To Duckman 154, in regards to the Imperator Titan, you shall see later. Also they aren't back in time. The Necron weapon that hit them worked on unknown ancient technology (maybe a left over relic from the War in Heaven against the Old Ones) has transported them here in the middle of a full fledged war between some humans and an unknown (to the imperial forces at least) alien species.
To emperorprotects, to me they seem fine. I personally am not a fan of the Space Marine chapters that have to have a ceremony for every little thing. I like the chapters like the Space Wolves. Speaking of the Space Wolves are they not gung-ho? And I apologize for the walls of text. I think I've finally solved the walls of text problems you guys keep moaning about and the lack of a solution.
To Soulful Plain Strider, your remarks are very good to the issue that I.HAVE.A.PERSONALITY.DISORDER brought up when you talked about Space Marines not having emotions when they do. But so far they have been to busy fighting to have very many emotions, but that will change later on as the story goes.
To I.HAVE.A.PERSONALITY.DISORDER, Space Marines might have fear suppressed through hypno-indoctrination and genetic engineering but they are still susceptible to human emotions, Horus fell to vanity and pride. Fulgrim fell to perfectionism and sensuality (as in the Horus Heresy book Fulgrim). And others have felt things besides just being generally PO'd and cheerless. In the Space Wolves book Ragnar's Claw, Ragnar has feelings sort of like love towards a female inquisitor. And has feelings of sadness when she dies. So it's like Soulful said they are more distanced from their emotions than normal humans are, but even Space Marines, including Primarchs, who are superior to Space Marines can feel emotions. And sometimes they act fatally on their emotions just like normal men.
Anyways, statements and questions aside here is the newest chapter of Second Imperium.
"So… you all know what I have called you here for" Mark said
"The questions we have to ask ourselves first and foremost are painfully apparent."
Glancing around the briefing room next to the Harbinger of Dawn's bridge; Mark was pleased to see that all of the senior officers of the combined Imperial fleet were in attendance. All ten captains of the Heralds of Light's varying companies stood to his left, along with Chief Librarian Rafael, and Senior Tech-Marine Isaac. Along with Gregor who even though he wasn't there for the decision making, he was there to lend support to and advise the Chapter Master since he was the oldest Dreadnought in the chapter.
A fact which struck Mark with a bit of irony since Gregor was also his oldest friend, at least alive Mark thought sadly. The rest of the Dreadnoughts were currently scattered about the ship, some chatting to Battle-brothers trying to catch up on the things that had happened since they had last been awakened. Others were just wandering about the ship, pausing to look out at the stars. Yet more still were gathered on the observation deck swapping old war stories with one another.
Returning to the men assembled around the briefing table, Mark spoke once more "The first obvious question is where in the love of the Emperor are we?"
Glancing at Isaac he said "I believe Brother Isaac and Tech-Cardinal Baroque have come up with the best answer to that question so I will let them talk".
Nodding his thanks Isaac pushed a button in front of him. "As far as we have been able to ascertain, when the Necron energy blast hit us it caused us to be dislocated from our universe and thrust into this one" as he had been speaking a video of the Necron tomb ship and the massive energy discharge played out ending in the bright green light engulfing the screen and the image going black.
"Now how this happened exactly we don't know, the Necrons have foul technologies vastly more advanced than our own."
Nodding in agreement to the last statement Tech-Cardinal Baroque said "And as such we have no way of being able to come anywhere near replicating that kind of technology so for the foreseeable future we are stuck here in this dimension" he stated in his mechanical voice.
"Also" Rafael said "I have conferred with the Navigators and the Astropaths of the fleet, the Warp is completely stable, with barely a ripple of disturbance". "That should be good a good thing right?" General List said.
"No that's not a good thing you pompous ass!" said Brigadier General Paulus; both representing the Imperial Guard in the discussions, General List being in charge of the Fifth and Sixth Steel Legions, and Paulus in charge of the Death Korps of Krieg Regiment.
"How dare you say such a thing to a superior officer I'll…" List started to say in a highly offended tone, reaching for his power sword.
