Chapter 3: Bad Blood
Explosions flashed in the dark, cold night as soldier after soldier was downed by concentrated fire. Missile trails streaked past him, impacting in masonry and earth ramparts and energy blasts lit up the night while he tried to survive the onslaught of the enemy attack.
"Major Morrison! Bravo 3 is down! Repeat, Bravo 3 is down!"
"Major! We're losing ground! The enemy force is chewing us up!"
Similar messages came rifling through the vox at regular intervals. They were outnumbered and outgunned. There was no way they would be able to come out of this in one piece. The mission was to delay and damage the enemy as much as possible to allow the other troops a retreat as save as possible into the fortress. But their best efforts barely scratched the surface of the enemy host.
Morrison looked through his night vision binoculars and felt a urge of despair coming over him. The enemy was overwhelming. He could see thousands of lunatics scrambling up the steep slope, screaming for his blood and skull. One positive aspect of their position was the inability of the enemy tanks to get to them.
"Major Morrison. General Thompson here. We are in position. Disengage from the enemy and fall back to the fortress. We will commence an artillery barrage on you position in one minute. Repeat, one minute. Thompson out."
Morrison turned to his vox operator. "Relay the general's message to the squads and start running. Anyone who stays here is dead." Following his own order he turned and started running. As he neared the gates of the fortress the earth shook as several earthshaker cannons started firing their load and obliterated the very same position he and his men gave their life to defend just moments ago. As Morrison watched his last men entering the fortress and the enemy dying in droves he just hoped that they would soon be reinforced. Else there would be no one left alive to rescue.
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As Maxim looked out the shuttle window he saw what the Inquisitor meant with 'special' ship. In front of him loomed a sleek but deadly vessel, its surface gleaming in the reflection of the distant sun. A faint memory came into his mind back when he was a second-in command on an escort vessel. He had seen similar ships destroying the convoy he was supposed to guard.
It was a Hemlock class destroyer, an eldar escort vessel. Fast, maneuverable and armed with a prow pulsar lance that could destroy an imperial escort vessel with one well placed shot.
Its holofields were inactive, the ship being hidden from curious eyes by being in the orbit of Adumbria IX, the outermost planet of the Adumbria system. As his shuttle closed, Maxim could make out some details of the ships hull. It was scorched in a few places, clear signs of battle damage not yet fully repaired.
"I wonder if that ship was part of the battle for this system" Maxim thought aloud.
He didn't expect an answer for he was being alone on the shuttle apart from the piloting servitor. As his thoughts went back to the battle that raged this system, the shuttle docked to the ship. Maxim waited until a connection was established and stepped through. The shuttle immediately undocked and left the vicinity.
Khornat was waiting for him, behind him two eldar.
"Glad you could make it Mr. Macharius" he said with a light tone.
"Did I have a choice?" maxim asked sourly, looking at both aliens.
"Ah, come on Maxim, it'll be fun. You'll get to know the inside of an eldar vessel. Is that nothing?" Khornat replied.
That was intriguing, Maxim gave him that. Few men have ever set foot on an eldar vessel as guests instead of prisoners. Maxim fell in step with Khornat and both men went into the direction of the bridge, lead by their escorts – or guardians.
"How long will we be underway?" Maxim asked Khornat.
"Approximately 4 days total." was the reply.
"What? Even with the warp currents in our favour it would take at least ten days to reach Lantanda. And we still have to drop out of warp sometimes in Omalgon so we're in danger of being discovered by the enemy."
"Maxim, Maxim, when will you learn to trust me. We're on an eldar vessel. They wouldn't enter the warp we know if you hold a gun to their head. We use one of their web ways. We will only have to leave it once and use another gate before we reach Lantanda. But the system is a backwater planet so we estimate the presence of an enemy fleet minimal."
"That all sounds easy. But I still can't shake the feeling that we'll get in serious trouble before we reach Lantanda." Maxim said.
"Relax. It'll go fine. Your only task is to deactivate your limiter once we're there. And hopefully that will close the warp portal.
"Anyway, up for a game of regicide once we are on our way?" Khornat asked.
"No objections there. I win usually. Want to play for inquisitorial secrets?"
"Ha ha. Lets better not. I'd rather not shoot you before this mission is over."
Maxim could only grimace at that.
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Aemos could feel the upcoming turning point. So far his plans worked out. The forces of Khorne and Slaanesh would soon be on each others teeth and the weak imperials were massing overwhelming forces against the nurglite faction. His pawn confirmed the absence of the invisible man.
He started to send out orders to his warlord and triggered long planned events that would eventually lead the the destruction of every chaos force in the Phyrias sector but his own.
And all over the Lantanda subsector, armed chaos forces were startinging to board their transport vessels and warships. Only 12 hours later, only a token occupying force was present in the Lantanda sub.
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"Maxim, may I introduce you to Commander Samuel Jarin and Lt. Commander Norman Vaughn."
