"The hive is firing defense lasers," the pilot informed Minerva.
Arachne chuckled. "I guess they want to be able to report they did something."
Minerva nodded. "Maintain course." Defense laser batteries were meant to engage primary warships, not strike craft. Against Thunderhawks, they were essentially firing blind, unable to even resolve their targets, much less track them. There was no point to evasion against completely random fire. "Is our fighter screen panicking?"
"They're holding course," the pilot replied. "Isn't much different from flying between engaged warships, after all."
"This does mean they're alerted," Artemis noted. "Their anti-air defenses will be active."
"To be expected," Minerva replied. She'd have preferred the element of surprise, but was resigned to the fact that they weren't going to have that. She would also have preferred more detailed information on the enemies they'd be facing, but Medea had declined to be specific with her prognostications. Minerva was used to that, and took it as a positive sign. When Medea felt the need to give details, it meant a hard-fought battle was to come.
The psykers had at least assured them they were unlikely to encounter manifested daemons; the areas between the cities were not sufficiently saturated in warp energy to maintain them for long. The downside of that fact was that the Grey Knights had declined to participate in the assault; their conventional firepower would have been a considerable asset.
As it was, she'd split her forces among the Thunderhawks, a battleline squad to each and then her and the specialists with the scouts as well as Atlantae. They'd re-armed Atlantae's squad as a tactical squad for the attack, bringing a pair of missile launchers instead of unwieldy lascannons. Minerva would have preferred to kit them all out as assault marines, but they only had enough jump packs for Helen's squad.
The pilot interrupted her musings. "Contacts on auspex; they've put up interceptors. I count twelve so far. Looks like Lightnings."
"They've been present long enough to have possessed them," Minerva warned her. "They may have extra firepower."
"Understood," the pilot replied. "Should I break to engage?"
"Negative," Minerva replied. "Our fighter screen can handle them. Keep on course."
o - o -O - o – o
There was a brilliant red-white flash through Fearless's bridge windows, visible even through the storm. "Magazine explosion," the gunnery officer said smugly.
"Expeditionary confirms," the vox master said. "They've got a new target for us at relative bearing 250, seven thousand two hundred meters. Light cruiser."
"Target that light cruiser," Alison ordered. "Do we have contact with Expeditionary's squadron-mates?"
"We're detecting Wayfinder and Ranger. No sign of Pathmaker," the master of detection reported
"We're getting a carrier wave from Ranger. No comms from Wayfinder."
Alison considered her options as the ship rocked with the recoil of another volley. If Wayfinder wasn't responding, that could mean she was sinking, or just that the storm had taken out her vox antennae. Either way, they were under orders not to risk the ship rendering aid, and she had no intention of being close by when another magazine went up. And she wasn't keen on getting spotted by the enemy destroyer screen.
She considered changing bearing to due west, but that would put Fearless broadside to the waves. That was a recipe for disaster in this weather. Fearless had been weathering the storm so far, but a rogue wave striking her broadside might be another story. Especially if it happened in the middle of firing.
"Reduce speed," Alison ordered. "Keep us in detection range, but no closer." She was hoping that the enemy auspex was as badly confused as her own by the witch-bred storm. If they could see clearly, they'd have long since spotted Fearless and for that matter the rest of the dreadnought column following behind. They could be targeting for their own dreadnoughts already.
Then another thought occurred to her that she didn't much like. Even if they were equally blinded, their auspex would be tracking incoming fire. The ship auspex wasn't truly suited for counterbattery fire, but it could give an approximate bearing. Combine that with a torpedo with a tracking head…
There wasn't anything she could do to change that, though. She'd just have to hope the keel would hold.
The ship rocked with another outgoing volley, and the vox master reported the relayed miss range. Gunnery corrected and fired again.
"Straddle," the vox master called.
"Fire on the same coordinates," Alison ordered. With how the ships were moving and pitching, and the twisting winds aloft, a straddling volley was separated from a direct strike by mere luck.
o - o -O - o – o
Reconstruction of the Battle Of The Storm would frustrate historians for decades to come, with no survivors of lost ships to question even for those of the Logos Historica Verita who received authorization to access interrogation transcripts from Inquisitor Malachi.
The basic battle plans were established easily enough; both sides were determined to close for a battle-line engagement with their full force in order to destroy the enemy at sea. In the storm conditions, there could be no realistic hope of evaluating the full enemy formation and maneuvering to cross the enemy's T via mundane means.
