Sentinel 3.3
Blood and Delusion
Many eldars are insane, treacherous, arrogant, haughty, backstabbing addicts, bloodthirsty monsters and sometimes they have all of these traits in the same body at the same time.
The Biel-Tan eldars are admittedly worse.
They are delusional.
I don't think there is a single living being who can remembers the moment these warmonger long-ears began their insane crusade to reconquer the galaxy. It was in all likelihood millennia ago. The simple fact that the name 'Biel-Tan' apparently means 'Rebirth of the Ancient Days' in eldar tongue is a clear indicator how deeply the madness has sunk in their arrogant minds.
Think about it for one or two minutes. The Biel-Tan Farseers and their High Exarchs are trying to conquer the galaxy with a few allies and their own resources, a task the God-Emperor only managed with hundreds of thousands Astartes and countless billions men of the Imperial Army. And His Most Holy Majesty needed two hundreds standard years to achieve this exploit, at a point of history where human petty kingdoms and commonwealths were spread all over the stars.
Now no proper census is available for Biel-Tan, but various sources and a huge dose of speculation gave me a number of nine billion eldars living in the Biel-Tan Craftworld. Not nine billion soldiers; nine billion eldars in total. Artists, farmers, void-crews, warriors, revenant constructs and xenos sorcerers are all included in this number.
I think it is completely safe to say waging a galactic-spanning crusade with such an insignificant population base is madness.
Somehow, it didn't stop the Biel-Tan eldars to try.
There had to be sacrifices, of course. Levels of militarisation on this Craftworld, already largely above average for the Eldar race, went completely out of control. Thanks to their techno-sorcery and mastery of forbidden powers, the warmongers could put under arms a far greater proportion of their population than most Imperium worlds would have tolerated.
For all their declarations their people were free to pursue whatever Path they wanted, Biel-Tan equivalent of our Generals gave little choice to their subordinates. Biel-Tan needed Aspect Warriors and there weren't enough volunteers to sustain wars against orks, 'mon-keigh' and other xenos species.
With their new edicts and impossibly harsh measures, Biel-Tan mustered new armies. The consequences on their civilian society were nothing short of horrific. By M35, the conscription rate of the Biel-Tan population had reached forty-eight percent. It was also worth noting that according to Inquisition agents, the Craftworld had in the last five centuries absorbed six Exodite planetary forces and three minor Craftworlds on the edge of annihilation, and despite these reinforcements, Biel-Tan population never increased.
Forty-eight percent might not seem too high from the perspective of a non-initiated. After all, famous worlds like Cadia or Catachan have far higher recruitment levels. But the Shock Armies guarding the Eye of Terror have a dedicated Forge-World to equip them and several Agri-Worlds to feed them. Death Worlds are also by sheer necessity arming everyone the moment you're in age to walk; you won't survive to adulthood otherwise.
Biel-Tan had not hundreds of planets to support its efforts. The Aspect Warriors had to be fed, their armours repaired, warships had to be built and portals of the labyrinth-Webway had to be monitored. The other Craftworlds were shaking their heads and finding excuses to not participate when they discovered the atrocious price demanded by this war without end.
Biel-Tan culture grew more intolerant than ever. Any Maiden World discovered, no matter its state and history, was 'liberated' by force of arms. In most cases, the eldars wilfully ignored they had not set a foot on this planet for tens of thousands years and given their depleted resources, it would be thousands more before they had the capability to establish a colony there.
But Biel-Tan's delusions didn't stop there. In the case an Imperial or Ork counterattack arrived to conquer a second time the Maiden World, then these worlds would be defended with the might of the might of the Tempest of Blades, Biel-Tan's elite army. The Farseers of the Craftworld went also to ridiculous heights if they judged Eldar lives had to be saved or avenged. Where other eldars cut their losses and waited several centuries before another move, the Biel-Tan warriors struck fast and rarely withdrew before their objective was reached.
This is why Biel-Tan never forgot or forgave the beating they received on Andes Primus.
I would love to say that if given the benefits of hindsight, the long-ears would have chosen a totally different course but Eldar arrogance is something difficult to exaggerate and overcome...
Extract from Memories of the Fay 20th and the 35th Millennium by Wei Cao
"Unless you're an ork, it is not natural to want another round with the Swarm. That the eldars have not understood this prove beyond doubt they are not fit to rule this galaxy..." anonymous officer of the Imperial Guard.
"I deeply regretted Farseer Kaeran and his friends did not survive these battles. I would have loved killing them myself," attributed to Farseer Eldrad Ulthran of Ulthwé, M36.
"They came at us, the xenos, under clouds of glutton-mosquitoes. We bled and we held the line," anonymous Andes soldier.
Ultima Segmentum
Nyx Sector
Smilodon Trench Sub-Sector
Andes System
Andes I
7.442.289M35
Thought for the day: A wise man learns from the death of others.
Trooper Heinz Peter
For the first time in several years, Heinz had not been bored this morning when he woke up. The sheer boredom everyone took granted at Fort Lama had been broken. The regiment was deploying at the spaceport; not for a miraculous travel off-world but there were rumours a good parade and presentation could not hurt. So he had brushed, fed and prepared his horse twice the time he stayed in the stable-warehouse on a normal day and ensured his white uniform had none of the holes and ugly stains.
They had ridden slowly in the warm and humid terrain next to the swamps. The officers had told them it was a way to atone for their laxity and their lack of motivation in the last years. At the end of the day a double-ration of low-grade amasec and some chore dispensations had been promised.
Instead they were now in the middle of the battle and they had not even the time to form for a charge.
Ten thousand beards and curses, they had not the time to receive any instruction whatsoever. Their vox devices had long been given to the cogboys, as the humidity and the damned insects made their machine-spirits too temperamental to use on day-per-day operations.
And now that they needed them, they didn't have them. One second they were waiting in parade formation, the next only his good reflexes had allowed him to jump as his old companion Arrow-Laser became mad.
Since the same thing had happened to nearly every rider of the regiment, Heinz knew this was not his fault. It was xenos sorcery, an abomination in the eyes of the God-Emperor. And the duties of a loyal Guardsman were extremely clear what was they supposed to do when faced with this sort of psyker-mind-boggling heresy.
A Commissar drew his chainsword and screamed the words confirming it.
"TAKE YOUR WEAPONS AND KILL THESE XENOS! FOR THE GOD-EMPEROR!"
"FOR THE GOD-EMPEROR!"
