language.

"The Unending..." Hepthatra continues. the pair taking turns speaking.

"Your presence is...."

"Unexpected..."

"I accept your commendation." Tut'kan replied. There is a slight tone in his voice suggesting sarcasm.

"State..."

"your..."

"Purpose..." They speak in unison with the final word.

"I have been made aware of your trajectory. Our paths intercede. I have come to make my intent free of obfuscation." Tut'kan answered.

"The free it." Mesophet demands, commanded by her King.

"I wish to obtain new exhibits within my collection. Two, to be precise."

"Name them." Hepthatra commands.

"The first is of little concern. The Unclean that I have set upon the same path as us."

"You..."

"Have sent warp-touched...."

"To our destination?" The two chatty members of the Triarchy ask, hints of fear underlining rage that bleeds through them from Szarekh himself.

"Meaningless trivialities that bare no threat to the goal. If the information I gather remains accurate, they shall be too preoccupied to be more than a temporary pest. One that shall disappear once secured." Tut'kan explains.

"The other?" Hepthatra asks.

Tut'kan paces briefly. His trident tapping.

tap...tap...tap

"Elaborate." Mesophet demands. Their impatience growing. Tut'kan continues to pace. choosing his answer with extreme caution.

"I do not wish to." Tut'kan finally replies.

"You will." They both snap in rageful unison.

"I will not." Tut'kan says with little care for the demands of the Triarchy. He spins around and begins to walk away. The tapping of his trident gets softer as he walks away. Leaving the Triarchy to ruminate on this Phaeron's vague desires. Tut'kan will not stand in the way of the Silent King. This much, Szarekh knows. But his true intentions lack clarity. Beyond the desires to collect. A desire that Szarekh finds most juvenile and fascicle. Tut'kan knows this. And could not possibly care less.
 
"You will have none from me. Upon the pain of my end, either by your hands or my own." He spoke softly, the normal mirth and jovial nature gone. This was simply...him. "I have done my reading on your Crusade Indomitus. Good work, hard victories, I get the distinct sense we needed them." Clause wasn't truly the best at small talk, at least not when it came to the other resident transhumans of his father's court.

He couldn't bring him self to meet his brother's eyes. What ever feelings Titus held for him, he could understand it. He was fresh to the Imperium during Titus's shaming, and he could have said something, spoken something to his father to perhaps ease his censure? He didn't know, and the fact his own brother, who Clause saw as much, could even hate him for it all these years later nearly broke the Primarch's heart.

He let the room quite for a moment before speaking. "You and I both know I know not how to...maneuver this conversation, Titus, so tell me what I must do so that my actions shall speak for me."
 
Interlude Post While the Primarch meeting is underway

The Maw Emerges
Late 134.M42

The assault began with the coordinated attack from above and below the galactic plain by two new tendrils dubbed Nautilon and Promethor respectively by initial regional commands and adopted by the Segmentum Pacificus command in Hydraphur in the days after the attack commenced. Segmentum Command diligently passing along their own information in parallel with Inquisitorial findings that made their way back to Holy Terra in the days after Clausewitz Parsarian and Titus Ironborn would have their meeting.

The first indication of this assault into the Western Reaches of Segmentum Pacificus in the waning solar months of the 134th Year of M42 came when Imperial Astropathic Choirs noticed a sudden silence among worlds in the fringes. The first indication of the Shadow in the Warp. However, the initial loss of contact with outlying systems was not of immediate emergency due to the occasional unreliability of both Warp Travel and the sheer distances in a relatively sparsely populated region hundreds of light-years across. The slow-moving wheels of Imperial Bureaucracy, presence of Warp Storms, and the dual threat of Orks and Knydd in the region further compounded issues regarding an Imperial response.

It would not be until the horrific death of High Astropath Guideoth, mutating and screaming into a horrible tentacled monster that wrecked half of his Choir until brutally put down, did the scale of the threat become known to Sector level commands. Around the same time, within days, reports began flooding into Sector commands and to Hydraphur from across the Western Reaches.

