Disclaimer: Insert the usual stuff about Warhammer 40k and Code Geass and how I don't own either here.
A/N: And the Metal Monsters arc reaches a fever pitch!
Chapter Twenty-Eight: Metal Monsters, Part III
Chaos Battle Barge Iron Blood
Orbit of Mars
Built with the same cold logic that defined its masters, the Iron Blood eschewed viewports in favor of auspex arrays. The numerous logic engines reduced the titanic slugging match raging outside to multicolored runes flickering across a hololith display. The Iron Warriors that stood at the controls remained surprisingly free of mutation despite the numerous millennia spent within the Eye of Terror. The hulking form of Peturabo, his massive warhammer held loosely in one hand, stood at the front of the cavernous bridge.
"My lord," a Chaos Space Marine cautiously approached, dropping to one knee in deference to his Primarch.
"What is the situation?" the Daemon Prince rumbled.
"It appears that the enemy has given up on containing the breakthrough. Instead, they are focusing their strength into a series of collapsing skirmish lines," the fallen Astartes' voice wavered but remained steady, "The Fist of Iron and its battle group were surrounded and destroyed."
The Iron Warrior bowed even lower as Peturabo slowly turned to face him. He dared not lift his head, but he could feel the Daemon Prince's gaze boring into the back of his skull.
"So the enemy hopes to bait us out and destroy us piecemeal," the Primarch casually dismissed the loss of a Grand Cruiser and its dozen escorts, "Draw all remaining units back to form a defensive perimeter. Instruct them to protect the Battle Barges at all costs."
"Yes, my lord," the Iron Warrior somehow bowed even deeper, but stayed in place.
"You have more news for me?"
"Units from the Iron Resolve have boarded one of the Black Knights' warships, my lord. They report heavy resistance and moderate casualties."
"Inform the boarding teams to capture the enemy ship at all costs!" Peturabo showed uncharacteristic enthusiasm as a million possibilities raced through his mind, "Should they succeed, I will fill all their slave pits until they overflow!"
"At once, my lord."
Sector C-13, Black Knights Cruiser Dagr
Orbit of Mars
"The enemy has breached Sector C-14!" Lieutenant Gerold Cernik announced over the company channel, "Positions, everyone!"
The heavy footfalls of fully-equipped Knightmares echoed through the corridors and drowned out the chanting of the approaching cultist horde. Several enterprising militiamen had dragged footlockers and tables from adjacent rooms for use as makeshift cover. Others pressed themselves against the bare metal walls in order to present a smaller target to the enemy.
"Iron within, iron without!" bellowed an unseen enemy, heralding the Chaos charge.
"The first waves will just be slave-soldiers." Gerold calmly informed his subordinates, "Blasters and blades only. Save your hadron rifle charges for the Space Marines!"
Though the enemy came in great numbers, the Dagr's relatively-narrow corridors funneled them into the defenders' waiting guns. A faint zip told Gerold that his Knightmare's capacitors had finished charging. Hurriedly stowing his hadron assault rifle, he raised an arm towards the oncoming horde. Even as rounds ricocheted off the walls and the deck plates vibrated with the numerous footfalls, the Black Knights held their fire.
True to the Lieutenant's words, the first wave of attackers consisted solely of expendable cannon fodder. Prisoners of war, servants who had somehow displeased their heretical masters, and those whose minds were shattered by combat drugs threw themselves at the defenders. Most were dressed in rags and wielded improvised melee weapons, though a few had scavenged weapons and armor from fallen PDF or Imperial Guard forces.
"Open fire!"
A torrent of cherry-red beams ripped through the enemy, punching through armor and cultists with equally-frightening ease. Battle cries turned into howls of terror and the screams of the maimed and dying drowned out the hadron blasters' buzzsaw-like ripping. The militia lines did not waver even as the enemy entered melee range. Red flashes accompanied weapons and flesh vaporizing against hadron fields.
With a mighty roar, the cultist swung a rusted saber at the Knightmare before him. Triumph morphed into horror as the blade disappeared mere centimeters from the titan's armor. Sergeant Victor Dziedzic allowed himself a moment of smug satisfaction when his opponent paled and tried to run. The cultist proved not quite as resilient, with the Sergeant's hadron field-assisted punch replacing his chest with a gaping hole. Another servant of Chaos tripped over the body in his eagerness to join the brawl, falling to the ground before Victor. A savage stomp ensured he would not get back up.
