Heathen Stars, Koronus Expanse, 4 835.061.M42
The ancient vessel known as the Duelist of Sedna lurked through the fringe of the Heathen Stars, on a mission directed by the Millennial himself. To gain support from forces within the Koronus Expanse, ensuring that the Alpha Crusade would have a place to resupply, the 2nd Battlegroup of the so-called 'Battlefleet Alpha,' forged from the resurrected carcasses of abandoned vessels cast off to the reserve fleets or scrapyards of the Imperium, had come to the Expanse in order to deal with the forces of Chaos that had firmly entrenched themselves in the furthest corners of the great region of space. So it was that the refitted Retaliator, flagship of the 2nd Battlegroup, was on the hunt for a vessel upon which the Navis Nobilite had placed a bounty of immense value upon. That vessel was the rogue Retaliator known as the Monarch of Whispers.
The captain of the Duelist, Morena Machtherin, had worked in cooperation with the other half-dozen capital ships in her ersatz force to develop a plan, one which would hopefully lure out the mad Navigator, Ember Nostromo, and her flagship. Running silent, the Grand Cruiser awaited a signal from a lesser ship sent to prowl further into the void - the ancient Murder-class Cruiser Sequestrian. Captain Telos, the commander of the cruiser, understood his orders - the vessel was to lure out the Monarch, after which the Duelist would make its move, deploying null mines around the ship to both disrupt Nostromo's connection to the Warp and ensure that her vessel could not easily escape. The firepower of two loyalist vessels would soon reduce the ancient Retaliator to nothing more than scrap.
Patience was key, but even Captain Machtherin had to admit her nerves were further tensing as she waited for a message from the Sequestrian. "Perhaps they know we were coming..." She silently muttered to herself, staring out into the void.
"Captain Machtherin!" Telos' voice came over the vessel's comms. "We're under attack! The vessel... it's not the Monarch of Whispers!"
"Oh?" Her curiosity was now highly peaked. "Class and identification?"
"Slaughter-class Cruiser. As for identification... Hear it for yourself." Retransmitting the vox-message from the heretical ship, a single word continued to resonate for several seconds before the feed was cut off.
"KILLFRENZY KILLFRENZY KILLFRENZY KILLFRENZY KILLFRENZY KILLFRENZY KILLFRENZY..."
"Status report, Captain!" While unsure as to whether or not it was best to spring the trap, any decision made needed to be determined by the status of the vessel.
"We've unloaded a full plasma fusillade into their starboard flank, but it appears to have done nothing. We're under heavy macrocannon and lance fire. Void shields are at 73% and dropping."
"We'll maintain our distance and ready ourselves to jump to your location if the situation becomes critical. Keep us updated, Captain."
"Will do- another vessel's warped in! Murder-class Cruiser. It's the Promise of Sedition! They've warped in on our port-side flank - void shields are dropping rapidly. We won't be able to hold on if they go down."
"Acknowledged." Captain Machtherin responded to her subordinate. "Helm, ready us for the micro-jump. We'll exit the Warp within range of one of the cruisers and reduce them to twisted slag." Her Navigator readied himself, for this moment would require the utmost precision.
The Warp Drives of the Duelist of Sedna soon charged, a rift in the Warp opening for but a split second as the grand voidship traversed hundreds of thousands of kilometers in what seemed to its crew like the blink of an eye. Emerging well away from the battle, the Retaliator was nonetheless in range of the Killfrenzy, lance batteries opening up at range while fighters and bombers emerged from the Grand Cruiser's hangar bays, macrocannon fire supporting the more accurate lances. The unexpected move saw a pulse of energy from one of the lances pierce into the metallic flesh of the Slaughter, small explosions pepper-potting the many wounds in its hull as Abraham Thurst's infamous vessel was wrought with significant internal damage. But as the Duelist moved in to finish off the wounded traitor vessel, a new ship crossed the T behind it - the Monarch of Whispers had arrived on the battlefield.
Located behind the loyalist command ship, the Monarch began to unleash assault boats, complemented by lances and macrocannon rounds that impacted the Retaliator's void shields. The ship attempted to turn and keep pace, but the Monarch maintained its position behind the fellow Retaliator. More fire burst against its ailing rear void shield before a lance burst through, an explosion pockmarking itself in the ship's engines. Assault boats from the renegade ship continued to strike the Duelist's exposed flanks as heretical sabotage teams rended systems within the vessel. Fires began to rage within its hull as the ship listed dangerously - but even as it did so, Captain Machtheirin looked to even the odds.
With a synchronization of fire that was almost preternatural in origin, the Duelist and the Sequestrian unleashed simultaneous fusillades of fire into the wounded Killfrenzy. The crash of lances and macrocannons against its hull further marred the vessel - before a sudden explosion amidships rended it into twin pieces of scrap. A strike on one of the vessel's reactors had caused a catastrophic meltdown, detonating its fusion core with the power of an extraordinarily potent nuclear warhead. Still, there was the Promise of Sedition to deal with, and the heretic Murder was in better shape than the nearly unshielded Sequestrian was, even if it had taken minor damage.