"Both of you will do nothing to each other as long as you are here on the Harbinger of Dawn, so cut that kind of stuff out!" Mark shouted. "Now as Rafael was saying…" turning to Rafael, Mark nodded for him to continue, keeping the two generals in the corner of his vision.
"Right as I was saying, even though the Warp is practically smooth as glass we still cannot make a safe warp jump due to the fact that the guiding beacon of the Astronomican is gone" Rafael said. He might as well have said that the Warmaster Horus was back from the dead, thought Mark; because it got so quite the only sounds were those of respiration, the strange mechanical whirring sounds coming from under Tech-Cardinal Baroque's red robes, and the combustion taking place in the engine on Gregor's back.
"So that confirms what Isaac and Baroque have told us, that we aren't in the Halo Stars any more" said Mark with grim humor.
"Now our next obvious choice is what do we do now, because as it stands it appears we have come just in time to help the humans of this universe avoid a major military defeat and setback at the hands of these Xenos who dare give themselves a name and that their genocidal campaign against the humans of this universe is the will of their blasphemous gods." Mark said the last words with palpable hatred.
"Now we can both lend these people a hand, which it appears they sorely, need and bring to them the light and glory of the Emperor in the process." Pausing to let the words sink in Mark said "Or we could sit around praying for the Emperor to provide us a way to get back to our universe, which I might add it seems completely unlikely" after a few seconds Mark spoke once more "Or we could find a nearby habitable world, settle on it and bury our heads in the sand".
After a few more minutes of uneasy silence Mark decided to call a vote, the decision was unanimous, all were in favor of lending there fellow man a hand. As the meeting was about to be dismissed a harried looking tech-adept barged into the room followed by two angry looking Marines with bolt pistols drawn.
"What in the name of the Immortal Emperor could be so important that you would interrupt this meeting?" Mark asked; motioning for the Marines to stand down.
"I'm sorry Lord Mark" the adept said nearly doubling over bowing. "But the Tech-Cardinal requested to be notified if any significant breakthroughs were made in the humans FTL drive." Turning to Tech-Cardinal Baroque he said excitedly "We've figured it works almost exactly like our warp drives"
"Oh, how so?" Baroque said in his mechanical voice.
"Well, we found out that it tunnels into another dimension just like our warp drives tunnel into the Warp; but this dimension they tunnel into is completely stable with no danger of any mishaps" the adept replied.
"Can we replicate this technology?" Mark said before Baroque could speak.
"As a matter of fact we can and during our research we found out that the way they did it was just by ripping a hole into that dimension through brute strength and then keeping it open long enough for a ship to get through." Pausing for breath the adept went on "we managed to streamline the whole process so now if we were to use this drive we would just slip into this space with a minimal use of energy, which is why maybe they call them slipspace drives."
Grasping at the first part Mark said "so this will allow us to travel between stars again?" "Yes it most certainly will Lord" replied the tech-adept.
Glancing around to see that this new bit of information had sunk in Mark clapped his hands together, scaring the entire assembly and said "good then how long will it take us to retrofit all our ships Tech-Cardinal?" the adept passed Baroque a datapad; which after a few moments of study Baroque replied "based upon this data at least 10 to 15 hours at the most".
"Very well then you all heard him return to you ships and make you forces and personnel ready, for after the Tech-Cardinal and his fellow priest are done we shall head to Holy Terra herself and show our new allies what the armies of the Imperium look like, and show them how advantageous it will be with us fighting by their side, because I for one pity the poor Xenos who have to fight us next!" glancing from one individual to another Mark said
"Men we have been presented a chance to right the past, we have a chance to found a Second Imperium, free of the taint of the alien, the mutant, the heretic. We have a chance to render the Horus Heresy null and create the kind of Imperium that the Immortal Emperor had tried to make before the Arch-Traitor rose up and shattered his dream"
a short time after that last statement the entire fleet went up in a collectively tremendous cheer as word got out of the fleets new mission, to be the spearhead of a Second Great Crusade…
0500 Hours, August 31, 2552 (Military Calendar) / Epsilon Eridani System, Reach UNSC Military Complex, planet Reach. Camp Hathcock
Master Chief stepped on the brakes of the Warthog pulling up to a stop a few feet from the gates. A shaken looking MP jogged over to him, stopping to check his identification papers, upon seeing the Spartan armor on him the MP waved to the other guard to open the gate saying "Go on in Chief their expecting you".
