Chapter 13
Visions
As the Alliance/Imperium fleet arrived at the rendezvous point Admiral Halos could only stare out at the mass of warships in awe, dominating the view were three Emperor-class and four Retribution-class Battleships, their hundreds of plasma and lance batteries sticking out of their intimidating forms like sharpened spines, forming up around them were dozens of Cruiser class warships including Dictator, Lunar, Avenger and Exorcist-classes, ranging from 6 to 9km in length, these smaller ships were no less intimidating, if that wasn't impressive enough there were swarms of smaller escorts including Dauntless, Sword, Firestorm and Cobra-classes that ranged in size from 500m to the size of an Imperial Star Destroyer.
However more ships were still arriving, in the distance the intimidating silhouettes of three ancient Mars-class Battlecruisers and twenty more Cobras and Swords jumped in from the warp.
"It appears that Helios could assemble more ships than we thought" Rosso said in awe at the hundreds of warships that were swarming into formation "Incredible show of strength"
"Admiral" Magi started "You and your ships will make the rearguard of our force, stay with my ship and provide artillery fire"
"Understood Magi" Halos replied "What can you tell me about the Tyranids?"
"They are a deadly menace to this galaxy Admiral" the Magi said "I have fought these creatures many times and I can assure you they are an extragalactic plague that do nothing but murder billions and rape worlds of all life"
"So those colonies that you lost contact with…" Captain Mynn started before going silent.
"It is likely that they are nothing more than lifeless lumps of rock" the Magi said "Purged of all life by their Leviathan Hive-ships"
"How long until they arrive" Captain Severi asked.
"Our scouts report that they're three hours out" Durin answered "We plan to let them come to us and then bombard them with our lances"
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In the few hours before the arrival of what the Magi had called the Great Devourer Master Sabbath had decided to train Alana in a few more force abilities, at the moment Alana was trying to meditate, and failing miserably.
"Relax my apprentice" Gabriel said with a smile as he looked up from his datapad "To meditate properly you must clear your mind of any distractions and know patience, to find a peaceful flow within yourself…through force meditation you can see many things, the future, the past, old friends long gone"
"Yes master" Alana replied as she opened her grey eyes "I sense something but can't pinpoint it"
"Don't try and force yourself Alana" Gabriel cautioned "Clear your mind and relax, the force is always with you, a whisper in the back of your mind…can you hear it?"
"Yes master" Alana replied after a moment, her body and her youthful features relaxed, she heard the force, a quiet whisper in the back of her mind and as she relaxed further into its flow the whisper got louder, Alana lost track of time, of her surroundings, all that she felt was the soft, comforting light of the force surrounding and encompassing her.
She opened her eyes to find that she was no longer within Master Sabbath's living quarters but in a massive chamber, the walls were made of grey stone with towering, thick pillars on either side of the passage, holding up the high stone ceiling, on either side of the chamber were statues, their features long decayed, she blinked and found herself in the centre of the chamber.
The sound of maniacal laughter made her cringe and hesitantly she turned to the source, she nearly screamed in fear as four Dark Eldar Incubi warriors ran into the chamber and rushed right through her, feeling sick she spun around to see them rushing towards the silhouette of a person, his figure hidden in long black robes.
As the Incubi made the final stride towards him their blades sliced through black mist instead of a solid body, the person reappeared right beside her, he wore a mask that was coloured bronze and silver with a T-shaped black visor, he placed his hands against his hips pulling back the robes to reveal armour coloured bronze, silver and black, with the hilt of a lightsabre clipped to his waste.
Alana could only gasp at the figure, was he a Jedi? What was he doing here? As far as she knew Master Sabbath was the only Jedi within this galaxy, the Incubi charged towards the intimidating figure, blades ready to strike.
Without a sound the mysterious Jedi raised his hands in the shapes of claws and long blue bolts of lightning shot from his black gloved fingers, smashing and encompassing the lead Eldar, the raider's body shuddered before he fell to the floor, his armoured form steaming.