With her ship crippled, and a vessel in her battlegroup under serious threat of destruction, She opened her comm channels. "This is Captain Machtherin. Execute Tertiary Plan Aurek."
At the fringe of the system was a ship long misused by the Imperial Navy. Designed as a fast battleship, the Invincible-class vessel known as Kischer's Bulwark was disposed of in the Segmentum Tempestus reserve fleet, for as it looked like a battleship, it was used as a battleship, despite having the armor of a cruiser at most. Yet the ship's speed was an asset, its firepower more than effective against a weakened cruiser.
Or, as one would find out, a distracted heretic.
Kischer's Bulwark emerged from the Warp across from the Monarch, its pointed prow aimed towards the flank of the defiled ship. The engines of the fast battleship were overdriven, void shields focused to reinforce the ram's penetrating powers as Captain Marius Vindter ordered his crew to brace for impact. Slowly, the ships moved closer towards one another before an impact became nearly inevitable.
And happen it did. The tip of Kischer's Bulwark practically melted through the weakened void shields of the Monarch of Whispers, energized adamantium gouging an ever deeper crevice in the ancient warship. Its engines flared with righteous fury as it further forced itself through the Monarch, rending apart sections of frame that had remained intact for almost ten thousand years. Fuel lines were severed and electricity cut as the clean thrust was finally stabbed through the heart of the heretical vessel, splinters of ceramite shattering off its ruined sides as the Invincible passed through the wreckage, missing an impact on the Duelist by several meters at most. The fate of Ember Nostromo and the Warp-witch coterie at her command was now known.
The Promise of Sedition seemed to understand that it was now outmatched. Turning away from the wounded Murder, it soon reentered the Warp, leaving the shattered Grand Cruiser to be fired upon by the Sequestrian and Kischer's Bulwark until nothing remained. No bodies floated through the void. Nothing discernible in the form of a ship remained - all that was left was a large field of slagged metal several kilometers across, good only for the purpose of recycling. Nothing of note was left to be salvaged by the more unscrupulous traders in the Expanse.
"Your performance was exemplary, Captain Vindter." Captain Machtherin complimented the Invincible's liege - he was to receive the honor of bringing forth the data to the Navis Nobilite, ensuring that it was verified once and for all that the Monarch of Whispers was nothing more than a pile of slagged metal, the heretic who led it reduced to stellar ash.
"The honor goes to you for planning this out, Machtherin." His minor breach of etiquette was ignored. "I doubt we'd have considered the Monarch wouldn't have shown, not with the juicy morsel out here for that witch to capture. If there's one thing I'm not sure of, though, it's why these vessels were working in concert with one another. Battlefleet Koronus never mentioned any heretic unions out here, aside from that of Iniquity's foul forces. What were these ships doing?"
His comment gave Morena pause. No intelligence reports had ever indicated that the Monarch of Whispers was accompanied by any other renegade vessels - in fact, all information seemed to indicate that Nostromo had preferred assaulting her choice of targets alone, relying on the ship's ample armament to overwhelm smaller ships. Yet to know that such infamously independent ships as the Killfrenzy and Promise of Sedition were willing to ally themselves with her, however temporarily, was a worry. Perhaps they had heard of increased Imperial presence within the Expanse, and wanted to ensure they were not affected. Perhaps they had sworn oaths to foul gods, reveling in one another's malicious company. Or perhaps the reasoning behind their alliance was so impossible for a sane man to understand that it was best not thought of.
Whatever the answer, the vessels of the 2nd Battlegroup would require repair. Sequestrian was in the best shape of the three, having sustained minor hull damage only, though its void shields needed to cool down. Kischer's Bulwark had suffered heavy, but not irreparable, damage to their prow from rending through the Grand Cruiser. It would at least be capable of returning to Footfall under its own power.
The Duelist of Sedna, however, had received severe damage. Its engines were critically damaged, ten percent of the ship's crew was dead, and multiple systems across the vessel were in serious straits. Whether they could be repaired or not were serious questions considering the ship's age. It was likely, even if parts from other derelict Retaliators had to be cannibalized, but such would take time - time that would slow down the Alpha Crusade's reach into the Koronus Expanse.
Yet if there had been a cost, it had been minor. No loyalist vessel had been lost, and many crewmen praised the God-Emperor for their success. Two traitor vessels had been rendered insolvent, their purge of the stars and reigns of terror ended. They would become naught but names in the crumbling parchments of the Adeptus Administratum, of traitor warships long forgotten. Though one had escaped, two destroyed with no loss of an Imperial vessel aside from the repair of the Duelist was a most effective trade-off. Already Captain Machtherin was considering her next command ship, assuming she still remained in charge of the 2nd Battlegroup and did not receive a promotion.
Salvation had grown to become a very real possibility. The heretics within the dark heart of the Screaming Vortex were right to fear an assault from those who had plunged into the Eye of Terror, purging the daemon and the heretic where they were found with little or no care in even the slightest section of the word. Yet the Koronus Expanse had many a threat within it, many a secret to be revealed. The Alpha Crusade had scarcely scratched the surface of what lay within the region. It would take years to learn all there was, time that could be better spent elsewhere.
Yet the mystery was part of the fun. Wasn't it?