Both men leaped to their feet and saluted sharply when they saw the rank pins on Maxims otherwise unremarkable clothes. Maxim returned the salute. "As you were, Gentlemen."
"These two men were pilots in the system defense force of Lantanda and where close when the warp gate opened." Khornat continued. "They managed to escape after they recorded as much as possible. Upon hearing from them I ordered them to me to act as our guides when we reach Lantanda so we stay undetected for as long as possible."
Maxim leaned closer to Khornat.
"You said my nullifying field works systemwide. Why don't I deactivate the limiter once we exit the warp in Lantanda?"
"Because the exit point is directly opposite of the gate. The distance is great so I want to make sure it works. Also, since Lantanda is occupied by forces serving the chaos deity we call Tzeentch, we can be sure that they'd notice a blackout like this."
"If they notice us when I deactivate my limiter, we'll be chased." Maxim pointed out.
"Yes, that is a risk I am willing to take. The main objective is the closing of the warp gate to prevent any further reinforcements for the chaos forces." Khornat said.
With nothing more to say, Khornat gave the order to move. 2 hours later, the ship was en route in an eldar webway to their first destination.
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Gorak the Beautiful watched as his troops killed the last of the khornate garrison forces. He knew that he still had a long way before him but he'd find the khornate champion. As he was about to start calling down the transport vessels, one of his subordinates came running to him.
"My Lord! I received word from the Ark of Pleasure. They report a large fleet of chaos vessels. The flagship was identified as the Nemesis of Terra. That means the khornates are lead by their warlord."
Gorak felt joy. His lord Slaanesh had seemingly delivered his prey directly to him.
"All forces, move to the fortress. Bring in slaves from the population to fortify it further. We will make its surroundings a killing zone. After we decimated them, we'll destroy them in close combat."
His troops cheered and went to obey his orders. Mere hours later, forty thousand slaves were working to strengthen the fortress that wasn't able to hold off the initial invasion.
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"My Lord. We identified the enemy flagship as the Ark of Pleasure, the flagship of the slaaneshi invasion fleet."
Victor Harras smiled to himself. He had caught the invasion force before it could harass his realm further.
"All troops, prepare for drop. We will take the fight to them and slaughter them all. BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD!!!"
All over the fleet, the battlecry was repeated.
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"Tell me Inquisitor, if I'd be inside the Eye of Terror and deactivate my limiter, what would happen?" Maxim asked.
"I seriously don't know. If we discover blanks we try to use them effectively. They are too rare to be used in such an experiment." Khornat replied as he moved another figure.
"Then let us hope that none of your colleagues gets the idea to try it with me. My game." Maxim said, winning again.
"Man, you're lucky that you are that important of I'd shoot you for this."
Maxim saw Khornat smile and knew that he didn't mean that.
"Too bad you can't read my mind, huh?"
"Let me make one thing clear. I can't read minds like this" Khornat said, snipping. "Reading a man's mind would take great concentration and could have grave side effects on both the reader and the victim. If you try to read minds is like stepping into a large room filled with people where everyone is talking, and you try to listen to one single voice. But what I can do is feel intentions. In regicide, you think hard about your moves and it spills from you like heat from a radiator. You're a radiator that is switched off."
Suddenly the comm started blaring. "Inquisitor Khornat, report to the bridge immediately." said the voice of Commander Jarin.
As both men entered the bridge they saw what had alerted the ship. In front of them, close to the second planet, a large fleet battle was raging.
"I didn't know our fleet was already making their move." said Vaughn.
"They haven't" Maxim said. "Both fleets consists of chaos vessels."
He was right. Dozens of ships fought each other and transports rained drop pods and landers into the planets atmosphere.
"Why are we here?" Maxim asked.
"This is the system where we had to leave the webway and enter another gate." Khornat replied.
"Then why don't they do it?" Jarin asked, pointing to the eldar piloting the ship.
"Because the entry point is close to the planet. We will have to wait until they are finished. The holofields of this ship will probably prevent them from discovering us."
Maxim sighed and sat down. "At least we're getting a good light show."
The other humans chuckled at that. The eldar made no noise.
To be continued...
Addendum: The role of the eldar in the Phyrias conflict.
The actions of the eldar are of great speculation to the imperial strategists. Most of the times they are only pirates, abushing convoys and raiding isolated outposts and colonies. But sometimes they form alliances with the imperial forces.
Known incidents on a larger scale are the Battle of Gethesmane during the Gothic War and the 13th Black Crusade where eldar navy joined forces with their imperial counterparts. The same happened during the chaos incursion in Phyria. Although Lord Admiral Korchenbach had to ask first, the eldar responded positively and lend their strength to the imperial navy during the battle of Adumbria II.
Now the eldar have loaned a single escort vessel to the Inquisition for a special mission that could tip the balance of power to the imperial forces.