Welcome to Chapter 2 of the Forgotten Warriors Saga. I just started writing this story a couple days ago, and just started another story that the first chapter of will be posted soon. Leave a review and let me know what y'all think.

The pungent odor of acrid smoke hung heavily in the atmosphere. The sky had darkened as the sun had set an hour or so after Captain Potter had rescued the Guardsmen. Right now the group of surviving Guardsmen, Lieutenant Ibsen, and Captain Potter and his two men were all marching towards a rendezvous point that Captain Potter had been assigned.

Very few words had been exchanged between the two groups, essentially all between Captain Potter and and Lieutenant Ibsen. The rendezvous point was still a few kilometers away from their current position, and it seemed as if they would make it without incident.

Captain Potter had informed Lieutenant Ibsen that the Forgotten Warriors chapter had deployed his company to come and support the efforts to subdue the rebelling Hive World. Captain Potter was the commanding officer of this expedition, and it had been nearly pure luck that his drop pod had landed where it had and he had been able to rescue Ibsen and his men.

Lieutenant Ibsen was somewhat confused, yet he did not speak his mind for fear of angering or alienating the Astartes who had saved them. Ibsen, nor any of his men, had ever heard of the Forgotten Warrior chapter of the Space Marines, which was possible, many chapters existed that were not as famous nor well known as some of the the others, but it was odd in Ibsen's opinion. Ibsen was not so completely convinced that the landing of Captain Potter had been an accident or by chance.

It seemed odd that out of the entire hive city to land in that the commanding officer of the newly revealed supporting force would arrive just in time to save a Lieutenant and some Guardsmen. But perhaps it was just luck and chance, perhaps the Emperor had been watching out for Ibsen and his mean and had guided the drop pod, or perhaps it was part of a larger scheme or plan that the somewhat mysterious Space Marines were enacting. Only time would tell, Ibsen decided, and returned his focus back to the march. They were quickly approaching the rendezvous point and Ibsen was slightly nervous.

"Lord Potter, who exactly are we meeting here?"

The Astartes Captain cast his eyes down to Ibsen, who was much shorter. "We are going to gather with the rest of the Forgotten Warriors forces that have been deployed."

While that was somewhat satisfactory for Ibsen it was still not enough.

"And what will my men and I be doing?"

The short reply came back nearly immediately, "You will be returning to the 19th Cadian Regiment."

All of these short and borderline unhelpful responses had only furthered Ibsens curiosity about the Forgotten Warrior Captain. But Ibsen supposed that it did not matter, he and his troops would be safe, and able to recover from the losses they took. Thinking about all of the losses made Ibsen pause for a moment, they had incurred quite a few casualties. Possibly enough to make reinforcements or even a combination of his platoon and other damaged units to get as many units up to full fighting strength as possible.

As they rounded a sharp corner, once again in some sort of hab district Lieutenant Ibsen was suddenly distracted. Neither himself or his men had ever seen an Astartes in real life before the three arrived and saved them, but in an impressive display in front of him must have been at least thirty of the massive warriors. Most were stationed around the perimeter of the open plaza where three Thunderhawk gunships had landed, and some were assisting or directing servitors or human serfs.

Both Lieutenant Ibsen and his men felt awed by the impressive display before them. As their group approached, being led by Captain Potter they were greeted and saluted by all the Space Marines that they passed.

Making their way nearer to the middle of the three Thunderhawks near the center of the plaza Captain Potter spoke and pointed, "Have your men stay here. Resupply is over there."

Lieutenant Ibsen nodded to his remaining men, about twenty five to thirty Guardsmen, who all saluted and went to the small supply area that the Forgotten Warriors had set up.

Captain Potter was standing at the open entrance to the Thunderhawk and motioned Lieutenant Ibsen inside. This was beginning to further Ibsen's creeping suspicion that he and his men were going to be part of some plot or scheme of the Space Marines.