The Byroth Sub-sector was entirely consumed while its Guard forces fought Orks. In the Trinary Reach Cluster a League of Votann fleet broke and fled abruptly mere hours before Tyranid hive ships arrived over the factory worlds of those systems. Vast refugee fleets began arriving in the Haratus Stars, the Mytolian Belt, Templum II, and Gethsemanax. Despite security precautions and quarantines, Tyranid xenoforms and spores still got through and caused bloody uprisings in the aftermath.

Gradually, Imperial commanders were able to put together a horrifying picture. Two new tendrils of Hive Fleet Leviathan of unprecedented size had invaded Imperial space in a coordinated effort. One, Nautilon, was moving into the Vynor Sector from above the galactic plane while the other, Promethor, was moving into the Morpheum Sector from below it. Worse still, these two tendrils were coordinating with one another in a roughly paralleled eastern advance. It was a route that, if unaltered, would take them into Segmentum Solar and towards Holy Terra itself. The Imperial response to this horror was typically inconsistent, with some Governors oversee total mobilization to conduct a defense while others simply led a mass abandonment. Some Space Marine and Imperial Navy elements sought to wage whatever defense they could while other Astra Militarum armies began to attempt to create defensive lines to stem the Xenos advance.

It would take solar weeks before the Eyes of the Emperor affirmed the scale filtering in from Hydraphur. The Custodian frigate Pinion, operating out of the custodes star fortress Oracle Maximus, arrived in secret and held a special meeting with Trajann Valoris, the Custodian Captain-General, about the projected rout of this unprecedented in scale assault. The final destination was clear, Terra itself.

Imperial Palace
Fortress of the Lord Commander Militant of the Astra Militarum
Joined by Lord Commander Solar Arcadian Leontus

"You're certain, the reports I do not doubt. But rather the rapacious speed of a promised mobilization I doubt." Trajann Valoris spoke calmly. Almost indifferent save for the fact of the looming threat to his singular charge which sat upon the Golden Throne below them.

"Without a doubt, Captain-General. I have prepared a report with the Lord Commander of the Imperium. The Primarch will approve of such measures of that I am sure," responded Leontus.

Valoris touched his chin with his gauntleted hand. A mock, humanistic, gesture. Something he found to help ease such tense conversations with Humans. He spoke again, "Many threats abound, and Titus main force is fighting The Despoiler in Nihilus or holding the lines throughout Tempestus and Ultima Segmentum against a myriad of other threats."

The Lord Commander Militant of the Imperial Guard remained silent and merely looked at the summarization of Leontus' mobilization timetables. A sub-sector's worth of resources for singular worlds directly in the path of the approaching threat along the border of Pacificus and Solar. Mass conscription and mobilizations across Solar and Pacificus with emergency calls to Obscurus sectors Calixis, Scarus, and alerts to bastions as far out as the Drusus Marches. The Departmento Munitorum was struggling as is and the Administratum could never keep up. The Lord Commander Militant stamped the document with his gene-code signature and seal.

"I go to the Bulwark now to see the Primarch."

"Inform the other that I request his Astartes to assist the cordon around Hive Svoll."

Leontus nodded before departing. Arriving by shuttle to the Bulwark a half-hour later and awaiting in the Grand Strategium for the Primarch to join him. His report already sent to the Primarch's top level strategic data-feed.

The Leviathan Wakes

While the Solblades, established to fight Leviathan's previous strikes towards Segmentum Solar from Tempestus and Ultima also turned to strike at the approaching wave of Tyranid Hive Fleets tearing through Pacificus. A Sanctus Line was drawn on Imperial stellar cartographical maps comprising "Anchor Worlds" along the border zones of Segmentum Solar and Pacificus. Each one of these worlds would receive a Sub-Sector's allotment of resources. Entire Armies and Fleets would deploy along the line in not only defense but to muster. A policy of "aggressive defense" as Leontus termed it. The ponderous war machine of Humanity was already moving via a barrage of Astropathic Calls and courier ships departing the Sol System even as the Lord Commander Solar arrived on the Bulwark.