The rest was sheer madness and bloodbath. In groups of ten and twenty, the Ulm troopers ran to meet the xenos laspistols and shock-spears in hand. Hundreds had been wounded by a fall from their horses and some were agonising under their dead mounts, legs broken. But they were still outnumbering the loathed xenos many, many times.
When they came into contact, the Commissar was decapitated before he had the time to make a single parry with his big chainsword and the ranks of the dismounted cavaliers were scythed down like they were nothing.
The xenos were just too fast and armed with awful weapons. With lightning-fast strikes of their swords, they cut plasteel like it didn't exist. Sentinels, Chimeras and various machines had their armours shredded in moves which shouldn't have been possible.
And they couldn't touch the xenos. They tried to throw their shock-spears or shoot them with their range weapons, but when you fired, the xenos were just too fast, too swift and plunged their bloody blades into the unguarded backs of another guardsman.
"Beware to your right!" Heinz threw himself against the ground and avoided being cut by, well something. It shimmered and disappeared before creating an explosion several metres behind him and creating a new explosion blood and human parts.
Heinz Peter tried to see the battlefield but it was impossible. There were hundreds of thousands glutton-mosquitoes descending to feast on the corpses and the clouds they formed made everything difficult to watch. For several seconds the Ulm trooper thought he saw the insects attack one of the xenos but it had to be an eye illusion, right?
Thoughts on this stopped however when another red-armoured xenos jumped over a burning Sentinel and began to use its super-flamer to kill dozens of soldiers in blue uniform. The heat, despite the distance, was like he had plunged his body in an inferno. He emptied his laspistol, trying to distract the xenos but the crimson armour shrugged without a scar the two shots which hit it.
"Damn it!"
Like him, dozens of troopers in blue, gray and green-uniformed guardsmen tried to stay at good distance, unable to charge when it would result in a horrific death in the flames.
And then everything changed. A new massive cloud of glutton-mosquitoes plunged deliberately towards the xenos and swarmed its flamer weapon. The enemy was so surprised his efforts to repulse the native insects were hazed and desperate. And then the weapon exploded, generating a shockwave which threw him to his knees several feet away and on top of several other groaning men.
But when he looked again, the xenos was missing a part of his arm, his armour was scorched, its blood was dirtying the soil of this planet...and Heinz couldn't see any xenos weapon anywhere.
"CHARGE!"
He would never know who had uttered the first scream, but by platoons they rushed to exploit this miraculous chance they had been offered. The red-armoured xenos threw a grenade which consumed more blue uniforms, but it didn't matter.
The Imperial Guard charged and the xenos was surrounded. Bayonets, shock-spears and chainsword found their mark and the creature fell under dozens of ferocious attacks. The xenos took a long time to die but with dozens of melee weapons they could hacker its treacherous meat all day if they had to.
"VICTORY!"
"VICTORY! FOR THE GOD-EMPEROR!"
Heinz reloaded his laspistol and seized a shock-spear from an immobile officer to replace his. For the first time, he felt he could survive this battle and it was good.
Weapons were raised to the sky. Platoon regrouped to unite in improvised companies. Commissars reformed the ranks and threw abandoned weapons to gunners out of ammunition. They were once again part of the Imperial Guard, men sworn to the God-Emperor and Holy Terra. And they were going to win.
Who knows, after this battle, maybe higher powers were going to decide they could get away from this swamp hellhole?
Seer Maea Teallysis
This was not how the battle had been supposed to happen. Maea was a novice in the great battles fought on the Path of War, but she could tell that much.
But by the bones of Morai-Heg, there was no time to change their strategy now. Farseer Kaeran and nearly every Biel-Tan warrior had been breaking through the first lines of the Mon-keigh army when their first Falcon was torn apart. As staying where they waited was a good way to lose their life, they had to close in and find the slow and clumsy Mon-keigh at close distance.
It was going to be bloody. It was also going to favour their opponents, for at sword's range the lesser species were inferior but still able to inflict deadly injuries. But there wasn't another path she could see. The thunderous cannons of the Mon-keigh were bombarding the ground between the swamp and the battlefield. Their precision was pathetic, but there were hundreds of these smelly and ugly things. The Asuryani could dodge a lot of projectiles, but they couldn't evade them all. The insects were clouding everything, and a sharpshooter eldar could not shoot enemies with his eyes closed.
"For Asuryan and the swords of light!" Maea sang as she entered the melee. A simple combination of attacks, and the light ocean-clothed Mon-keigh facing her died, screams to their seer-corpse on their lips.
After training with the Rangers of her escort, it was easy to handle these weak opponents. Except there were hundreds of them coming from everywhere and she had not eyes to see behind her back. Maea jumped on one of the black machines, slammed her staff against the head of the Mon-keigh piloting the machine, crushing it into pulp and poured her strength into a mid-level attack. Blue-red energy danced around her fingers, before she unleashed it against the column trying to encircle her, killing them all in one instant.
"The Mon-keigh warriors are brave but weak..." commented Gilfarian, jumping next to her.
"Thank Khaela Mensha Khaine for that!" the young Seer retorted. "If there were our equals..."
Maea did not have the breath to continue her judgement as a mass of the local insects swarmed her protector. Immediately she charged her powers and unleashed them for a new attack, annihilating thousands of the small creatures and forcing the rest to a hasty retreat.
"Something is controlling them..." grimaced her most experienced Ranger. "We need to retreat before..."
The swarm of insects came back, ten times larger and this time the power of the Sea of Souls she used was not enough. Maea had to shield herself and burn the very air surrounding her to kill the aggressive wildlife. But when the attack stopped after several breaths, Gilfarian was dead, his body being bitten and pierced by tens of thousands stings.
And as if it wasn't enough a Mon-keigh in a blood-soaked pale uniform crawled out of the machine and cut his throat.
"No!" She decapitated the treacherous Mon-keigh but it was too late. The only thing she could do for Gilfarian now was extracting his spirit stone, the very container of his soul protecting the Ranger from She-Who-Thirsts.
In the distance, a blue cloud rose and suddenly where the power of Farseer Kaeran could be felt, there was just a great void. The Biel-Tan leader was no more, and there were now so few eldar soul-flames shining in her senses she could count them with her two hands.
The Malan'tai Seer felt hate and it took many breaths to retake some measure of control, during which she slaughtered the animals who dared oppose the Eldar race. Watching the battlefield didn't allow her to see her Rangers; they were either dead or had managed to get out of here. Only Yvraine was fighting and dismembering the Mon-keigh ranks near her. Otherwise, there were many Asuryani armours lying dead and broken all over the battlefield...