"Their attack's losing steam! Keep up the pressure!"
Two cultists jumped forward to replace Victor's late opponent. One brandished a spear while the other wielded a clearly-nonfunctional autogun mounting a very functional bayonet. Ducking beneath the initial thrusts, the militiaman ignited his hadron blades. With two simultaneous motions, he sliced both of them in half: one from crotch to crown and the other at the waist.
"Another wave incoming!"
Victor kicked the legs out from beneath yet another slave-soldier, ramming his blade through the enemy's chest before she hit the ground.
Chaos Battle Barge Iron Blood
Orbit of Mars
"Are the preparations complete?" Peturabo demanded without so much as turning around.
"Yes, my lord," the kneeling Iron Warrior reported without delay, "The Battle Barges are in position and the gun deck reports all bombardment cannons loaded and ready to fire."
"Excellent," the Daemon Prince rumbled, "Commence planetary bombardment."
Argyre Planitia
Surface of Mars
The booming of bolters and the whirring of chainswords filled the air of Argyre Planitia as the dwindling sea of blue struggled to stem the blasphemous tide. Though the vortex cannon had ravaged the surface for many hundreds of kilometers around, nowhere were the effects more profoundly felt than in the impact basin the Ultramarines swore to defend. The already-weakened veil between reality and madness ripped open, unleashing a daemonic horde of apocalyptic proportions. From savage Bloodthirsters to bloated Great Unclean Ones, all manner of horrors assailed the Astartes positions.
"Stand fast, brothers!" Guilliman urged, "Remember your oath! Not a single step back!"
A high-pitched screech assaulted the Primarch's ears, and he whirled around to face the threat. A hail of storm bolter fire answered the Daemonette assault, shredding their physical forms and banishing their essences back to the Immaterium. Guilliman suspected it would take them mere minutes to re-manifest.
"Above us!"
Roboute swung his Power Fists in great arcs, smashing the swarm of flying daemons that descended upon him. Gouts of flame crisscrossed the skies, roasting a great many of the putrid creatures, but the horde seemed endless. Several brothers were carried off, screaming and struggling as they were dropped into the ravenous horde below. Others were reduced to ribbons of flesh by the thousands of razor-sharp claws.
"My lord, behind you!" a Novamarine cried out as he rushed forward, wildly spraying bolter fire into the mass of daemonic flesh and muscle before him.
The Bloodthirster of Khorne regarded the Astartes with little more than minor annoyance as bolter shells bounced off of his Warp-forged armor. With a bestial roar, it picked its assailant up and ripped him in two, sucking out the innards as though enjoying a treat. Blood still dripping from its mouth, the greater daemon tossed the empty halves of power armor aside and turned towards Guilliman.
Angered beyond words, the Primarch rushed forward and smashed the daemon's knee with a savage swing of his Power Fist. As the Bloodthirster roared in pain, Roboute whirled around and emptied the last of his storm bolter ammunition into its other knee, sending the great beast crashing to the ground. Roaring in pain and rage, the daemon drew its arm back in preparation to strike with its whip. Guilliman smashed the offending elbow with a punishing uppercut and dropped his massive weight onto its shoulder, rendering the limb useless.
The Bloodthirster wildly swung its massive axe in a last-ditch attempt to fight off the enraged Primarch. Roboute caught the attack with one hand, smashing the weapon's handle to splinters as his other hand snapped the daemon's forearm in two. Squashing down the savage glee that rushed through his veins, Guilliman raised his Power Fist and bought it down on his opponent's skull with a triumphant roar. The resulting psychic backlash nearly knocked the Primarch off his feet and destroyed scores of surrounding lesser daemons.
The brutal beatdown had lasted mere seconds and granted the Ultramarines the long-sought opportunity to seize the initiative. Astartes vaulted over their fortified positions and fell upon the disoriented horde, banishing daemons back to the Warp by the hundreds. Roboute's tunnel vision cleared up in time to witness the Ancient gore a Horror with the butt of his flagstaff and use the impaled monstrosity as a makeshift club to smash aside the rest of its pack. When the chittering beast split into two smaller daemons, the veteran Space Marine sent one flying with an elbow to the face and bought his bolt pistol to bear on the other. Mere meters away, an Assault Marine grappling with a Bloodthirster was run through from behind by a Plaguebearer's disease-infused blade.