Imperial forces on the Bulwark seeing the gravity of the reports that arrived daily, even as meetings and discussions abounded among the Imperium's highest echelons, saw a grim digest. An estimated half-dozen sectors in Pacificus were gone and two more under siege.

Hive Svoll

The rumble of bolter fire echoed amid the hive's galleries and tight corridors. Blood and gore decked the maze of halls, habs, work zones, and sub-levels. Imperial Enforcers and Arbites were the first to realize a Genestealer force had slipped through the Cordon and infiltrated Svoll Hive but within minutes reported mutantforms on a dozen levels. In a move to by time local Enforcer and Arbites officers sealed off levels and zones. Condemning the civilians but ultimately slowing the Genestealers who were forced to bring forth heavier weapons to break through the blast doors or melt through stone and metal.

Svoll's main arterial was the Via Ordinarius Route 519. Forty meters across and cut through the hive allowing a flow of ground car and foot traffic with an underslung mag-lev line leading across an East-West latitude. The mag-lev line had been stopped when the Cordon first was formed. But the Genestealers once gaining access via maintenance tunnels and work shafts funnelled into the Route in their tens of thousands. Fierce fighting erupting all along the Route 519 until incoming Sororitas forces and Astra Militarum units sealed the Routes exit gate out of Svoll and Mechanicus adepts disabled and purged the access terminals.

It was this event which triggered a surge into the upper levels and in the outer galleries Guard troops deploying via Valkyrie managed to stem the tide.
 
Titus took in the measure of Clausewitz, his face remaining emotionless as stone, before his eyes turned to his data-slate and took in the top priority alerts that had been pushed to it. “Terra has come under considerable threat. It seems there is an extensive gene-stealer infestation taken hold. If you haven’t been informed about them, you will be, but know that they are a considerable threat. You will assist the Custodes and local authorities in dealing with it. There are also reports of Tyranid hive-fleet tendrils making their way into Segmentum Solar and most certainly Terra itself. Your primary focus will be Terra. We cannot take the risk of the infestation becoming worse.” Titus said, tone as level as always.

“However, Clausewitz, you are not to cause issues. No arguments with the Ministorum, regardless of how distasteful you find them. And especially none with the Mechanicus.” Titus said sternly, more so that last part, as he recalled that the Mechanicum of old often chafed at the wanton disregard Clausewitz often showed in regards to them and particular treaties.

Titus received a report that Lord Commander Solar Arcadian Leontus was awaiting him, and sent a quick request for the Custodes representative to join him and the Lord Commander Solar in the Grand Strategium. “Follow.” Titus said to Clause as he stood, sliding Clauses’ belt back across the desk as he did so, before walking to the door.

As he exited the study, he and Clause would be flanked by four Astartes, two Firstborn and two Primaris, and in the colors and liveries of loyalist Legions, representatives of the Chapters that all other Chapters had formed from. Many chapters had an honor guard of a single Astartes attached to the Lord Commanders retinue. Titus would sometimes joke that he could form a new Chapter with just the representatives.

As the two Primarchs entered into the Grand Strategium there would be a momentary silence as those present took in the sight, before returning to their work. Clausewitz might notice that Titus’s features softened, and he was less tense, Titus relaxing his usually stern features to appear less intimidating to the regular humans. As they approached the Lord Commander Solar there were even the flickers of a smile on the corners of his lips.

“Ah, Lord Commander Leontus! It is good to see you again, though the circumstances are dire, though not so dire that the men and women of the Imperium cannot overcome.” Titus said, half turning and gesturing to Clausewitz. “Clausewitz Parcarian, Primarch of the 13th Legion. He will be assisting you and the Captain-General in your endeavors.” Titus said, eyebrow raising a nano-meter as if daring Clause to challenge the unspoken order.
 