Once inside the Thunderhawk Captain Potter went to stand near a table with various maps, holograms, and infopics on it's surface. It was a common sight to Lieutenant Ibsen, he had been inside many different war rooms in his many different campaigns with the 19th Cadian. This was the functional HQ of the Forgotten Warriors inside the hive city. Two other Astartes were hunched over the large and tal table, both with the same color and pattern armor that Captain Potter was wearing. One was wearing his helmet while the other had his helmet maglocked to his belt. Both of the Captain's honor guard Space Marines were posted directly outside the Thunderhawk.

Saluting, the Space Marine with his helmet maglocked to his belt spoke first, "Welcome, Captain, Lieutenant. We are here." Pointing at a small plaza on one of the maps, "and the largest concentration of enemy forces that our auspexes picked up is here." Pointing to another location, relatively far away from their current position. "Other main objectives are located here, here, and here." Pointing to three more locations the Marine fell silent.

The second Marine, the one with his helmet still on, had been silently nodding in agreement during the impromptu debriefing of the situation for the Captain.

Captain Potter looked at the maps in front of them, silently contemplating. "We will dissolve this HQ shortly and move on to the first objective."

Lieutenant Ibsen spoke up, "What is our first objective, and how can my men serve?"

All three of the Forgotten Warriors turned to face him, the Marine with his helmet still on looking at Ibsen for the first time. He seemed intimidating, but in a different manner than the cold battle prowess that Captain Potter obviously possessed. This Marine had been silent, and he was now towering over Ibsen, the mortal's eyes locked with the glowing red eye's of the Marines helmet.

"You will be escorted to the Imperial Guard HQ. It is slightly past our main objective."

Lieutenant Ibsen nodded in response, he was still slightly awed being in such impressive company, and even though he realized that the captain had not answered his first question he was content. He would be returning back to relative safety and that was good enough for him. While he did wish to return and smash the enemy he knew that it would be impossible to be in combat very long with his troops and supplies as they currently were.

"Gather the troops. Sarno, your squad will remain here." The imposing Marine with his helmet on, now identified as 'Sarno' nodded his head. "Ansel you will be with me and my men." The Marine without his helmet nodded.

Captain Potter nodded, and both other Marines recognized the dismissal. Making the sign of the Aquila as they exited the interior of the Tunderhawk Lieutenant Ibsen was left with Captain Potter.

"We'll be moving out shortly."

The main objective that the Captain had been speaking about had turned out to be one of the last remaining hab blocks that was still standing and largely undamaged. Inside the hab buildings it was suspected that hundreds, if not a thousand or two of the enemy were taking shelter. While an orbital bombardment of the position was possible Captain Potter himself had denied the request for orbital bombardment. He had some sort of plan, whether it was to simply gauge the strength of the enemy, uncover some intelligence or secrets that the enemy held, or some unknown reason.

It would not be a very difficult or dangerous mission for the Forgotten Warriors, but it would be significantly more dangerous for the Guardsmen.

The Guardsmen were set up in a protected position, near Captain Potter. With a fireteam of five or six Marines on each flank and the captains honor guard standing with the Guardsmen everyone felt confident. Lieutenant Ibsen knew that they were horribly horribly outnumbered, but the enemy was so severely outclassed that the numbers were simply voided. The Astartes' equipment they had brought was so incredibly above the weaponry and equipment of the enemy. Clubs and rocks would be completely useless against ceramite and bolter rounds. The Astartes would be a cement wall and the heretics would be a wave breaking upon it.

But Ibsen was still worried. He could think of no good reason why his men would be included in this mission, unless they were truly just auxiliary troops. The grim look that was now present on Captain Potter's face was also worrying Ibsen.

The Space Marines had finished setting themselves up and preparing their positions for the coming battle. It was now nighttime, but the various fires and street lighting that still operated created a suitable environment for Ibsen and his men to fight in. The darkness would not bother the Astartes at all, and it would also likely hurt the heretic and rioters that they would soon be facing.