Filled with renewed vigor, Roboute Guilliman raised the Gauntlets of Ultramar into the air and rushed to join the fray. The skies suddenly split and the world became engulfed in flame, and not even a Primarch could remain standing in the face of the shockwaves that followed.
Far above the chaos at Argyre Planitia, the Iron Warriors' carefully planned battle formations kept the defenders at bay. At the clash's center lay the stricken Dagr, its few remaining weapons forming a formidable gauntlet for would-be boarders. The sheer amount of ordnance flying across the battlefield blinded many a sensor suite, but the two fleets were so densely-packed and so close together that precise aim proved nearly unnecessary. Volley after disciplined volley from the Tau and the Eldar's devastating hit-and-run attacks stopped any Chaos attack before it could gather steam, and the flurry of torpedoes and lances from the Iron Warriors' fleet reduced even the mightiest Imperial and Black Knights warships to lifeless hulks.
A single Imperial warship—a tiny Sword-class escort—had somehow defied the odds and became the only allied vessel out of a dozen failed charges to reach the disabled Black Knights cruiser. Chaos weapons fire promptly crippled the diminutive frigate, but not before hundreds of void-suited Naval Security Troopers were deployed to aid the besieged Dagr. A torpedo blew the tiny escort in two, sending its stern section spinning off into space. However, the bow half continued on the warship's previous course and smashed into the Iron Resolve. Having lowered its void shields in preparation for a teleporter assault, the much larger Iron Warriors cruiser sustained catastrophic damage in the collision. In a twist that reaffirmed many an Imperial's faith in the Emperor, the conjoined hulks travelled at just the right trajectory to mask the Dagr from the Chaos fleet's sensors.
The battle only intensified as the Battle Barges at the Chaos fleet's center opened fire with their bombardment turrets. Hundreds of magma bomb warheads streaked through the Martian atmosphere, annihilating vast swathes of terrain wherever they hit. The release of energy sent many orbital sensors into overload, and a few of the explosions were visible even to the unaided eye.
Fueled by desperation, the remaining defenders surged forward with no regard for having enough ships left over to repel future attacks. Caught off-guard, the Iron Warriors fleet was slow to react and only mustered sporadic and inaccurate volleys when they did. Spearheaded by the Black Knights dreadnought Beijing and the Eldar battleship Khaine's Wrath, the desperate charge plunged deep into the enemy flank. Endless waves of warships poured from the corrupted Craftworld Altansar, but the allied fleet continued to bludgeon their way through.
With the Chaos lines finally broken, the battle devolved into a point-blank slugging match. Tau warships pulled close enough for battle suit boarding teams to jump the gap. Eldar squadrons hugged their targets so closely that many an enemy gunner opted not to open fire lest risk self-destruction. Imperial ships engaged in some truly impressive ramming, reducing smaller foes to twisted wreckage and splitting the larger ones in two with their armored prows. Black Knights captains ordered FLEIJA volleys from dangerously-close ranges, tactical jumping away at literally the last second.
As the desperate clash dragged on, the Battle Barges continued to ravage the surface below.
Sector C-13, Black Knights Cruiser Dagr
Six Hours Later
Though the Iron Warriors' slave-soldiers attacked in great numbers, they failed to so much as dent the lines of battle-hardened Black Knights militia. Forced into a densely-packed horde by the narrow corridors, they fell in great numbers to hadron blasters. When the fight inevitably became close-quarters, the militiamen's superior training, equipment, and discipline quickly prevailed. Panicked lasbolt volleys and autogun bursts hit more cultists and Black Knights, and the shots that found their mark simply bounced off their armor. Some tried to break and run, only to meet their ends at the bolters and chainswords of Astartes blocker units behind them.
Yet, the attack had accomplished exactly what its planners had hoped. Hours of frantic close-quarters fighting had taken their toll, and fatigue, both mental and physical, began setting in amongst the defenders.
Panting heavily and ears ringing from a fragmentation grenade that exploded a bit too close for comfort, Gerold forced his tired muscles to meet the oncoming Astartes' attack. Swinging his assault rifle out of the way, he ignited a hadron blade. The militiaman's opponent, unable to stop in time, impaled himself upon it. The Lieutenant gritted his teeth as a metric ton of muscle and ceramite transferred its momentum into his shoulder. With a Knightmare, he felt several bones crack. Without a Knightmare, his arm would have torn free of its socket. Bringing his weapon to bear, Gerold blew away a great chunk of the Space Marine's torso with a pump of his scatter cannon.