The Jedi drew his lightsabre and activated it, a crimson red blade shimmering into existence that made Alana shudder, many innocents and Jedi had fallen to that weapon. As the Eldar raiders came within metres of him the Dark Jedi jumped at them, corkscrewing unnaturally in midair as he went and stabbed one of the Eldar in the chest, he then pulled the weapon clear and in a flash of movement spun around cutting into the abdomen of the second Incubi before meeting the power sword of the third.
He spun deflecting the quick strikes of the Eldar before in a movement to swift to see he decapitated the last warrior. He deactivated his weapon and stalked towards her, she backed away as he came closer, but instead of bumping into her he passed right through her, thousands of years of life and knowledge flowed through her with him and along with those thousands of years of experience came a name.
…Darth Revan…
She spun around to see his retreating back, his lightsabre reactivating as he stalked towards another group of Dark Eldar warriors, he weaved his lightsabre deflecting the splinter rounds and suddenly everything went black.
Alana awoke with a shudder to see Gabriel shaking her "Alana, are you alright?"
"Yes master" she breathed "I…I touched the force, I was in the force"
"Incredible" Gabriel said as he sat down beside her, a mystified smile on his face "You have perfected meditation on your first go"
"Master I had a vision" Alana said "But I don't know whether it's past, future or even important"
"What did you see?" Gabriel asked, his face turning serious.
Alana took a deep breath and closed her eyes, she could still see the temple vividly in her mind "I was in a temple of grey stone, Dark Eldar Incubi were fighting a warrior dressed in black, and I heard his name through the force…Darth Revan"
"Impossible" Gabriel said calmly "Darth Revan lived over three thousand years ago"
"I'm just telling you what I saw master" Alana said quietly before yawning.
"We'll look into this later Alana" Gabriel said, managing a small smile "Why don't you get some sleep"
The young girl nodded and walked into her room, as the door closed Gabriel moved back to his table, this vision may be important but for know there was a more pressing threat, picking up his datapad he surveyed the information on the Tyranids and growled frustratingly.
So far only four forms of Tyranid ships were known, the largest being what was named Leviathan-class Hiveships, monstrous ships similar to marine squids in appearance that were said to be the same size if not bigger than an Imperium Battleship, next in line was the Razorfiend-class Cruiser, considerably smaller but no less deadly, shaped like manta rays, these craft were about the size of an Imperial Cruiser, next was the smaller Stalker and Prowler-class Droneships, small escort sized monsters that the Jedi guessed were comparable to Imperium Cobras and Swords.
Besides their given names and descriptions Gabriel knew very little about them, anywhere where important information on these living ships was needed there was only a blank and the Jedi mentally cursed the stupidity of those who wrote these descriptions.
What are their manoeuvring and combat capabilities? Gabriel thought frustratingly as he continued to scan the information Are their weapons long ranged? Do they even have weapons? How many creatures do these things carry?
The sudden sound of alarm blares signalled that the Tyranids had arrived, from his viewport Gabriel could see the gun batteries of the Vengeance open up with every long ranged weapon she had. As the Jedi rose to his feet and rushed out of his quarters he guessed that he would have answers to his questions in one form or another.
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Halos ordered the view screens to maximum zoom and saw the massive fleet of Tyranid ships which were an intimidating sight, reminding him of the Yuuzhan Vong fleets that he had fought barely a year before. The hiveships were the first things to take shape in the distance followed by the specks of hundreds of support craft. As more and more ships began to appear out of the dark void of space the Admiral could only gape at how many there were, hundreds, maybe thousands of living monsters soared across the darkness towards the Imperium and Alliance battle line, as they got closer he only thanked the force that they would meet this swarm in deep space, lightyears away from the nearest inhabited planet.
It was a half hour later before the Tyranids came within weapons range but when they did the Imperium unleashed a withering salvo of firepower, thousands of beams of lance energy streamed out of the hundreds of warships tearing dozens of droneships and Razorfiends fell under the withering barrage.