Castellan (Captain) Lilianna, leader of the 66th Vanguard.
Imperial Navy ship, in the Warp heading for the front lines in Segmentum Solar

Lilianna stood around the central holo-table on the bridge, other officers with her. "Alright we're going to fight some xenos, Tyranids more specifcially" she said, she noted the variety of reactions, some groans of frustration, some concerned grumblings, all to be expected. "I know I know, and we'll be without our main armour force for a few months so the only vehicles we will have are Tauros assault vehicles, and Chimera variants, some of which have been modified to be dropped with our drop troops" she paused as the hologram showed the vehicles as she mentioned them. "As for regular troops, in addition to regular Guardsmen, Elysia has sent us the aforementioned drop troops, the Tempestus Scions have graciously allocated one group of Kasrkins, and of course our Sister Hospiteller, Cecilia, has managed to get a small contingent of her fellow Sisters of Battle to join us, especially since there's rumours of a Shrine World being threatened" she explained. "And when the tank arrive what will we have?" one of her officers asked. "Hellhound variants mostly, some Leman Russ Exterminators and Punishers" she paused for a moment. "And I might've been able to swing for a few bigger items, on top of borrowing some Sororitas tanks if everything pans out with requistions requests" she added, theholo quickly showing showing Crassus armoured transports, as well as Immolator and Castigator tanks. "So hold the line, wait for back-up?" Cecilia asked. "Yes, and no...we hold the line in the way we always do" Lilianna stated. "So if the line moves, hold it where it moves to, got it" Cecilia added, smirking slightly. "Also we may end up having to help with the cleanup of the remaining 'Nids in the AO" Lilianna added. "Alright, dismissed!" she said, saluting her officers as they all left for thier duties as it was almost time for translation from the Warp.

A few hours later, Lilianna was doing basic maintenance on her Bolter, including reciting the rites for the machine spirit inside her weapon, when Cecilia walked in. "Don't forget the blessings, it was one of our weapons after all" she stated. "I would never think of forgetting that" Lilianna said, smiling at her close friend. "We're about to translate out of the Warp" Cecilia said. "Thank the God-Emperor, fighting Chaos onboard a ship in the Warp isn't something I want to do...save that for the Rogue Traders, they can have that sort of...fun" Lilianna said. They both laughed at this, knowing in another life maybe they would've been in a Rouge Trader's retinue, but that was neither here nor there. The ship would come out of the Warp to the predetermined location the Imperial Navy was told to bring them to.
 
Personal quarters of the Calisto class gun cutter Stardancer
Low Terran orbit

Lucretcia Dunn was...worried. On one hand, she had been excelling in her training. On the other hand, she had still been pondering the nature of her meeting with the Lord Primarch. He she had never seen a being shine so brightly in the warp, so much so that even during the times during the battle she could feel him, even across the city, even amid the near maddening blood lust that had fueled the enemy.

She was drawn from her mental state by a nock at her door. Getting up from the lotus position, she straitened her clothes and opened her door. She was met by the sight of a towering Astartes, not Brother Sargant Morrin, this one a bit shorter, and wore a set of Gold and Garnet armor of the Burning Scrolls. "You are requested to accompany me to the Primarch's Residence on Tera."

She paused for a moment, her mind starting to wonder. "For what reason?" The Astartes was silent for a moment, the subtle tilt of his helmeted head told her he was maybe thinking over a response. "The Lord Primarch has requested you join his command staff." Her? Lucian Dunn's Daughter? She wasn't even technically an Inquisitor yet, still an Interrogator.

In a moment she felt something, a soft tendril of a familiar presence. Her father, some where down below, was reaching out to her.

Go with him. The Council of lords won't permit me to be fully detached from my current duties to him.