That left the question of the esoteric abilities of each side, but their seers appear to have played no direct role in the battle once it was joined. The Astral Amazons Librarian spent the battle in meditation aboard their strike cruiser, possibly in an attempt to counteract any scrying by the enemy, but was unable or unwilling to provide tactical direction. She has declined all requests for interviews on the subject.
The black cross incident involving Wanderer and Venture attracted a great deal of scrutiny by popular historians, primarily focusing on the possibility of deliberate treachery. This was investigated by a full review board with Inquisitorial support, which drew the conclusion that it was a simple case of ordinary misidentification by inexperienced crews in a tense situation, exacerbated by the storm affecting IFF transmissions. No further evidence has arisen to question this conclusion.
Actual contact between the two forces occurred at 1323 Astor Standard, to west of the center of the Imperial formation. Due to the auspex disruption of the storm, both sides were well within effective gunnery range at the opening of the engagement, and the armor of the engaged destroyers was unable to resist even the gunnery of their opposite numbers.
This gunnery was hampered by the storm, however. The high winds rendered targeting unreliable, blowing even heavy shells notably off-course despite the guns' machine spirits best efforts to compensate. Furthermore, the ships could not turn broadside to fire all of their turrets without risking a wave striking while they were firing. Combined with the recoil, such a wave could easily sink even a dreadnought. Based on review of auspex records from Expeditionary, it is believedthe destroyer Pathmaker was lost in such an event.
With at least part of the enemy fleet located, Fearless led the main dreadnought column in the direction of the battle, and drew first blood on the enemy. She destroyed two enemy destroyers and a light cruiser in short order.
It was at this point that the Thousand Sons attempted a decapitation strike.
o - o -O - o – o
Solon always hated being a spectator to a battle. It wasn't an uncommon experience for him; he'd often watched as a clash in space determined whether he'd live or die, sometimes from an engaged warship and sometimes from the ground. All he could do was hope the friendly icons beat the enemy icons, and not give away that he had no idea what was going on.
"Order the dreadnoughts to form line," Jasper instructed. "Alternating spread, odds westward, evens eastward. Admiral Gerax, can your strike craft descend?"
"A lot of them won't be coming back up," Gerax replied grimly. "We need to be sure of the location of the enemy dreadnoughts."
"Send the unengaged portions of the screen forward," Jasper ordered.
Solon was distracted by a sudden burst of familiar sound from beyond the door that he couldn't quite place, distorted by the heavy soundproofing. Then there was the unmistakable thunder of a bolt weapon, and he realized the initial sound was las fire.
"We're under attack!" he shouted. Reflexively, he looked for the nearest cover and drew his own bolt pistol. The rest of the Astra Militarium presence and a handful of PDF officers had reacted similarly, while most of the PDF and the governor stood in the open in shocked surprise.
Malachi had stood up and grabbed his staff, facing the door. "Renegade PDF, no doubt," he called. "Naval officers, back to your stations! They won't be getting through that door."
o - o -O - o – o
It had taken Mayumi an unacceptable half-second to react, her drug cocktail tuned towards passivity. The PDF who had burst in with guns levelled managed to open fire on full auto into the equally surprised and even slower S-company detail and fishing inspectors while she was still halfway through drawing her executioner pistol. Fortunately, she'd been out of the immediate line of fire, as had Mem.
Her half-completed painting of Guilliman in stasis tumbled to the floor as she whirled on the attackers. Four were through the double doors. Her pistol roared, and there were three. Two. One. Zero. Another four came in behind, with too much momentum to pause at the deaths of their comrades. Mayumi dropped them in four more headshots before they could turn to face her. There were shouts, surprise.
She wasn't wearing her helmet; it was "indiscreet." That meant she was vulnerable to headshots herself. She'd have to keep moving. She leapt out towards the doors, moving with proper speed now that her drug cocktail was switching, purging of the antipsychotics and injecting frenzon and slaught. There were more PDF in the corridor beyond, and as she closed towards the doors, she dropped another three. Two bolts left when she was through the doors, enough for two more kills.
She counted targets. Combined with the eleven she'd already dropped, they made a full platoon. She laughed; they'd thought that was enough. They were slow, so very slow, even slower than the S-company Tempestus Scions.