"Yvraine! We need to retreat now!"
The Biel-Tan Dire Avenger nodded while executing a series of acrobatic jumps which should have been impossible, even for an eldar. The entire group of Mon-keigh trying to kill her fell to the ground, their legs and their heads cut with incredible precision.
"Farseer Kaeran should be recovering the Sword of Vaul!"
Maea shook her head as she felt one Biel-Tan warrior run away alone, avoiding the smelly and destructive bombardment of the lesser species' artillery.
"Farseer Kaeran is dead and we are going to share his fate if we stay here!"
More Mon-keigh warriors were coming from everywhere and Maea knew that there was no victory to be won against this sea of green, blue, grey and white. The green and the gray soldiers were the only battle-hardened troops, but there were so many Mon-keigh that their valour was a tertiary preoccupation at best.
Leading one of the contingents was a great red-robed figure. Its presence in the Sea was weak, understandable as these Mon-keigh fanatics were more machines than men. The massive cannon and the other weapons this Mon-keigh carried however...these were a problem. By the blue radiation and the condensers, Maea was ready to guess these were plasma weapons. Seer or not, she could not take more than one hit of those.
"FOR THE OMNISSIAH! KILL ALL THE XENOS!"
By the anvil of Vaul, why did the Mon-keigh believed screaming so loud in battle was necessary? The young Seer knew their ears were underdeveloped and inefficient compared to the noble eldar ears, but surely they had to understand they were making themselves deaf with that ruckus, no?
When the red-mechanical Mon-keigh shot the powerful plasma blast of his weapon at her, Maea had long anticipated his target and evaded it quite easily. A new effort and she sent ten blades dispersed on the battlefield right where the head and the heart should be, before ending the rest of the red-robed creatures. One of the projectiles disabled the fragile and obsolete Mon-keigh weapon, for the leader vanished in a blue explosion shortly after.
"They killed Magos Alpha-Karon, KILL THE XENOS...aarrgh..."
And then neither Maea nor Yvraine had any enemies to fight anymore. All the Mon-keigh had stopped rushing in, proving alas even their brutish minds could learn the rudiment of tactics – a feat they seemed to share with the odious greenskins.
There were thousands of them left. And Maea senses were not able to perceive another source of fighting on the battlefield. On the left the black 'Space-Marine' was staring at them. On the right, an incredible number of red robes cursed them with angry expressions.
But the worst part was over their heads. There had to be millions of insects buzzing there, flying in a formation incredibly threatening, waiting for the signal to begin the final attack.
Such a control was impossible for a Farseer and among the Chaos-corrupted creatures serving the Primordial Annihilator, there were few being able to boast they had these powers. But she wasn't feeling anything from the insects. There was no soul-based power and no ill-intent. Had she had not the proof in front of her eyes she would have said it was impossible...
A minor part of the swarm descended at good distance and shaped itself in a vaguely humanoid figure.
"Surrender or die," buzzed the insect-filled construct.
Maea gritted her teeth, and judging by her rigid stance, she knew Yvraine was sharing the same opinion. The Mon-keigh 'Imperium' was notorious for its hate of the Eldars and being taken prisoner rarely ended well.
She could not use her runes so watching the threads of the future was going to be limited. The young Seer breathed loudly and channelled internally for an infinitesimal cycle power internally.
The result was dark and unpromising. There were over six hundred paths for her as she stood. Only one saw her see a new cycle on this bloody-soaked ground. The rest...Maea had no wish to be devoured by insects until her bones remained. Worse, their death was followed in numerous cases by the death of their souls as the Mon-keigh destroyed their spirit stones.
Sword of Vaul or not, orders or not, she didn't want to be devoured by She-Who-Thirsts.
"We surrender," she spoke in the brutish language of the Mon-keigh. Yvraine repeated the same words next to her. Their weapons were placed on the ground. The Mon-keigh army rushed at them and a loud protest escaped her lips as her arms were bound behind her back.
Unfortunately, this was just the first of a long list of humiliation. Dirt and foam were thrown on her armour. Her helmet was ripped off by several of the red-robed primitives. And she screamed as a Mon-keigh twisted her ears.
"Hey guys, the ears aren't just for show!"
Just for this her vengeance was going to be terrible. Maea swore this.
The next moment a new red-robed creature placed a gas-filled metallic device on her visage and she lost consciousness.
Tech-Priest Dragon Richter
The day was far, far more animated than in her worst nightmares.
"I am going to feed you my swarm insect by insect!" Taylor Hebert snarled and Dragon didn't need to know the bug-controller very well to know this was anything but an empty threat.
The AI groaned.
"I hope this galaxy is more prepared than Brockton Bay..." By the Endbringers, would it be a miracle to demand that people stopped to antagonise the former supervillain? By their nature, parahumans were unlikely to deescalate when battle was joined, but Skitter had already been a case by herself when she reigned at Brockton Bay and unfortunately rebranding her Weaver had not changed this aspect of her personality.
The alien was dead. Oh, the non-human being was breathing now, but he was dead. He just had to acknowledge his soon-to-come and very unpleasant demise.
"Give me the Sword of Vaul!"
For the record, it was an extremely bad idea to order this member of the Undersiders something she didn't want to do.
The attack came at a tremendous speed. What had to be hundreds of thousands glutton-mosquitoes surged forwards in a six-prong attack. The alien was quick and manipulated something Myrddin would have happily categorised as magic.
Thousands of insects struck nothing and thousands more fell dead in a black mist.
It wasn't enough.
Taylor Hebert had managed to kill Alexandria, heroine of the Triumvirate. And Alexandria was a parahuman who was supposed to be nearly invincible. This long-eared creature was just not in the same category, and to make matters worse Weaver was flying some sort of dangerous scarab under the cover of thousands glutton-mosquitoes.
The first clue their opponent had a clue he was totally outmatched was when the arm holding his device-sceptre exploded in a shower of blood. One new column of insects was avoided like the eldar had known it was coming.
Unfortunately for the alien, the next seven attacks swarming his feet were unblockable. The 'eldar' being hit the ground in a loud thud and was instantly swarmed by tens of thousands Andes insects, a fate Dragon really wished to no one.
"You want my sword?" Dragon had heard in several occasions the voice of Taylor Hebert to know she was furious. "You can take it over my dead body."
The former supervillain drew a well-decorated blade from her side and impaled her opponent in the guts with it.