Lucretcia steadied her self, and fallowed the marine.


Aboard the Bulwark.

Clause nodded, taking in each word and their meaning. He knew that in times past he had...agitated certain portions of the Imperial Government. No more, the situation was to grave to be petty. Rising to fallow his brother, he laced the belt around his hips once again and fallowed.

Upon leaving, his own two Guards, Castor and Pollux formed up with him. The contrast between the newer, younger and mostly Primaris marines of his Brother's guard and the much, much older crusade pattern armor worn by the twins gave him a hint of amusement. He stood next to Titus as he was introduced to an officer, the Current Lord Commander of the Militarum. He looked to be a solid man and so Clause greeted him with a respectful nod and warm smile.

"It is a pleasure to meet you, Lord Commander. If I may, perhaps you can give me a brief overview of the tactical situation here on Terra." He spoke in clear and calm tone, any hint of his earlier emotions gone. He also chose his words carefully, as he was known as a man of focus when it came to military matters and he wished to have a better idea of the threat that faced his Father's Home world.

He had been given some information on the Xenos "Tyranids" and their insidious methods of infiltration and it unsettled him deeply. Just what was he really facing here.
 
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Aboard the Bulwark

The Strategium was a large and cavernous space teaming with machinery of all sorts. Wires and piping as large as long dead Terran trees snaked along the walls and rafters. Empowering the vast array of holo-liths, screens, projections, graphs, charts, and scrolling data streams. If one could plug into the Noosphere around Terra one would see a dense nexus about the Bulwark as it was both a literal and cyber-figurative hub of Imperial High Command level traffic from across not only the Solar System but the entire Imperium of Man.

Leontus, The Lord Commander Solar and chief commanding officer of the Astra Militarum within the Segmentum Solar bowed to Titus and Clausewitz deeply. A small, professional, smile creeping on his stony face as the Lord Commander of the Imperium addressed him. "You grace us all with your presence, Lord Commander," replied Leontus as he turned to the largest, central, projection depicting the region of the Nordafrik Underhives and now also Hive Svoll. A deep band of red across hundreds of levels of Terran hyperurban landscape signified the cordon. Dozens of icons flickered across the holo-scape with their own data-streams and reports. Allowing Titus and Clausewitz to blink-click through them. A theme was present, just as it was the week prior, as it had been since the initial Custodes foray into the Underhives had led to the capture of Begeter. The Genestealers were constantly probing the cordon and the recent, even if halted, breakthrough to an adjacent hive district had galvanized their efforts. Even now within these moments two dozen after-action reports scrolled on by the data streams from just as many Guard regiments detailing recent contact and repulse of the xenoforms.

Leontus began, but not before over a thousand individuals fell silent and stood in great rings around the hololith. Forming terraces as the holo-lith occupied a terraced, amphitheater, like pulpit for large strategic meetings. Astartes representatives abound with many notable Chapters displayed on their power armor. Representatives of the Ecclesiarchy in the form of Titus' Apostolic-Militant and flanked by members of the Sororitas Convents on Terra and Ophelia VII and of the Ordo Hospitaller. Inquisitorial members from at least a half dozen orders were present while an entire section of the congregation was composed of Magi of the Martian Priesthood. Custodians stood on the perimeter. Clausewitz would see Hadrian and his squad that had retrieved him on Parsarius but also members of the Emperor's Legion that he did not know such as Colquan. Who was Valoris' own representative to Titus. Admirals of the Imperial Navy formed their own sub-section and so it went on. From Solar system based Knightly Houses to Princeps of the Collegia Titanica. The number of people in such a space was truly astounding but even then, the cavernous ceiling ascended high above. No sense of feeling cramped permeated among the crowd.