She drew her power sword as she fired two more bolts, then switched to the toxin darts. She didn't like those as much, they took longer to kill than a bolt to the head, but reloading was awkward while she had her sword out.
Mayumi decided to clear the left side of the room with her blade and the right side with her pistol, and darted forwards. The first renegade in her path was opening his mouth to yell when she drove her sword directly into his heart. The right amount of blood spurted out; he wasn't one of those people who had their heart on the wrong side. She yanked the blade up diagonally as she jumped over the collapsing body, decapitating her next target in the same motion.
She was halfway through the room, corpses dropping at her feet, before the renegades got shots off, wildly off-target panic fire on full auto. Most of it went through the doorway she'd long since vacated. That made her job simpler; a kick knocked another renegade into the path of his fellows' fire while she peppered the shooters with darts. They seized up, poison that could fell an Astartes freezing their hearts
There was a sudden crack of a different timbre than a lasgun, and a bolt of lightning arced through the air, missing her by over a meter. Mayumi switched targets; psykers were always the priority. She fired three times, then rushed the collapsing form and decapitated him. Psykers could be resilient. The surviving dozen renegades were panicking, starting to turn to flee. Mayumi didn't let any of them escape.
Mayumi paused momentarily over her last kill, wondering what to do. The rising tide of chems demanded more slaughter, but she didn't have a target profile. She didn't know the building layout, and she didn't see anyone else in a PDF uniform.
Then she remembered that she'd been told the sealed room was a command center. If the PDF was hostile, there was only one thing to do, and she pulled out a melta charge and-
"Gladius Citrine Omega Stasis!" Mem shouted, and Mayumi froze at the standdown code. It was in the voice of an authorized handler and the currently active one in rotation, and her drug cocktail switched again.
"Go back to painting," Mem called. She liked Mem.
"Could have used one of them alive," he muttered. "I hate when we interrogate dead people." He was silly sometimes. Why should enemies be alive?
o - o -O - o – o
Though rattled by the unexpected assault, the fleet command quickly returned to their duties. Proceeding on the assumption that the enemy dreadnoughts would be following behind their screen closely, fleet command ordered the destroyers to reserve their torpedoes for the capital ships. This remains a point of contention, with many scholars arguing that an initial torpedo volley could have cleared the enemy screen and reduced Imperial casualties. In the event six vessels, five destroyers and a light cruiser, were lost to enemy action before contact was made with the Archenemy's main body.
An aside regarding oceanic torpedoes is necessary at this point, as void torpedoes are quite different in their operation. Where void torpedoes are subject to turret and fighter interception, this is not generally the case for oceanic torpedoes. An inert projectile underwater quickly loses speed, and counter-torpedoes have poor maneuverability compared to anti-air missiles; effective systems are rare patterns Astor V did not possess. There are defensive nets employed on some worlds where torpedoes rely on impact detonation, but the patterns of torpedoes used on Astor V detonate well underneath their targets. As such, torpedoes represented a potent threat to dreadnoughts even in small numbers.
The first vessel to locate a traitor dreadnought is believed to have been Wayfinder. Auspex from Fearless shows it suddenly maneuvering hard to port, followed by a loss of propulsion. Several minutes later, it sank suddenly, lost with all hands.
Ranger was the first ship to successfully report a contact, and fired torpedoes at a vessel identified as the Unrelenting. To keep them from being disrupted by wave action, Ranger's torpedo officer set their depth settings twenty meters below the standard for surface engagement. Unfortunately, this proved an overcorrection, and the explosions lacked sufficient force to break the keel of a dreadnought at that depth.
Fearless then engaged the Unrelenting with its main cannon battery. At the initial range of engagement, even armor-piercing shells would be unable to penetrate the main armor belt, and so captain Alison ordered the loading of high-explosive shells to hopefully damage communications and auspex arrays, as well as the lightly-armored anti-aircraft defenses.
Ranger's captain proceeded to begin an evasive pattern, remaining within detection range of Unrelenting to spot for Fearless while maneuvering to disrupt their aim at his ship. He eluded at least three volleys entirely even at such close range, before Ranger took a direct hit to an upper turret that then penetrated the deck armor, detonating in the mess hall.