Over the vox Captain Potter could be heard, "Ready yourselves. The enemy does not yet know we are here, but they will soon. You all know your duty."

Raising his bolt pistol and squeezing the trigger the first shot was fired directly into the window of one of the hab buildings. The bolters and heavy bolters of the Astartes and Imperial Guard opened fire into the buildings. While the lasguns of the regular Guardsmen would be ineffective until the heretics charged, the bolters were quite effective. Passing through the hab block and detonating and killing targets inside of the hab blocks.

Ibsen caught a glance from Captain Potter, but could not tell if it was a cold glance, or if Potter was simply scanning the troops.

By now the heretics had begun filing out of the hab blocks in massive numbers. The Guardsmen began firing their lasrifles into the mass, felling more and more heretics as each second went by. The heretics were being killed as soon as they were being seen, but they began advancing very slowly. Each foot they gained was bought with their blood, slick black blood was running freely through the street.

The mob had not quite made it half of the distance between the hab buildings and the Space Marines position when everything had began to go wrong.

From the middle of the roiling mass, near to the hab buildings, a sickly purple aura began to build. The bolters of the Marines and Captain Potter had fallen silent, as Lieutenant Ibsen now noticed. In fact, he had been so preoccupied with slaying the cultists that he had not realized that the Space Marines were no longer at his immediate side. The bolters had not stopped until very recently, the Marines had still been killing large amounts of the heretics, but they had at some point retreated back.

Lieutenant Ibsen was now very worried, in fact he was very nearly panicking. Without the Space Marines then he and his men stood no chance against the mob of heretics. But that was to be the least of their worries, as the curling purple aura began to condense. The aura was sickly and brought intense feelings of death and discord. As the sickly aura condensed one last time it was suddenly released from its invisible tethers and sped towards the Guardsmen.

As the bolt of purple energy slammed it's way across the gap and hit home in the middle of the Guardsmen. Immediately the flesh was seared off of the nearest two troopers, with the other men of the squad being intensely burned. Within seconds everyone of the Imperial Guardsmen had died, included Lieutenant Ibsen himself. He had no time for last words or actions, as was the same with all of his men. Their deaths had been sudden and violent.

Standing a couple streets back Captain Potter clicked his vox 'on' twice. It was the signal to the rest of his battle brothers that the greater forces of Chaos were indeed present in the hive city. This would pose a larger problem, and was the reason the Forgotten Warriors were present. They were there to identify, flush out, and ultimately eliminate the greater forces of Chaos.

As his troops heard the signal over the vox they moved in on the mob. Now that the Guardsmen had been killed by some sort of Chaos sorcery the battle was complicated. This did not matter much to Captain Potter, The Forgotten Warriors came swinging in from both flanks of the mob, with Captain Potter and the two members of his honorguard creating a sufficient defensive front. While the two fireteams smashed into the mass of heretics.

The Space Marines made short work of the engagement, but it soon became obvious that among the corpses and the river of blood flowing through the street that all of the bodies were the same. None of them were special, none of them were marked as an agent of Chaos that would have had any sorcerous powers. So whoever or whatever had vaporized the Guardsmen and the Lieutenant had escaped the slaughter that the Space Marines had brought down so swiftly.

This confirmation of his fears was unsettling for Captain Potter, he had suspected rather strongly that the greater forces of Chaos were present. That was truly why he had brought Lieutenant Ibsen and his soldiers along. They had genuinely been a benefit during the short engagement, until the Marines had pulled back and allowed the sorcery to do it's grim job. While some people would condemn Captain Potter and his methods in this instance, it was undoubtable confirmation of the presence of Chaos and it's corrupting influence on the Hive world.

Turning his cold gaze onto the burning pile of the heretics corpses Captain Potter sighed slightly. This would likely be another hard campaign for the Forgotten Warriors. And the Forgotten Warriors could not sustain too many more harsh campaigns.

Let me know what y'all think. A slight teaser for my next story… the title is "How a Roman Should Die"