"Order all Battleships to pick their targets" Durin ordered "One shot each aimed for a Razorfiends" he waited for a few more minutes before at least nine of the living warships were in range "And fire!!!"
The space around the battleships lit up with yellow light as the Battleships fired their Nova Cannons, the powerful shells zoomed across space before colliding with the cruisers and exploding in blinding flashes of light, Halos and all of his captains winced under the near blinding light.
"Incredible" Florn said in disbelief "What in the force was that!?"
"That captain was our Nova Cannons" Inquisitor Vallace said with a fiendish smile "Anti-ship weapons specially made to take out larger capital ships"
A second round of shells fired from the battleships finishing of the already badly damaged hiveships, the nine targeted Razorfiends were blown apart in blinding flashes of light.
Even with the withering barrage the Tyranid ships were pushing forward, for every vessel that was destroyed by the concentrated fire another three took its place as they slugged their way through space, slowly closing the distance between them and the metal ships firing continuously at them.
As they got closer the living ships opened fire with their guns, at first Halos thought they were normal explosive blasts but as they got closer he saw that the salvos were spherical shaped.
"Inquisitor" Halos asked as he zoomed a view screen "What are they?"
The Inquisitor scanned the projectiles and her eyes widened in horror "Shot them down" she said, fear evident in her voice "Shot them down!"
"What are they?"
"Those are surgical transports" she said "Within are a shock force of Tyranid warriors, they drill into the strongest hulls and unleash their payload of creatures"
"Enough said" Halos said "Scramble the fighters, order them to target the pods and destroy them, contact the Magi and tell him to do the same!"
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The swarms of starfighters flew out of the belly hangers of the Star Destroyers; at the lead was Colonel Rachel Wern, a Corellian and leader of Redsun Squadron. She led her assortment of X-wings and Tie Interceptors through the maelstrom dodging the major engagements between Imperium Thunderhawks and Tyranid drones before spotting the pods, sickening spheres that reminded her of Yuuzhan Vong transports.
"Redsun leader to Redsun flight" Rachel said "Form up into your groups and choose your targets, we need to get as many of them as we can, avoid major skirmishes unless you need to"
She then banked her X-Wing sharply behind the nearest sphere and targeting it let lose a salvo of red laserfire, the red shards collided with the transport searing through its stone plated hull, it exploded in a burst of fire. Her smile was cut short as the Tyranid warrior smashed into her shields, trying desperately to cut through to her canopy, the large monster didn't get the chance as it was vaporised against the shields.
She let out a ragged breath and hit off the proximity alarm before turning her comlink to the squad frequency "Watch out for backlash, my shields are almost gone!"
"We got ya cap" Redsun two said over the frequency as he and three flew in close to her creating a shield trio.
This type of close flight was developed by the Jedi during the Yuuzhan Vong Wars, designed to strengthen the shielding and concentrate fire on a single target, the shields of the three fighters would overlap and strengthen their defence, Rachel didn't agree with all of the Jedi's decisions but admitted that they made brilliant battle plans.
Together Rachel and her companions formed up into a shield trio and targeted the next sphere, the front two X-Wings opened fire with their laser cannons riddling the Tyranid pod with laserfire before watching it explode.
The colonel took the moments peace to look at what was happening around her, thousands of starfighters and Tyranid skirmished for as far as the eyes could see, the Tyranid warships were close enough to fire their short ranged weapons including Bio-plasma cannons and organic torpedoes, a dozen Swords and Cobras were blown apart and a Dictator cruiser, its bridge section smoking from several direct hits drifted out of the battle line, dozens of secondary fires started to appear on her hull. The Emperors Fire, the Alliance ships firing continuously from the protection of the larger ships void shields started to back away from the fast approaching bioships, a few of her escorts following suit, firing everything they had.