Soon after Ranger was struck, the destroyer Trailblazer detected an enemy dreadnought as well, believed to be Unbreakable, and signaled the nearby Indomitable for assistance. At this point, the standard datalink that allowed fleet command to track the location of their own ships collapsed entirely, and all further communication was voice only. That this occurred only after the battle was joined in earnest is a sign of the Emperor's grace, as command had the approximate location of the enemy line. Admiral Gerax ordered his strike craft to attack.
o - o -O - o – o
Calix had seen many storms from orbit, and he didn't like the look of this one. It was a massive, sickly thing periodically riven by purple flashes, and it was conspicuously unnatural in its shape. A storm so big and dense should be forming a visible eye, but it was instead an almost perfectly uniform square. And he had to lead a strike mission straight into it.
He also had a tagalong joining the crew, in a black greatcoat with a peaked cap, in case he decided he didn't want to after all. Calix didn't think the commissar could really fly in this weather, but didn't doubt the man would make the attempt if anyone balked.
"Falcon One to Falcon flight, prepare to dive," he said, projecting a confidence he didn't feel. "If you lose me, follow your inertial guidance. Get below the cloud cover before you release. Let's show these PDF how the Navy flies."
He received a series of crisp acknowledgements, and checked his guidance system one final time. Inertial wasn't fully reliable, but it had the advantage of being entirely internal to the Marauder instead of depending on external signals or a working auspex.
Calix took the Marauder into its dive, bracing for turbulence. On the auspex, he saw the other flights dive as well, including rather fewer Lightnings than he'd like. But then, it wasn't likely enemy fighters were staying aloft in the weather. Below, the auspex showed dancing phantoms, flickering in and out of being in a way that reminded him entirely too much of the damned Aeldari holofields.
As he entered the clouds, the wind struck like a hammer, throwing him against his restraints. He clung to the controls as tightly as he could. Resisting his urge to check on the rest of his crew, he locked his eyes onto his instruments, fighting to keep his dive angle. Too shallow and he'd miss the target. Too steep and he wouldn't be able to pull out.
The wind tore and twisted like a living thing, seeming to oppose him with purpose. When he adjusted downwards, the wind shifted to push him further. Correct his roll, and it would make him overcompensate. He'd been forced to fly in storms before, but this one felt like it hated him. Maybe it did.
On his auspex, he saw the carefully-spaced formations come apart, every craft fighting its own individual battle with the elements. A few were clearly breaking off, those who didn't have a commissar on board and who were willing to take their chances with the ones on the fleet. Idiots. The storm or the enemy might kill them, but the commissars definitely would. If he had to explain himself at the Throne, better to be for fighting the enemy than running away from them.
The com squawked. "Bats! Bats! Bearing-" Apparently the enemy wasn't quite out of fighters.
o - o -O - o – o
The beastman had a name once. He'd been able to leave the cockpit once. Both were lost to him; he was Harpy now, feeling the wind on the Hell Razor's hull as he'd once felt it on his own body. It screamed exultantly, eager to attend a kill.
He didn't have an auspex anymore; it had been replaced by a living crystal granted by the masters. He could see the enemy craft in his mind through the storm as easily as in the void. They were scattering under the masters' fury, the wind that urged him forwards doing its best to claw them from the sky.
"Target the bombers," he ordered his wingmates. Harpy would have preferred to dogfight, but the orders of the masters were absolute. Kill the bombers, kill them all. If they waited to clear the fighter cover, the bombers would make their runs
Harpy locked onto a bomber that had strayed away from its fighter cover, and a mind-impulse triggered the autocannons. Wind guided them along their path, arrowing into the bomb bay. It didn't explode. He'd have to-
Purple lighting flashed from every direction, homing in on the hole torn in the bomber. A plasma bomb detonation removed it from existence. One kill for the masters. Harpy looked elsewhere, found more prey. The bombers were trying to congregate, the fighters struggling to break their own dives and engage.
Harpy's next target was holed through the cockpit, instantly losing control. Wind curved its descent and slammed it into its neighbor, which had been driven dangerously close by a sudden gust. Two kills for the masters.
A Lightning struggled to get its guns on Harpy, and he vectored thrust to bolt upwards while killing his momentum, letting it fly under Harpy. It started to dive, but not fast enough. Harpy had enough ammo to kill it and still strike the bombers. The Lightning fell, trailing the black smoke of a certain kill.
Not enough thought Harpy. He swept down on another Marauder.