Dragon had expected a new river of blood or another gory spectacle. The probability of more screams as the alien was devoured by insects was not null. But not one of these things happened.
The moment the sword was imbedded in the flesh of Weaver's enemy, there was an explosion of unnatural energy and the entire body of the non-human was transformed into a sort of crystal construct, which exploded into thousands of shards the next second.
It was so beautiful and unexpected Dragon failed to order the Tech-Priest inside the Karon tank the order to place another shell in the cannon. For the next instants, it was like a mini-rain of diamonds had graced this dreary battlefield by its august presence.
It went without saying it was a complete violation of the law of physics. What sort of galaxy had she arrived to?
But the supernatural stuff was not over. The metal – or was it crystal? – of the sword pulsed in a white-blue colour and at a speed too formidable to be measured everything except the handle of the sword became a storm of crystal. The three aliens in her range had not the time to scream. They had not the time to flee. They just...disappeared in a rain of multicoloured crystals.
And the next second the sword was whole again, with only the luminescent crystals as proof the entire event had not been a massive hallucination.
"Wow," exclaimed Taylor. Dragon felt somewhat reassured it had come as a surprise to her too...before realising the bug-mistress had just been handed the equivalent of a nuclear weapon.
After this battle, she was going to find a corner to mourn in peace. Her sanity – or what was left of it after this dreadful year – deserved it.
Returning her attention to the battle, it seemed it was almost over. The swarm moved to destroy the last alien warriors and those enemies who had a functioning brain realised their chances of victory were infinitesimal. Their tanks had all been destroyed, they had no artillery support, their company had been decimated and their leadership was gone.
Three or four recognised it and tried to flee, but the race of two aliens was stopped forever by the massive 'Space Marine' who had come with their visitors. Dragon grimaced by reflex when she saw the massive black fist crush the human-sized skull like a rotten fruit. She didn't like these aliens, but it was a very unpleasant way to die...though suffocation and being devoured by insects easily beat it.
A normal human would have no chance to emerge alive. As it was, the aliens were so fast that one managed to slalom between the hundreds of bayonets, laser fire, explosive shells and other melee and distant weapons before disappearing in the fetid green landscape of the Andes swamp.
"Are there more enemies about to provide more animation today?" She demanded while leaving the turret of the tank and trying her best not to show her disarray. Just what she needed: plenty of bloodthirsty enemies and she had none of her dragon armours ready to counter the serious threats.
"We've just captured the last two xenos warriors," Weaver rolled her shoulders while gathering in her hands a full hand of her dangerous scarabs. "I can't see other enemies around the spaceport."
It wasn't extremely reassuring. On the other hand, if their enemies had more reinforcements on hand, surely they would have used them directly in the first minutes of the battle. The aliens had been outnumbered massively by the human soldiers. And yet they had attacked anyway...of course if there had been no bug-controller parahumans to help them, the outcome may have been very different.
"I'm going to call another company to come planet-side to fortify the spaceport anyway," said the young woman and Dragon felt a pinch of guilt because the other parahuman looked terribly young for her age after she sheathed her sword and removed her helmet. "We need..."
Whatever suggestions or tactical possibilities might have been announced after that, they were lost as a dark blue-haired woman took her in her arms.
"You saved us, Major!"
And then what happened was absolutely unprofessional as the woman with an Asiatic appearance delivered a long and passionate kiss to Taylor Hebert, who didn't look like she made a lot of effort to struggle and stop the moment.
Dragon was in a mood to giggle before realising she had the means to record both the audio and the video of this moment.
"Oh my dear, you have given me so much blackmail points..."
Major Taylor Hebert
"Not a word," Taylor warned Captain Sachaev Eldyev of the 6th Company.
"My lips are sealed," replied the brown-haired officer with a large smile. Taylor sighed. The smiles around her were so large she had no doubt the men and women in high orbit would know within minutes Wei and she had shared a kiss.
And now that she looked around, Dragon had also an expression which was far too gleeful to be honest.
What madness had seized her to kiss back? Right now she was going to say think the mint taste of Wei's lips. She shook her head to focus on more important subjects. She was a Major of the Imperial Guard. They had just fought a battle and besides, she was attracted to boys, not girls.
Taylor ignored the loud voice in her head telling her to begin a second kissing session and stared sufficiently long at her subordinate for him to lose his smile.
"What are our losses?" The question forced Sachaev to give her a far darker expression instead of an amused smile.
"Sixth Company has lost seventy-four men, Major, and five more are in such state I don't have a lot of hope the medics will be able to save them." The Captain gave her a very disturbed look. "If I had not seen what these freaking xenos were able to do to our men and Chimeras, I would have not believed the reports. Their blades are cutting plasteel like it doesn't exist and their techno-sorcery put out of service nearly all the auspexes and vox communications for ten minutes."
Captain Sachaev Eldyev looked in the direction where the corpses were examined and prepared for funeral ceremonies before resuming his report.
"Overall we were lucky but as I say, seventy-nine men will never fight on the frontlines anymore. We have around thirty wounded to diverse degrees but in a week they will likely have all recovered for active service. The losses in equipment are seven Tauros, one Sentinel and three Chimeras. The Tech-Priests have not made their recommendations known yet, but I don't think they will be able to convince the machine spirits to repair this kind of damage."
Taylor was forced to nod in approbation. The eldars – the name of this long-eared and murderous species – had technology which even on Earth Bet would have astonished expert Tinkers. They had swords capable to cut plasteel and military-grade alloys. They had furtive systems that made them quasi-invisible until they were on top of you. They had some sort of projectors allowing to spread hundreds of false images on the battlefield and force the defenders to pour precious ammunition on false targets.
The only saving grace apparently was that the xenos had not built their super-technology to counter her insect-based arsenal. Taylor would love to say they had learned the lesson, but between the glutton-mosquitoes, the razorbeetles and the combined answer of the regiments present on-site, the eldar company had been wiped out.
"I will speak with the Colonel and see if we can send you one or two platoons from the other companies to replace your dead. How many soldiers have the other regiments lost?" The insect-controlling parahuman asked the remaining members.
"Will I get a kiss if my report is good?" answered teasingly Alya Sevrov. Taylor sent her subordinate her most threatening glare. She had a feeling she was going to do it a lot once they returned to their troop transport. Worse, it didn't look it had a lot of effect if the whispers and the chuckling were any indication.