Putting his foot on the gas, John speed on down the gravel road, swerving to avoid burned out Warthogs and the smoking chassis of Scorpion tanks. Five minutes later he pulled up in front of the main facility, grimacing at the damage done to the place. Climbing out of the Warthog he walked up to the MP in front of the entrance, the MP just nodded and went back to scanning the horizon.
John thought of the futility of that as he rode the elevator down to Subbasement III. There at least some semblance of order remained as the MP attendant told him to wait outside in the debriefing lounge. Also waiting in the lounge was Captain Keyes, Whom the chief saluted promptly, where's Keyes sketched a frazzled salute and said "At ease Chief".
Glancing around the room John also noticed Dr.Halsey sitting in a seat next to the doors. Upon noticing him she stood up and walked over to him extending a hand and saying "Hello John, how are you?"
"I'm fine ma'am it's good to see you again even if it was so soon." John replied.
Ignoring his second comment she asked"So I heard you fought alongside these, what do they call themselves? Space Marines that's right, anyways so you fought alongside them did you?"
Before John could reply the doors swung open and the MP attendant motioned for them to enter. Sighing Dr. Halsey walked in followed by Keyes, last was John. They were standing under a spotlight while in the shadows John could see the same outlines and hear the same voices as those who had grilled him earlier in this chamber. Suddenly a voice spoke up out of the whispers and said "Enough we have to face facts, that Covenant fleet would have defeated us no matter what we would have done".
Another voice spoke up and said "let's review the evidence shall we?"
with that a video appeared showing the massive Imperial capital ship shoot one shot from it's humongous center line cannon, whose barrel was large enough to park at least a UNSC frigate in. and send a shell straight into the Covenant armada to impact dead center on a Covenant ship that to UNSC standards was massive but compared to this new ship it was only about a third of the size, and get sucked up in a massive vortex that proceeded to suck in almost the entire Covenant fleet into. Leaving a few survivors who proceeded to move around and bombard the other side of the planet sparingly, leaving large brown spots on an other wise blue and green world, drop of a staggering amount of ground troops then flee into slipspace.
"Unbelievable, simply unbelievable that one shot could annihilate an entire fleet.", the voice next to the figure in the center said "it's positively mind bending"
"that's not all" the center figure said again.
Another video played, this time (John could tell it was his combat camera) showing group of giant white armored giants with gold trim charging up the side of a brown, singed hill and upon seeing Covenant scurrying around on the other side raise massive guns and unload their clips into them, blowing them to wet ragged pieces. Someone in the shadows coughed uncomfortably. The video speed up to show a giant with a massive whirring sword with what appeared to be chainsaw blades swing it into an Elite with such strength that it's personal shield collapsed, allowing the chainsaw blades to tear the Elite clean in two at the waist.
Then it speed up again to show another giant heft a blocky version of a plasma gun and fire it at a Hunter that was firing at some armored giants taking cover behind a rock, and the bluish super heated plasma burn a hole straight through it's center of mass, toppling the Hunter forward.
The film speed up once more to show another squad of giants line up a group of 12 Grunts against a couple of rocks and open fire on them firing squad style and pump the little Grunts so full of what had to be mass reactive shells their little bodies disintegrated, one jumped out of the way and tried to run but had it's legs blown out with two precision aimed shots, and the silver helmed leader stride over and watch the creature continue to try and escape before taking out what looked like a combat knife only larger and run it through the Grunts head.
"As you can see not only do they have superior technology, they have cold-hearted brutality and unwavering determination to go along with it" said the speaker on the right of the central figure, gesturing to the last clip.