"The Genestealers have taken Hive Svoll but a successful amendment to the Cordon, at the cost of sealing the Hive off with bombardment blast doors, has been established. Reports from across the cordon report increased activity of late as a result. However, all efforts are in-line with an axis of attack towards the Palace. Casualties remain negligible and it seems as per Intelligence reports from both the Munitorum and Inquisition point to an inefficient command and control with the absence of their Patriarch. However, we are on the clock. Magi Biologis from the Mechanicus expect a new Patriarch to have evolved to succeed Begeter to appear in no less than sixteen solar days."

Leontus pointed to a series of muster zones. "The enemy is still having trouble differentiating ordinary transit routes from our own military pathways. Indeed, it seems they are not aware of all of them. As a result, in an effort to decrease the cordon's zone by 22%. The first in a systematic advance through the Underhives, the Astra Militarum has gathered eight regiments apiece in twenty-eight muster points. These are reserves drawn from across the Solar System from garrison armies around Jupiter, Saturn, and Neptune. All communications have been masked and false Noospheric traffic placed. As far as the Genestealers are concerned we are still passive with a cordon of twenty million personnel. Enforcers and Arbites will follow up to screen anyone who poses as civilians. The Magi Biologis have delivered identifiers and medical equipment to assess in the field a subject being infected or not. Further, the zone nearest Svoll seems to be a psychic nexus of some sort, or importance, our Psykers have picked up intense mental traffic in an area just beyond the western terminus of Hive Svoll's East-West transit line." Leontus straightened as everyone looked at the planned attack. The targets were various transit convergent points which once seized would disrupt the cultists movements allowing a systematic clearing by follow on forces and the cordon to advance to a smaller area. Cutting the zone by at least a fifth would free up over two million personnel.

As Leontus finished the Lord Commander stepped back and went to Titus side for their own meeting. A smaller meeting that was more somber. The Hive Fleet Leviathan had launched an overwhelming assault throughout a vast zone of Sectors in Segmentum Pacificus. At least six sectors were silent, and the Strategic Collective's own stamped report estimated them to be complete write offs. While two others such as Morpheum were under heavy assault and scout fleets were already nearing the Sanctus Line.

While that was going on, Clausewitz would be approached by a figure in red and gold. Bearing the iconography of the Sun Angels but elaborate. The Sun Angels representative to Titus as it were and one that if originally a firstborn had since crossed the Rubicon. The marine bowed his head. Laurels of Victory about his helm and an elaborate golden iron halo mounted on his power pack. A longsword was at his side. While scroll artwork along his pauldrons denoted the name K A Y N E.

The red and gold giant removed his helm with the clasp of seals. Revealing a handsome face that struck Clausewitz with the memory of his sister-primarch. Straight nose, high cheek bones, noble brow, bright eyes with snow white and gold hair. Some of the Sun Angels took after their Primarch than others it seemed. "I am Sergeant Kayne of the 2nd Company. To meet a second Primarch in one's own lifetime is surely an ostentatious occasion. But I must ask if the records are true. That you spent much time with my Primarch-Progenitor?"

Troop Transport of the 66th Vanguard

The troop ship shuttered as klaxons blared. The ponderous vessel carrying six regiments of the Imperial Guard including the 66th Vanguard burst from the warp with crackling energy and a harsh purple-white tear in the fabric of space. The vessel one of an entire flotilla which had mustered at the Sanctus Line Fortress world of Regium. A cornerstone in the defense and in orbit an entire fleet of Imperial warships were gathered around two battleships. The Emperor-Class battleship Boreal Crown and the Retribution-class Battleship Arc Triumphant. Three entire cruiser squadrons of six ships apiece formed around them along with dozens of lighter warships and over sixty escorts. A Ramilies Star fort hung over the northern tilt of the planet's axis while a ring of orbital gun citadels ringed the planet with ten platforms in total. This not only counted the two large orbital defense laser bastions on the poles and fourteen atmospheric defense bastions which ringed the equator. While the planets moon of Regium Minor had a silo-citadel of twenty-eight nuclear-fission silos housing an arsenal of warheads with yields to devastate continents.