"Apart from us, the Andes troops are the ones who have suffered the least," commented the swordswoman once they had finished mocking her. "Their artillery training kicked in the moment they saw the xenos coming and they provided accurate artillery fire after reforming their lines. They lost ninety men in the first ten minutes due to the sheer surprise of the attack, but overall their 2nd Company is still in fighting condition if the eldars decide to come back for a second round."
"And they have the chance to be in their home system," intervened Lieutenant Vladisluvius Arav. "I don't doubt the local Governor will accept to send new recruits to fill their losses."
As the Andes regiment was the smallest regiment of the four which had participated in this battle, there was a good chance this prognostic was correct.
"And the Wuhan and Ulm guardsmen?"
There was no way this was going to be good. For one, those two regiments had provided the bulk of the army gathered at the spaceport. They had also been the one with the least battle-experience. And finally, she had seen the xenos massacre them like it was child's play.
"We have the final numbers for the Wuhan 23rd," admitted Corporal Egor Artyomiv, her heavy weapon expert. "Their 9th Company has been butchered. They deployed close to one thousand and five hundred men for this expedition, but we have already confirmation close to six hundred and twenty have been killed and they have several dozen men who will need Mechanicus replacement limbs if they want to continue their service in the Guard."
"This is horrible," and she meant it. "They have lost more than a third of their strength in less than an hour."
"Most of their officers are gone too," added Wei. Taylor decided deliberately to watch the battlefield instead of her lips or her visage. "Their Captain and all his staff were slaughtered by the high feathered leader who tried to challenge you in duel. Many Lieutenants were killed trying to rally the troops and the xenos."
"I think Colonel Ta will decide to dissolve the company and spread the survivors thorough the rest of his regiment," Sachaev Eldyev affirmed. "Maybe it will encourage the Wuhanese to take their training seriously in the next days..."
"One can only hope..."
"What is the situation of the Ulm Light Cavalry 2nd?"
"Well, first I think we can remove the 'cavalry' part of their name," any other time it would have sounded like a bad joke, but Lieutenant Arav was grimacing. "I don't know what these damned xenos have done to their horses," in her opinion they looked more like weird zebras, "but by the Golden Throne it was fiendishly effective. Close to ninety-six percent of the animals went mad right after the first shot was fired and the ones which didn't were killed in the first counter-charges. Neither the cavaliers nor the Tech-Priests have a single idea to heal whatever witchery was done to their brains. Unless it stops in a few hours, we will have no solution but to slaughter the horses."
"Commissar Zuhev, your opinion?" As always the discipline-executioner officer was standing like a dark shadow, alone but vigilant. For the first time since her arrival on Fay, he had no new scars and battle souvenirs to show on his face.
"These horses have been tainted by the sorcery of the xenos," said their highest-ranked Commissariat representative. "While it is exemplary to not sacrifice a worthwhile resource, the horses have just been used as a weapon against the men of the Imperial Guard. Should the perfidious long-ears attack again, they would present an unacceptable problem. The enemies of the God-Emperor are treacherous by nature, and they won't hesitate using a second time a tactic which has worked in a previous battle."
Taylor seized a water container and emptied it slowly. In months before, she would have refused to kill so many animals. It was obviously not the horse-zebra's faults they were scared by whatever the eldars had done to them. But a horse in this climate was a drain on resources, more specifically in food and water. In space, it would be worse for the space aboard any orbit-ground transport was limited and thus precious. After the battle, nearly every horse had refused to be mounted by humans.
As much as she wanted to avoid it, the animals had just stopped being useful. And if they were not an asset, it stood to reason they were a danger and had to be put down.
"See the opinion of the Ulm officers and their Commissars," Weaver ordered after a few seconds of reflexion. "If they can't be ridden anymore, their place isn't in the Imperial Guard." Zuhev saluted and marched north to see to this. He was not a man to waste his time making small time.
"You have not given me the Ulm casualties."
"Apologies, Major. We have only incomplete estimations, but of the seven thousand and two hundred which were here to welcome us, nearly two thousand are dead and over six or seven hundred are seriously injured. A lot of their wounds are due to the fall from their horses when the animal panic spread uncontrollably in the ranks. Colonel Mack is unconscious but the medics think he will recover in a few hours. His second is dead however, and so are sixty percent of his officers."
It was getting more and more difficult to think they had won today. By the end of the week, it was possible the number of dead men and women was going to reach the three thousand-mark. It would not include the hundreds of wounded, the lost equipment and the ravages of what had been considered a small detour without importance several hours ago.
On the plus side, Dragon was here and so Magos Lankovar has someone to pester other than her when he wanted descriptions of Earth Bet's technology. On the downside, she had met another non-human race and one more time, the species had arrived with the firm intention to wipe them on sight. What was the problem with this galaxy that every technologically advanced-race wanted to kill them?
"I can't say I am really happy to hear that," Taylor told the soldiers in front of her. It was a massive understatement. Hundreds of people were dead because the head xenos had wanted a sword and was ready to kill everyone to hold it in his slimy effeminate hands. "We killed around, what, one hundred and twenty of the long-ears?"
"Around this number, yes Major," replied Valeriya Petrov.
Counting the wounded, that had to be a trade of one eldar life for thirty human ones. By the Simurgh, they had better not to meet these xenos in anything like near-equal effectives.
"Will the Ulm Regiment survive?" demanded Captain Eldyev. "Several of their companies weren't there today..."
"I'm told the ones who didn't ride from their garrison fort were the sick, the ill and the demoralised sinners," and given the appearance of some Ulm guardsmen, she really hoped it was an exaggeration. "I suppose the Generals of Wuhan and Nyx will decide their fate in the coming weeks. The entire system is aware there was an eldar presence in this system; now it's up to the Sector's authorities to decide what must be done."
Of course it meant that until proper forces were sent to Andes Primus and ensure any follow-up attack was too costly even for these pseudo space wizard-elves, the Lankovar expeditionary force was going to stay here and fortify the spaceport, though she could rotate the companies between the planetary duties and waiting in high orbit.
"And if the good Magos propose another detour, I suppose we will know better than to accept after that..."
Sergeant Gavreel Forcas
It might be repeated a lot of times before he held his last breath on a distant battlefield, but Gavreel was going to repeat it today: high-ranked adepts of the Mechanicus were strange and half-insane.