"No wonder how they wiped out a Covenant army at least 20 times it's size" said the central figure. "Now that the immediate Covenant threat has been dealt with…" suddenly he was interrupted by a MP who rushed in saying "Sir we have a situation!"
"Really?" Keyes said to himself, though John could hear him. Turning to the MP, John wondered what the problem was…
6 hours after retuning in the HLV that had carried the Defaeco Haerectium to Reach and back. Princep Brandon was called to Commander Constantine's Office; saluting him Brandon said "You wanted to see me sir?" "Ah yes Brandon good of you to arrive so promptly the sooner we get this mess resolved the better" Constantine said returning Brandon's salute. "What would that be sir?" Brandon asked, folding his hands behind his Princeps robes. "Well…We need a replacement Princeps for Esurio Filius."
"What for Sir?" Brandon replied. "I thought that Princep Vilas was in command of it"
"Well he was till about 2 hours ago" Constantine stated matter of factually.
"Okay Sir I'm sad that he's dead and it's a loss to our Legion, but what does that have to do with me?" Brandon said.
"Well Vilas had the same gift for being able to sift through vast amounts of data without being overwhelmed by it all; something few in all of the Titan Legions posses. And since he was pretty much the only one in control of the Esurio Filius, we think that it would refuse to cooperate with some one that it perceived as weak because they needed the help of a few Moderati to operate it." Constantine explained.
"So where exactly do I fit into this?" Brandon asked, realization of what was happening causing him to swell with pride.
"Well as we said you're the only other Princep who has the same ability, so from now on you will be in charge of the Esurio Filius, but I want to say that even though you showed your mettle against those aliens on Reach doesn't mean that you have been instantly promoted to being in charge of an Imperator Titan. So I'm warning you now do not, I repeat do not let this go to your head, got me?" Constantine said.
"Sir, Yes Sir" Brandon said standing ramrod straight.
"Very well then Brandon I want you to make you final goodbyes to the Defaeco Haerectium and catch a shuttle over to the Esurio Filius's HLV, the Massive; got that?" Constantine asked staring at Brandon.
"Sir, perfectly clear Sir!" Brandon said, saluting.
"Very well as soon as you get to the Massive I want you to begin getting used to running it" Constantine said as he moved to sit behind his desk again.
"What for sir?" Brandon asked, generally puzzled.
"Why, haven't you heard?" Constantine as he shifted through a stack of maintenance and other reports.
"Heard what sir?" Brandon asked perplexed that as a Princeps he had almost potentially missed something important.
"That the we are headed to holy Terra herself and as the biggest symbols of the majesty and glory of the Imperium and the God-Emperor our entire Legion will be deployed along with the entirety of the Heralds of Light, plus the mighty 5th Armageddon Steel Legion will deploy in it's entirety to display the military might of the common man in the Imperial Guard; also theirs to be a massive air show by the Imperial Navy, with lots of Lightning and Thunderbolt fighters, plus Marauder bomber formations." Constantine said, visibly swelling with pride at each sentence.
"But can you guess who the stars of the show are?" Constantine whispered conspiratorially.
"No sir who are they?" Brandon said feigning ignorance.
"The most powerful machines ever created in the Universe the two Imperator Titans of our proud Steel Hammers Titan Legion!!" Constantine shouted.
Brandon simply nodded his head and with another crisp salute hurried off to get squared away for the event which was just a few hours away…
As soon as all the shuttles, fighters patrols, and other small ships were retrieved and safely tucked away within the hulls of the bigger ships; the entire 1st Imperium Expeditionary Fleet activated their Slipspace drives and jumped into a gateway of bright light. Their destination, Earth to the men and women of the UNSC and though they were human just like the bulk of the Imperial force, to the Imperials it was something else entirely.
To the men and women of the 1st Imperial Expeditionary Fleet it was not only the cradle of humanity but it was the world that the Immortal Emperor himself was born on and it was there in the 41st millennium in their universe that he sat upon the Golden Throne since time unremembered to all of the humans in the 1st IEF. But to the Space Marines of the Heralds of Light, it was a raw scar still remembered as the single worst time in the history of Mankind; and the history of their chapter…