As the troop ship pulled into orbit with its brethren the 66th Vanguard was not deployed to the world with the other five regiments aboard. Those that made their way down to the planet in large drop ships, haulers, and gunships. No, the drop regiments assigned to Regium were held in orbital reserve. The scale of this operation Liliana would get glimpses of as it became clear that dozens of Regiments were on the ground in fortified bastions, underground bunkers, or garrisoning fortified cities. Millions of guardsmen had been deployed to reinforce Regium and the worlds of the Sanctus line alike while nearby a Gladius frigate in the livery of the Ultramarines was positioned at anchor at the starfort.

The down time on the ship would not be long, however. A system wide alert went out and hours later Astropathic traffic from Regium, including last minute reports of the Shadow in the Warp's approach, ceased.

Emerging from the darkness of the systems exterior regions in the direction of Pacificus. Imperial Augur arrays on Regium and on ships in orbit picked up a mass of objects, a cloud, a fleet. Dozens of Tyranid hive ships, the forward advance, a scout fleet, had entered the system. Making for Regium without pause the ships approached over the period of four solar days until finally, within gun range of the fleet and orbital platforms, the void caught alight. Macro-Cannon rounds burst through chitin, Lances burned untold mega-tonnage of innards, and torpedoes detonated limbs from caraspace bodies. Hive ships died only to be replaced by another.

Swarms of Imperial attack craft engaged a disgorged horde of smaller Tyranid horrors in the silence of the void as the two fleets neared each other. While squadrons of Starhawk Bombers made daring runs. The scout fleet was half destroyed by the time it came in range of the terrestrial guns and met its end in high orbit. But that was just the beginning. Even as the last hive ship burned to vast clouds of ash and debris in orbit Imperial Augurs chimed that an even larger force had entered the system.

A tendril of hundreds of Tyranid bio-ships moved rapidly and within three solar days plowed into the orbital defenses. The Imperials reaped a fearsome tally as the orbital space around the planet became filled with dozens of dead and dying bio-ships and nebula of vitae. But some got through. First a few rained down smaller organisms that were beset by storms of ground-based fire. Most did not make it to the ground within the first two days of this tendrils assault. But the tendril kept coming as a long stream of bio-ships kept entering the system from the blackness of interstellar space. A few ships surviving long enough to disgorge their gestating spawn became several. And by the fifth day became over a dozen. Then two dozen. Soon reports came across the surface of actual Tyranid assaults commencing on Imperial fortified zones on the planet.

By day seven the first fortified city had its outer defenses breached as a surge of bio-ships managed to get close enough to rain millions of myocytic spores onto the planet. The 66th Vanguard were mobilized from their troop ship amid combat alerts.

Orders from the system's commanding officer, Lord General Ernst Bracken, had come down. The 66th Vanguard was to make a combat drop to reinforce the Fortified City of Anziograd. The scenery for the 66th as they mobilized, loaded onto their dropships and gunships, was one of the chaos of war. The void above and around them alight with furious combat and fiery barrages of weapons that if so, much grazed their own troop landing craft would vaporize them completely. Even as they pierced the atmosphere, deploying from the troop ship in orbit, and the gray-white clouds of the world they'd see storms of ground based AA, the occasional fire of the polar laser defense citadels turning an entire horizon red, and once below the stratosphere they could see in detail the devastation of conflict against an enemy that cared not for casualties or wounded. Artillery bombardments walked across the land around Anziograd. Trenches once neat and organized lay ruined as the Guard had retreated within the rockrete and steel-reinforced walls of the city. A city that covered 1,700 square kilometers. A cloud of black FLAK fire accompanied by lancing beams of energy fired from ground-based emplacements and parked Hydras tore through a passing cloud of Tyranid fliers. The troops of the 66th Vanguard were dropping into a Hell of claw, tooth, and bio-acid strong enough to melt the armor of a Leman Russ.
 
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