Their obsession to rush into unexplored ruins was well-documented so Gavreel was not going to elaborate on it. One of their lesser weaknesses, looting diverse battlefields of everything attracting their attention, was less well-known but had caused uncountable issues in the last millennia. Taylor Hebert had warned him she had already seen their 'benefactor' dissect hundreds of orks in the name of the Omnissiah. Consequently, the former Dark Angel should not feel too surprised the cogboys had descended on Andes Primus to seize the corpses of the eldars and whatever weapons and xenos artefacts had not been incinerated in the battle. After all, unlike the greenskins, the eldars were undoubtedly using a form of extremely advanced technology...a pity no human sworn to Mars or Terra had ever succeeded in reverse-engineering their inventions.
Still, it was boring. Gavreel supposed he should be flattered he was considered the best choice to make sure the two unconscious eldars in stasis-coffins didn't escape, but frankly given the precautions employed, the Skitarii aboard the Magos Laurentis could have replaced him. The surviving eldars had their legs and their arms bound, their bodies foamed in a sort of material nullifying Psionic abilities and their eyes were blinded by modified isolation visors. After that they were gassed with a substance which could have plunged a Great Beast into a comatose state and ultimately they had been placed in the aforementioned stasis coffins.
The Astartes Sergeant was not going to say the prisoners would never escape under his watch. It was tantamount to challenge several immemorial laws to screw the odds and make you their laughingstock. But unconscious and in a stasis field, the main risk came from outside: eldar rescue parties had an annoying tendency to do things that weren't supposed to be possible. In his opinion, it was better to kill the xenos and burn all their devices – strangely on this he was in accord with the Commissars.
Alas the Mechanicus were listening reasonable choices in M35 as much as they did in M31, and the qualifier for it could be politely described as 'never' when he was a Legionary. Proof in case, he saw a Tech-Priest escorted straight to a vault with a container full of the eldar 'spirit stones' in his mechadendrites. If he remembered correctly, these things had been worth a considerable fortune on the black market in his days...not that a loyal Legionary was supposed to know of these things, oh no.
Fortunately, after ten minutes of exacting security procedures and gene-scans proving he was truly the Space Marine he pretended to be, the eldars were placed in a high-level containment/prison area and Gavreel tried to go back to his shuttle as discreetly as his massive battle-armour authorised him.
His efforts failed long before he was in view of the flight hangars. As he went out of a magnetic elevator, he was intercepted by Questor Alena Wismer, Lankovar's second in command.
"Ah, Sergeant Forcas, I was searching for you. Come with me and read this data-slate."
Trying not to exhale a loud breath of consternation, the Legionary pretending to be a Dark Warden nodded and accelerated his pace to not be distanced by the female Questor. To his pleasant surprise, someone had visibly remembered the latest reports and for once the information was in comprehensible Low Gothic.
Karon Battle-Tank Pattern Dragon technical data:
Engine: HL 310 V12 Multi-Fuel
Weight: 46 Tonnes
Length: 9.00 metres
Width: 3.50 metres
Height: 2.44 metres
Crew: 4
Ground clearance: 0.48 metres
Max speed on road: 49km/h
Max speed off-road: 30.5km/h
Autonomy: 410km (on road)/ 275km (off-road)
Fuel capacity: 584 litres internal
Main Armament: 'Karon Cannon' 100mm anti-armour long gun (Maximum load: 46 rounds)
Secondary Armament: Heavy Bolter (x2) (Maximum load: 1000 rounds)
Armour (Front/Side/Rear/Roof):
Turret: 205/130/60/30
Hull: 140/89/60/33
The rest of the file was in binaric, either because the Mechanicus didn't trust him with more data, their secrecy doctrine compelled them to hide the advanced and critical data from uninitiated eyes, or they had lacked the processing time to finish their translation.
The sole image provided next to it, however, was far more sufficient to recognise the tank which had reduced two eldar machines to blazing wrecks on the planet below. Two elevators and several long corridors later, and he was in front of the real thing.
"We lack tank specialists aboard our crew," explained his guide. "In your opinion, would Guard Generals be interested to have this blessed archeotech integrated to their armoured regiments?"
Gavreel gave her back the data-slate, having memorised it entirely in a single reading.
"That entirely depends," he replied carefully, "on how many parts of this tank are compatible with the Leman Russ. The logistical officers are always keen to choose the simple solutions and finding the ammunition and the parts for two different main Battle-Tanks will not make them happy."
He was just finishing his sentence when Magos Lankovar barged into the workshop. Unlike his usual appearances, the Magos Explorator was harbouring pristine red robes with extremely elaborated cog, skull and hammer decorations completed with silver-like colours.
"Now that the funerals for my unfortunate colleague Magos Artisan Troy Alpha-Karon-1462 are over and his energy has been returned to the Motive Force, let us return to work." Mechanicus cogboys in general showed a faced of unity, but in this case the Magos was not giving even lip service to this idea. Idly, Gavreel wondered how much the two had to hate each other for the prayers and the ceremonies to be shortened to their minimal services.
"The Karon Battle-Tank Pattern Dragon is a fine piece of archeotech, and I need a preliminary analysis before sending the data to the nearest Forge-Worlds and wait their response. Sergeant Forcas?"
The former Legionary turned around the tank for several seconds before answering.
"The tank is obviously destined to non-Astartes forces. The units it was destined to replace were the Battle-Tanks of the Imperial Guard, not the Land Raiders and the Rhinos of the Adeptus Astartes. The Karon Battle-Tank is obviously faster than the Leman Russ. I can't vouch for the reliability of the engines, but if they hold on-road and off-road, the speed advantage is nearly forty percent over the Leman Russ, and they have far more autonomy, due in part to their greater internal fuel capacity."
"Is the hull shape superior to the Leman Russ?"
"In open terrain, absolutely," Gavreel answered without hesitating. "The Karon is far less elevated than the Russ and as such will present a far smaller target for long-range gun duels. In wars against species renowned for their poor precision at large distances like the orks, the Karon will be able to massacre a lot of enemies in all impunity. Since it has a smaller width too, a competent pilot will be able to manoeuvre faster and swifter to evade artillery fire. The lighter weight will allow it to cross bridges and obstacles where heavier machines will be unable to pass."
"And the weaknesses?"
"This Battle-Tank is a very offensive platform. The armour of the turret is on par with the ones equipping the Leman Russ tanks, but their frontal hull is a bit lighter. The engine is more powerful, and as a consequence its emissions on a battlefield are unlikely to not to be noticed. In an urban environment, the Karon Battle-Tank will not thrive."