As his opponent slid to the floor, shock evident in his body language, the exhausted Lieutenant took a moment to catch his breath. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw one of the company's newer members going hand-to-hand with an Iron Warrior. Despite the Chaos Space Marine having at least fifty kilograms of solid muscle over her and losing both her hadron projectors to a series of lucky swipes, she stood her ground. A deactivated Power Sword lay forgotten at both their feet. Gerold rushed forward as the Chaos Space Marine grabbed the militiawoman and threw her to the ground. To her credit, she took her opponent down with her. Before he could reach the pair, the traitor Astartes had retrieved his Power Sword and stabbed it through his opponent's chest and into the deck.
An inhumanly-loud roar drew Gerold's attention, and he barely managed to bring his assault rifle up to meet the incoming chainsword. Diamantine met rutalium carbide, sending sparks flying as the chainblade bit into the stubborn material. With a sudden burst of strength, Lieutenant Cernik swept his opponent's attack aside and used the momentum to propel his attack forward. The hadron blade through the stomach only enraged the Iron Warrior, but the blaster burst that followed put him down for good.
"Iron within, iron without!"
As yet another wave of fresh Iron Warriors joined fray, Gerold found himself losing hope. The number of active lifesigns dwindled with each passing second, yet the enemy's numbers showed no signs of thinning. News of an Imperial Navy boarding party storming the ship and fighting their way towards Black Knights lines had buoyed the defenders' spirits, but Gerold seriously doubted a couple hundred shotgun-wielding conscripts could take on Astartes.
Lowering his stance and planting his feet, Lieutenant Cernik met his next attacker head-on. His swing was interrupted by a Power Sword running him through from behind. Numerous warning messages appeared on Gerold's heads-up display as his Knightmare flooded the new hole in his chest with medical foam. Already going into shock from trauma and blood loss, the militiaman hardly noticed as the sword was withdrawn. He sank to his knees and dropped to the ground with a thud.
"For Emperor and Imperium!"
The final sight to reach Gerold's eyes was a dozen Imperial Navy Security Officers storming down the corridor, their massive shotcannons booming.
Argyre Planitia
Surface of Mars
As suddenly as the bombardment began, it ended. Roboute Guilliman staggered to his feet, head still spinning from the concussive shockwaves. Wiping away the dust that caked his face, the Primarch of the Ultramarines cracked his eyes open. A scene of desolation greeted him. Massive craters, some so large that they stretched beyond the horizon, dotted the landscape. Thousands of dead Astartes and chunks of Astartes littered the ground as far as he could see, their blood staining Mars' soil a bright red. Clouds of smoke billowing from thousands of destroyed vehicles nearly blocked out the pink Martian skies.
Roboute's eyes snapped downwards as some hard crumpled beneath his foot. Seeing the ornate pauldron of an Ultramarines Honor Guard, he slowly knelt down and dedicated a moment of silence to the fallen. As he swore vengeance on the cowards who laid his brothers low, a series of far-off sonic booms reached Guilliman's ears. Standing up and looking to the skies, he saw hundreds of crimson streaks falling towards him. He feared another bombardment, but quickly realized he was looking at drop pods descending from orbit. He highly doubted they were friendlies.
Guilliman carefully avoided treading on the bodies of fellow Astartes as he made his way to the Ancient's charred corpse. The veteran Space Marine had died an agonizing death ensuring the Banner of Macragge neither touched the ground nor came to any harm. The heat had turned his armor into an oven, cooking his flesh and boiling his blood, and the pressure wave that followed crushed every hollow space in his body. His corpse remained standing, not by some last-breath determination, but instead because the white-hot temperatures had fused his armor servos.
"Rest now, brother," the Primarch of the Ultramarines whispered as he took up the standard, "In death, your duty ends."
Roboute whirled around, Power Fists ready to strike, at the sound of footsteps approaching from behind. He lowered his weapons at the sight of several dozen Astartes warriors dropping to one knee and placing their weapons on the ground in front of them. The heat had scorched the paint and markings off of their power armor, leaving only bare ceramite. The Primarch could not identify which of the Ultramarines' many successor chapters they belonged to, but he found it oddly appropriate. Several of the warriors had lost their helmets in the bombardment and the chaos that followed, and Guilliman only saw burning determination in their eyes.
