Grit-Nife was an Ork Mek-boy who'd spent all of his life working in a Mek Shop on the northern continent of Forwaethe Two. The Orks didn't use that name for the planet of course but few who lived there cared enough to come up with a name for the place. Grit-Nife was also the largest of the local Mek-boyz after the Big Mek who ran the Shop. The Old Mek was so big though that no Ork short of the Warboss of the nearest Settlement would ever stand a chance against him.
In order to keep the Warboss happy and the Mek Shop running, they'd relocated years ago to just outside of the old crater that the Settlement was in. The Old Mek however had to head into the settlement often these days and see the Warboss about one thing or another. "Sumfing 'bout getin ready fo' dem raiderz..." Grit-Nife mumbled to himself.
Whenever possible, Grit-Nife used the absence of the Old Mek to hide shiny parts and other 'fixy bitz' in a tunnel he'd secretly dug under the shop. Teef were something he could spend but could never hang on to for any length of time so he saved up parts of weapons and other gadgets instead. As he turned back to head out of the tunnel he was hit by a pressure wave of the sort he normally felt when they tested weapons.
"Wot da? Iz dem Tankbusta boyz shootin' at this time o' day?"
Grit-Nife came up out of his tunnel and slid the disguised hatch back over it he's built. Seconds later a burna boy ran past, on fire but still desperately clutching his burna. Laughing for a moment at the spectacle the Mek boy kept walking until he rounded the corner of the Shop. There in front of him the entire settlement and all of the buildings inside the crater were on fire. A white beam flashed down from above and any of the buildings still standing in the crater were instantly knocked flat.
Even as he watched, a Nob stumbled through the wreckage and caught fire, burning to the ground before he could escape. "WOT DA ZOG! DA BOYZ IS BURNIN'!" Grit-Nife yelled.
Grit-Nife, apparently the only Mek boy not caught inside the fire, ran inside the shop and pulled together every power shield the Old Mek still had. When he though he had enough of them, he threw a pair of nearby hiding grots onto the roof of the Shop and tossed the shield up after them.
"Oy! Ya turn on dat shield dingy if ya wan-ter live!"
Thankfully for the Mek and his shop, he didn't need to kick the Grots to get them to do what he said. An orange shimmering glow filled the air above the shop just an instant before another beam fell from the sky. The shield exploded, killing both Grots and knocking the Mek to the ground, but when he looked up the Shop was still in one piece.
A small transport shuttle set down on a hastily built temporary landing pad a short distance away from where Megara was parked. The entire surrounding area was filled with construction vehicles. Some were clearing debris or digging trenches down to Bedrock, others were engaged in placing prefabricated structures. Captain Elgar had come out from his ship to greet the arrivals.
Parek stepped out of the shuttle first, followed by Brother Atar and his two escorts. Everyone wore light armour which was rated for space exposure, a necessity since the area was still cooling and filled with fumes from the bombardment.
"Welcome to Forwaethe Base One." said Elgar, over the suit's built in com.
"How are things progressing?" Asked Parek looking around.
"Slower than I'd like. We don't have that much experience setting up a base like this. It's a work in progress."
"What do you have so far?" Questioned the Captain.
"We're already extracting heavy metals directly out of the mantle. Used a cutter beam and surrounded the opening with a force field. The temporary wall you can see going up should be finished by the end of the day."
Lavidean pointed at one of the tractors leveling the ground nearby. "I've seen one of those before, they're sometimes used as siege tanks."
Both of the Captains paused and regarded the Space Marine strangely for a moment. Elgar shrugged. "I guess with a little armour you could use one in an emergency. It's just not something I've ever thought of using it for before now."
"We have a moment Captain." Suggested Parek. "Brother Atar, do you recognise any other vehicles in our STC?"
Elgar quickly flipped through the remaining list of construction vehicles and Lavidean pointed out an even larger vehicle. "The Land Raider. Most powerful tank in use by the Space Marines."
The young captain nodded as if that made sense. "We normally use that for transporting mining crews through unstable tunnels. There were normally a pair of lascannon on each side so they could cut their way out of a collapse if need be."
Parek nodded as well. "Brother Atar were there any other vehicles that we could look up quickly before we get on with our tour?"
"Yes, the BaneBlade."
"I'm not sure we have that one." Confessed Elgar. "We have some twenty models of BaneStar, and the old Seer."
"Would any of them have heavy treads?" Asked Lavidean.
Elgar turned his data slate again.
"Yes! That's it! Though it appears to be lacking any weapons except for it's main gun."
Elgar frowned. "Survey crews for Terraforming efforts used those, they called them the Seer because of the sensor packages they loaded into the sponsons. The only thing that heavy turret mounts is a directional high gain subspace antenna. Generally good for environments that might cause problems with anti-grav systems."
Lavidean slumped somewhat. Disappointed with how little these people did with the technology they had.
Grit-Nife gathered together all of the Grots and Boyz that hadn't been killed by the previous night's bombardment when day broke. Not one of the Nobs had survived and only a couple of the smallest Mek boyz were left not counting himself. That meant he was the biggest baddest Ork in the camp.