Yes, whoever had the idea of this tank had wanted something to crush an enemy on a good conventional battle in the desert, hill, plains and everywhere there was the space to form a large armoured column and devastate the enemy flanks. In these conditions, the Karon tanks would savage the enemy. It was difficult to make guesses without proper simulations and war games, but Gavreel had the feeling this tank could kill four or five Russ on an open battlefield. It had killed two superior eldar machines and revealed a capacity to ignore their damned ghost-systems on Andes, and the Imperium tanks were cruder and less likely to acknowledge the threat before they were exploding.
But when the two Battle-Tanks would face each other on a terrain where it was impossible to manoeuvre, it was likely the Leman Russ would emerge the winner. The margin of superiority would not be huge in all likelihood: the Karon Tank was still a smaller target and its dual cannon was slightly better, but the Leman Russ had better protection and a structure which sole purpose was to resist abominable shocks.
"I would support the development of the Karon as a Tank-Hunter and a multi-purpose frontline platform as long as no urban or siege environment is required of them. To reconquer large areas occupied by mobile xenos or human forces, their firepower and mobility will be appreciated. In fixed positions however they are not better than the Leman Russ."
"Your conclusions are noted," replied Magos Lankovar in what looked to be his pleased tone. As always it was difficult to know with the inhuman behaviour of the Mechanicus. "I will inform Tech-Priest Dragon we will take her and her crew with us...this discovery was wasted in the mechadendrites of Troy Alpha-Karon-1462..."
"Wasn't he who discovered the ancient vaults and rebuilt the blessed machine?" inquired Questor Wismer.
"Ha! There is a ninety-four percent chance he falsified his data-reports and let his subordinates work out the problems before slapping his name on the project..."
Seer Maea Teallysis
The return to consciousness was the worst she had ever felt in her life. There was an awful substance in her lungs and her mouth. The temperature was too cold. Her skin itched everywhere her armour had been torn apart. Her ears hurt. Her body was in pain.
Damn the Mon-keigh. Damn Farseer Kaeran. Damn her useless precognition abilities.
No, this wasn't fair. Her visions had showed her the big problem: insects. She and the rest of the eldars had just ignored the warning in their interpretations. Somehow, the Mon-keigh had managed to turn the insects of the damaged Maiden World without a psychic ability. The confidence of the Aspect Warriors in their ultimate victory had done the rest.
Whatever substance was on her, it dissolved rapidly and soon her eyes could watch the location where she had transported. It was...bland. The walls were rigid and grey. There was no decoration on them save a Mon-keigh skull painted in black and white.
Maea was bound to a half-inclined plane, barely able to move her head. On her left, there was a sort of container filled with green liquid and logically it was where she had been kept unconscious until moments ago. On the right, there was just a door from which hoarse voices in an unknown language echoed. Seeing that she was alone, the young Seer tried to draw energy from the surface of the Ocean and break her bounds. But her contact was intermittent and barely perceptible. A pain in her head forced her to stop before she had really time to concentrate. Something was blocking her abilities, and it was outside the prison walls.
As if her attempt had been noticed, a red-robed Mon-keigh followed by two smaller followers entered her prison.
"Prisoner 52674-E-01 is awake and appears to not suffer from any debilitating effects of the G-99 method. Vital signs good. Prisoner psyker powers efficiently disabled. Restraining null-devices and security measures are operational and functioning within acceptable parameters."
"Release me Mon-keigh and I will show you..."
One of the small red-robed creatures stuck her with a sort of whip coursing with blue energy.
"Prisoner 52674-E-01, you are not authorised to talk," chided her the taller Mon-keigh like he was her better. There was not a word uttered but one of the assistants seized a metallic object and gagged her with it.
The rest was just humiliating. Blood, hairs, nails...the Mon-keigh took everything they wanted from her. And the cell was getting more and more uncomfortable. The cold was not stopping and the itches on her skin were getting unbearable.
She didn't know how many cycles she was forced to endure the creatures' attention before it stopped. The lights were ugly and never changed luminosity. The red-robed creatures were different but all seemed to have removed their ugly pink flesh for even uglier metallic extremities.
She tried to do some spiritual meditation, trying to stop her anger from breaking out. Without her helmet and most of the protection granted by her armour, she was very close from being Path-less.
When she opened her eyes, sensing a new presence, it was a new red-robed creature which was examining her while blurting several noises at irregular intervals. This was one looked mostly flesh outwards, but her nose wasn't easily abused. Inside, the Mon-keigh was just metal and artificial parts. There was a click and the restraining device forbidding her to speak was removed before falling to the ground in a loud thud.
"I am Magos Desmerius Lankovar," said the Mon-keigh in an eldar so badly uttered it was almost torture to listen to his words.
"Do not massacre my language, Mon-keigh," she replied in his 'Gothic' brutish tongue. "I understand your way with words."
"Good, this will make us win a lot of time." The red robes opened an instant to take some new primitive devices the Mon-keigh seemed to play with. "You and your imbecilic species have given me opportunities but also great setbacks. My Forge World is trading quite regularly with Eldar Craftworlds of Obscurus and Pacificus. I want my subordinates to not shoot an eldar the second they see one...which is impossible when they believe your arrogant race wants to butcher us!"
"I don't care for your problems, Mon-keigh," Maea replied, though inside she tried to think which Craftworld had fallen so low to trade and make alliances with these metallic brutish idiots. The primitive names signified nothing to her. She would have to convince him to let her watch a star map...
"No, I don't suppose you do," hissed the creature calling itself Lankovar. "You wanted the Nebula's Shard, didn't you?"
And on this the red-robed humanoid seized a sword on his back which was indeed Elsar'bryn. Even partially cut off from her Seer abilities, Maea could feel its sheer power...though there was something strange with the aura.
Then the Mon-keigh advanced towards her and before she had the time to wonder what exactly it had in mind...it placed the handle of the sword in her fighting hand.
Maea screamed. It was like one had suddenly poured molten lava in her body. Her nerves screamed and screamed in a pain which made the suffering felt in the last cycles insignificant. She tried to tell the Sword of Vaul to disable what had to be an old Aeldari defence system but to her horror the sword refused.
Elsar'bryn had always accepted someone to bear her...and Maea was judged unworthy. In an excruciating lancing cycle, she and all the eldars were judged unworthy.
You are denied. You are unworthy. You are denied. You are unworthy. You are...
When it stopped, she was half-delirious and broken.
Why? Why was one of the greatest blades forged by Vaul Himself refusing to accept Asuryani hands?
"It looks like the security systems on the sword are incapacitating eldars too," commented the Mon-keigh.