"Break, break, break"
Rachel broke her gaze off what was around her and instinctively spun away from her wing mates, they in turn broke from their defensive trio just in time as a small swarm of Tyranid fighters fell upon where they once were and broke off in pursuit, Rachel dived sharply, feeling the g-force of the tight turn before the dampeners kicked in a moment late.
The Tyranid drones continued pursuit firing continuously with their bio-plasma cannons, she started executing sharp turns to dodge the salvos of plasma but the odd shot hit of her shields weakening them further, the next shot could break the shield and cripple her little fighter.
A devastating barrage of red laserfire met the Tyranid drones turning several of them to balls of fire, the remaining living monsters broke off pursuit, her squad mates had just saved her.
She scanned her ships radar searching for the pods but they were nowhere to be seen, they had passed her "Vigilance we have taken out seven pods but the others have slipped past us!"
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"Fire short range weapons" Halos called as the surviving pods appeared on the screen, out of the hundreds of surviving pods a dozen of them were aimed for his ships "All troopers first alert, Master Sabbath they could use a Jedi's leadership!"
The Jedi master nodded and ran out of the bridge with almost supernatural speed.
He caught a brief twitch from the Inquisitors mouth and smiled "You wish to join the defence?"
"If you'll let me" she replied.
"I'm sure that master Sabbath will welcome your experience in battle against these creatures" Halos replied "He'd be gathering forces in the main hanger bay"
With a brief nod to Halos and Florn Inquisitor Vallace spun on her heel and stalked out of the bridge.
"Shot 'em down" Florn shouted as the pods came ever closer "Bring us hard to port, maybe we can get out of their way"
The Alliance warships immediately began executing turns, trying to get away from the transport pods but the Vigilance turned to late, half of the pods were vaporised against the shields but a few managed to get through and started drilling through the Star Destroyers armoured hull.
Halos steadily checked the power pack of his blaster pistol "Send response teams to the following points"
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"You with me" Vallace ordered to the squad of Stormtroopers before stalking past them down the corridor, she entered the turbolift and waiting for the soldiers to follow her in before hitting the button to the furthest down floor.
She lead her requisitioned squad down another corridor and stopped dead when she heard something smash against the outer side of the left wall, she stepped back, falling into a defensive stance with her power sword, the Stormtroopers hesitantly following suit, raising their blaster rifles towards the wall.
The pod broke through the durasteel wall and unleashed a small swarm of Tyranid Gaunts and a warrior, standing at least 5m tall it found the corridor a tight squeeze, the Stormtroopers rushed out in front of the Inquisitor, shielding their charge and spraying the Gaunts with blaster bolts, Robyn admired these men, they reminded her of Imperial Guard except they had the discipline of the Space Marines, a very dangerous concept.
They managed to down all of the Gaunts before the warrior righted itself and used its scythe like claws to rip through her protectors, blood spattered onto the walls and the floor as the Stormtroopers were torn to pieces, return fire bounced of the monsters armoured scales.
Robyn charged forward, her fifty years of experience as a Sister of Battle kicking in, she swung her power sword slicing of one of the warriors claws, it screeched in pain before spurting acid from its adrenal glands, the Inquisitor jumped away but the small spray caught her sword arm, acid flowed onto her clothes and she screamed in agony before being hit by the warriors whip like tail, she flew backwards and crashed into an unyielding durasteel wall.
Blood dribbled down her mouth as the acid began to burn through her robes, she quickly disposed of them and looked up to see the warrior, blood covering its remaining scythe claw and spatter on his scales. Time seemed to go slow as it approached her, its black, lifeless eyes starring mercilessly at her and then it charged.
In the next chapter the Tyranid shock troops come face to face with the Alliance soldiers, how much damage can they bring and what will happen to Inquisitor Vallace, and how will the main battle go? And if you are a little confused by the vision don't worry all will be revealed in time, fans of Revan prepare, Keep watching for the next chapter…Kraken!, oh and reviews please!!!