Dust filled the air as the first wave of Iron Warriors drop pods smashed into the Martian soil. Within minutes, blasphemous battle cries and the rumbling of daemonic war machines filled the air. The very ground shook with the footfalls of countless slave-soldiers and their traitorous masters. The last of the once-great Legio XIII, less than one hundred in number, rose to their feet and readied their weapons. They remained stoic even as the vanguard of an innumerable horde emerged from the dust clouds.
"Brothers!" Roboute bellowed as he raised the Banner of Macragge into the air, "If this is to be the site of our final stand, we do it not as the Ultramarines and its successor chapters! We fight as the Thirteenth Legion!"
"Courage and honor!" the newly-reforged Legion roared in response.
"Fight for Terra, and show these traitors how true Astartes die!"
Black Knights 15th Militia Field Headquarters
Tharsis Region, Surface of Mars
Though the tactical map now updated once an hour at most, Lelouch kept his eyes glued to the holographic display. The situation in orbit devolved into utter chaos as enemy warships poured from Craftworld Altansar by the thousands. The allied defenses, already pushed to the breaking point, buckled in several areas, allowing the enemy to reinforce their beleaguered beaches. A sizable Iron Warriors fleet—including a half-dozen Battle Barges—had taken up positions above Argyre Planitia. Fighting above the massive impact basin proved leagues above the rest in terms of scale and savagery as the remnants of the defending fleet desperately fought to prevent the capture of a besieged Black Knights cruiser and break through the enemy lines.
The situation on the ground quickly became just as bad, if not worse than, the one in orbit. Fresh Chaos troops landed by the millions, quickly tipping the bloody stalemate against the exhausted defenders. Only a timely intervention by the Tau saved the army at Syrtis Major from total annihilation, but the hundreds of thousands of Imperial Guardsmen and Astartes were forced to abandon or torch almost all of their equipment to hasten their withdrawal. The Cydonia region had gone silent upon Corax's horrified discovery that the enemy was using Raven Guard vox transmissions to guide airstrikes. Their preparations to mount a counteroffensive almost complete when the enemy attacked, the White Scars and Eldar forces repelled the Chaos offensive at Ismenius Lacus but sustained crippling losses in the meantime. Though the Space Wolves had lost their Thunderhawks to a surprise airstrike, the chapter itself remained combat-effective and had already begun rapid-marching from Mare Boreum.
Before leaving to join the Salamanders, Vulkan reluctantly confided in him about the Guardian's visit and the dire warning she brought. The Primarch clearly expected censure, no doubt remembering Lelouch's heavy-handed punishment of Magnus the Red. He nearly fell over in surprise when the amethyst-eyed immortal thanked him and speculated that he had encountered on the Warp's few benign denizens.
Whatever the Guardian's intentions, the current situation rendered her warning moot. Argyre Planitia would have occupied the forefront of Lelouch's concerns either way. Judging from the number of drop pods and troop transports, the enemy was pouring a disproportionate amount of forces into the region. Even more worrying, while they received at least sketchy details from the rest of the planet, they had no information on the situation at Argyre Planitia. The bulk and proximity of Craftworld Altansar, coupled with the sheer amount of ordnance flying between the two fleets, made orbital scans nearly impossible. The many thousands of Warp phenomena erupting within Argyre Planitia itself, already a very bad sign, similarly precluded sweeps by planet-based sensors. Abaddon's forces had also gone to great lengths to seize and maintain total air superiority above the impact basin, shooting down any reconnaissance craft that came close.
"Argyre Planitia," Lelouch announced without preamble as he turned towards the headquarters staff, "Why is it so important? What's there that merits enough troops to seize an entire planet?"
"According to Intelligence, there's a few mining facilities in the basin itself and a number of forges clustered around the rim," Colonel General Majka replied, "However, the mineral veins are long since exhausted and the concentration of heavy industry is no greater than any of the other areas the enemy's currently hitting."
"There has to be something there!" Lelouch gritted his teeth in frustration, "Do we know what those forges produce?"
"The Mechanicum's stonewalled us every time we've asked," Lilia replied, the annoyance evident in her voice, "They eventually caved when we asked enough times about literally any other forge, but they're not budging on this one."
"Tell them," the temperature in the room dropped several degrees as Lelouch's voice took on a dangerous tone, "Tell them they can either willingly give the information, or my Custodes will take it by force."