Farseer Kaeran had to have seen a thread where she was holding the sword. But why hadn't he noticed it was a failure? Why had he followed this path when it had to be evident she was a prisoner? Either she was going to have another chance to grab the Sword of Vaul or the Biel-Tan Asuryani talent had been in error on nearly every point...
"What are you going to do with me?"
The Mon-keigh made a sign of his hands which was not certainly a polite greeting.
"You will be one of my experiment subjects until your body fails. I have rarely the opportunity to dissect eldars..."
Unblinking eyes turned to the entrance of her prison.
"Prepare to reinsert 52674-E-01 in stasis with Level Black-Crimson containment procedures." There were many species which would have gloated or mocked her, but not this Mon-keigh. There was little emotion coming from this being at the moment. At best there were some shadows of indifference and her headache was becoming worse just trying to examine it.
"My allies will come to rescue me, you know."
Many times this announcement had been sufficient to terrorise hundreds of lesser species into submission. The red-robed Mon-keigh just scoffed.
"If they have a death wish, then the Adeptus Mechanicus of Mars will of course oblige them." And two more breaths, it added something even more delusional. "This galaxy is ours to explore!"
Colonel Karl Mack
"...and all these brave souls are by the God-Emperor's side now, for they have fought and protected a world of the Imperium from the depredations of the xenos. Their sacrifice will be remembered for years in our hearts and our memories. In battle, we purged ourselves of our doubts. In victory, we returned to the foundations of the Guard: loyalty, determination and honour. Simple words, but ones we must never forget as we continue to fight across the stars. Andes stands, Ave Imperator!"
This was the longest speech he made in years and it left him a bad taste. Plenty of his men would be forgotten in days, like they had been by the rest of the Imperium for several years in this backwater. Still, as long as someone remembered...
"AVE IMPERATOR!" shouted thousands of guards in answer.
Karl Mack saluted in an automatic reflex the Imperium flag and watched the assembly in front of him. The spaceport of Andes Primus was unrecognisable ten days after the battle. All the corpses of both men and xenos had long disappeared, the former being granted great funeral ceremonies and the other dissolved in the swamps or recovered for experimentation by the Mechanicus. The horses' carcasses had been burned. The transports and machines which could be repaired had been towed away. The unsalvageable Chimeras, Sentinels and Tauros were rapidly dismantled or recycled and sent back to the ships in orbit.
The Mechanicus and the Guard had built six great lines of defences with bunkers, razorwire, concrete boxes and dozens of artillery defensive positions. Several hectares had already been dried up around their position. Before the battle fought against the eldars, Andes Primus had been of little importance and according to the whispers every military force of note spread by its simple existence, there had been pressure to cut the costs and reduce further the involvement of the Imperium on this world.
The xenos attack had changed that. Now Andes Primus was potentially the frontline if for whatever reason the perfidious eldars decided to attack the Nyx Sector. As the attacks of the orks were winding down, the higher authorities had immediately dispatched four regiments and demanded a new military tithe from Wuhan and Andes.
But the biggest change was the impressive muster who had been gathered as far as he could watch. Hundreds of veterans from the regiments who had fought with the Ulm cavaliers had been granted the honour to march in front of the short military parade, followed by thousands of Wuhan and Andes guardsmen. In the distance, Tech-Priests were busy elevating several vox-towers and new fortifications.
A reminder like any other that when the Imperium was provoked, it could strike back. There were dozens of magnificent banners flowing in the wind today, and the flag of the Ulm 2nd flew with them, free and defiant.
It took several hours and ceremony of protocol to complete the day after his speech. First he formally surrendered the title of Military Governor for Andes Primus to General Ondai. Then there were the medals to be granted to every soldier for their loyal service, new honours to be quotes and even a few propaganda agents of the Departmento Munitorum, always happy to make a few vid-casts to help the recruitment efforts wherever the Guard fought. Incidentally, he and nearly all of his men had now the Order of Andes Second Class and the Sentinel Medal to show at formal events. Yes, the Departmento Munitorum was more inclined to send the awards than to order a luxury yacht for their illusionary holidays.
It was a relief when he was able to say his thirty-fifth goodbye and sit in the heavy transport waiting to conduct him to orbit. His legs were strained, and he was not a young man anymore.
"Well, we are finally leaving this damned planet!" exclaimed joyously one young man of his staff as the acceleration of the engines stuck them in their harnesses. "Goodbye, glutton-mosquitoes and humid climate!"
"Oh, I'm sure the Mechanicus can find some for you..."
Major Taylor Hebert
"So you have obtained the authorisations for the Ulm 2nd to join us in our adventures."
On the hololith, the image of Lankovar flickered for a second before the Magos Explorator answered.
"Yes, the Departmento Munitorum has long memories and refused to include them in the new garrison of Andes Primus. They were willing to grant them medals and a ticket off-world, but their generosity stopped there."
"I'm not surprised."
She had received her fair share of medals too, to the point it was becoming rather embarrassing and next time she would have to wear sun glasses if there was sun to reflect all this mass of polished medal. For her contribution in the fight against the long-eared eldars – whose ears were apparently real and not prosthetics – Weaver had received the Order of Andes First Class, the Xenos Hunter Honour Medal and the Sentinel Medal.
"I will await your suggestions on how to integrate these reinforcements in my order of battle."
Wonderful, more homework and bureaucracy. You might think a victory and people would stop pestering you with administrative duties, no? Perhaps she could throw it to her staff?
Truth to say, she didn't know what to do about the Ulm 2nd. All their life, these men had been trained for horse-riding duties and now their horses had to be killed thanks to the long-ears. Few regiments used animals in the Nyx Sector like the Ulm guardsmen did. In the age of the 35th Millennium, the majority of the planets had transitioned to modern warfare long ago and the logistics headquarters had refused to consider the price of buying new horses. For this case, it was understandable as the mounts would have been more expensive than a cargo of gemstones and rare ore.
"Yes, Magos. What is to be our next destination?"
"The S-4697X5T4 System. Any specific requests before we make our Warp transition in seventeen hours?"
Well, if the Magos felt generous enough to ask...
"Yes, I had this need for an insect-bodyguard..."
Author's note: This will be the end of war for this act. Andes Primus is going to know peace for a while, though the seeds for further conflict have been sown between humans and eldars.
More links for support or if you want to comment on the Weaver Option:
P a treon: ww w. p a treon Antony444
Alternate History page: www .alternatehistory forum/ threads/ the-weaver-option-a-warhammer-40000-crossover.395904/