"Awl a ya boyz lissen up! I'm da biggest so, I'M da boss!" All of the boyz looked at him waiting for more. "Nows wez gotta find da boyz dat burned us an krump 'em reeel gud loik! Wez gonna av our very own WAAAAAAAGGGH!"
"WAAAAGH!" yelled out the remaining boyz raising their choppas in the air.
"We'z gunna need a great big Pile O Gunz so, LETS GET LOOTIN!"
"WAAAAGH!" Yelled the Orks again as they scattered to start dragging usable wreckage from the old crater.
Grabbing a few Grots that were nearby, Grit-Nife headed for his stash of parts.
"Sinite to Captain Serth, come in."
Parek touched a button on the side of his helmet. "Go ahead Sinite."
The synthesized voice of the ship's AI came on again. "The ships on station in orbit are detecting movement around some of the Ork camps in the northern hemisphere. Do you wish to resume bombardment?"
"How strong are they in terms of numbers?" he asked.
"Small sir. Only a handful of vehicles so far."
"Leave them be for now. We still need to test the effect of this bio agent. Speaking of which..."
Parek double tapped the button on the side of his helmet.
"Elgar, how much longer before we can begin producing the anti-Ork chemical agents?"
The younger captain looked down at his data slate. "Two days give or take?"
Journal entry of Brother Lavidean Atar, Ultramarines 6th company
The more I learn about the ways of these survivors of the Dark Ages the more I come to understand how they fell in the first place. Their arrogance and supreme belief in their technology alone is truly beyond measure. So much so that these people almost seem more akin to the Eldar. Their arrogance brought civilization to it's knees and were it not for the intervention of the Emperor, all surely would have been lost.
After seeing the abundance of STC pattern repositories used by the construction crews on the planet I have scaled back my previous plans. One of the lesser reliquaries may go missing without these people expending as much effort to find it I believe and hope.
The Dark Age survivors hold little respect for the Baneblade or Land Raider patterns. There simply must be other patterns that could be easily converted to the Imperium's use. What I have seen of their wargear patterns makes me believe they would be too expensive to ever reach wide scale use. Something to use across the entire Imperium is what I need.
So that the Emperor and the Space Marines might protect.
In the week following the landing things settled into a steady rhythm for Brother Atar.
For so many hours he would instruct in the small cargo bay he was starting to think of as more of a Chapel. More than one student was becoming increasingly attentive in learning the Emperor's word.
'With any luck, some of them might turn to the side of the Imperium.' Thought Lavidean.
After that, much of the day was spent analyzing Ork movements on the planet. The Fleet Captain was becoming increasingly determined not to be caught off guard by an Ork attack despite the huge superiority they held from orbit. The Captain, like all of his people, were inexperienced when it came to ground combat. Lavidean soon found the people of the Dark Age fleet asking for advice on the placement of firebases and even some minor force deployment.
Even though the Space Marine had been paying attention to orbital displays through the week, he was still surprised by the progress made when he and the Captain returned to the surface.
Parek stepped out onto the same temporary pad he had just one week earlier and looked around. Behind him Lavidean was momentarily speechless. The entire complex of new buildings was now walled in with thirty meter high fortifications. Towers were built into the inner side of the wall at regular intervals, housings no doubt for future weapon or defensive emplacements.
Captain Elgar approached the landing pad in what appeared to be version of Land Speeder designed to hold more passengers. Elgar parked the vehicle then stepped out.
"I see you've started building additional vehicles." Parek noted, shouting over the dying whine from the Land Speeder engine.
"We have a smaller factory building just finished that's producing small transport craft. We're mainly building APC's or Speeders for scouting. Heavy Armour production should be next up."
Parek watched Lavidean's gaze scanning the compound. "Brother Atar?"
"How big is this base now?"
"About three kilometers on a side. We built it square, no need to turn it into a star shaped Fort just yet. We decided to just keep Megara parked in the center until we're needed at a new location."
Another open topped speeder drove past carrying a construction crew. Not one of them were wearing their helmets, instead keeping them underarm.
"What's the air like now?" Parek asked while Lavidean removed his helmet and inhaled deeply.
Elgar pointed up in the air. "We've got a filtration field in place over the base with emitters on top of the wall. The work crews say they've tested the air outside but it should still be a few more weeks until enough of the burn has worn off."
Parek and Brother Atar were given a tour of the new structures that had gone up over the past week, the last being the all important chemical plant.
"I wanted to show you this building last so that we might actually have something made by the time you got here." Confessed Elgar with a laugh.
The open loading dock they had just entered housed three canisters, each of which looked like they could be attached to the underside of an aircraft. The Canisters were two meters long and had a dispenser mechanism at one end.
"Is this all of it?" asked Parek.
"So far. The chemical refining process is rather slow. Two hours apiece. We're going to start building an addition tomorrow, that should speed things up."
"Start today." ordered Parek coldly.
Elgar looked slightly confused. "But sir that'll slow down Heavy Armour."
"Only a by a day or two. Once you've gotten things started here have these canisters loaded up and tested on the nearest Ork encampment. They've started migrating in this direction and it can't be by chance."