Argyre Planitia, Surface of Mars
017.M51, Day Seven of the Battle of Mars
Though every breath bought a new wave of agony as shards of his shattered ribcage drove deeper into his organs, Roboute forced himself to remain conscious. Despite his enhanced biology near-instantly sealing wounds, he had already lost enough blood that he could barely remain standing even while leaning against the flagstaff. Through blurred vision, he could see his brothers forming an ever-tightening circle around him.
What had started as a desperate last stand turned into a serious hurdle for the enemy as the Ultramarines' ranks swelled with additional survivors until the re-forged Thirteenth Legion had nearly tripled in size. Though hopelessly outnumbered, each Battle-Brother fought with the strength and ferocity of an entire army, driving back the Chaos horde time and time again. The sight of the Banner of Macragge inspired the Ultramarines to new heights of valor, and they continued to fight despite exhaustion and heavy wounds. When their ammunition ran out, they scavenged more from the dead. When their bolters jammed, they fell upon the enemy with chainswords. When their chainswords became clogged with flesh and viscera, they fought with fists. The past five days had seen the Ultramarines fight with unparalleled savagery, and Roboute could ask of no more from them.
Even now, exhausted and without weapons, the loyalists made the enemy pay for every centimeter of ground gained. Bodies—both cultist and Chaos Space Marine—covered the basin floor, piled six deep in some places. The forces of Chaos trampled their own dead into paste to reach the Ultramarines, and the Astartes gladly added them to the macabre carpet. Every Battle-Brother that fell only renewed their resolve to fight.
Roboute Guilliman fell as any Astartes could hope to fall: with his hands around the enemy's throat. Clutching the flagstaff for support, he swung his Power Fist in great arcs, smashing dozens of foes with each swing. Even as he sank to his knees, the front of his armor dyed an even deeper crimson with a dozen new wounds, he kept the Banner of Macragge upright in a final gesture of defiance. Swimming in and out of consciousness, the Primarch's ravaged body sank into the Martian dust.
Roars of blasphemous praise deafened Roboute as dozens of cultists fell upon him, striking him with clubs and swords or pounding him with bare hands and feet. The heretical litanies turned to screams of horror, which were then drowned out by the barking of bolter fire as Iron Warriors Chaos Space Marines unloaded clip and clip, first into their own slave-soldiers then into Guilliman's prostrate form. The Primarch bit his tongue. He would not give them the satisfaction of crying out.
The rounds struck home and exploded, driving shrapnel into his back, shattering his bones, and rupturing his internal organs. Through the pain, Roboute felt a soothing presence hanging over him. The roaring praises to the Ruinous Powers, the booming of numerous bolters, and even time itself slowly ground to a halt. With great effort, he lifted his head to see the hem of a now-familiar pink dress.
"Th-the ba-ban-banner," Roboute choked out, "P-Pl-Please save i-i-it…"
As time resumed, the Primarch felt the flagstaff's weight slide out of his grip. Content that the final legacy of the Ultramarines now lay beyond the enemy's reach, Roboute Guilliman breathed his last and died.
Black Knights 15th Militia Field Headquarters
Tharsis Region, Surface of Mars
With one word, the fact that the forges at Argyre Planitia were the last in Imperial hands capable of producing Scourge-pattern bolters and Sabbat-pattern power armor became insignificant. With a single word, the shipment of completed Exorcists and Immolators sitting on the production floor no longer mattered. With six letters, the entire situation on Mars changed.
"Titans," Lelouch repeated unnecessarily as a million disastrous implications rampaged through his mind, "Argyre Planitia is a Titan workshop."
"Yes, sir," confirmed an Intelligence officer, "According to the Mechanicum's report, a Warlord-class and two Warhound-class Titans were being prepared for transport just before the communications blackout hit."
"What forces do we have there? The forge should have its own garrison, and Roboute was planning to use the basin as a staging ground…"
"Just before the blackout, Primarch Guilliman reported that he had gathered the Ultramarines and twenty of their successor chapters, totaling just under twelve thousand Astartes, at Argyre Planitia. The forge garrison numbers two and a half million Skitarii, with one million stationed at the Titan workshop. Additionally, forty-seven thousand Brides of the Emperor were in the process of arming and equipping when we lost communications."
"The whats of the Emperor?" Lelouch's eyebrows hit the ceiling.
A/N: Yeah! Here come the nuns with guns! Now this is a party! Though I feel like I'm forgetting somebody... Huh...probably nothing important... With that, I will see you all next time!
