And...yeah, that's about all I've got to say here. On with it!
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WARHAMMER 40,000
By the Horns
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Even at the best of times, the moon of Monocerat IV could be nicely described as hellish.WARHAMMER 40,000
By the Horns
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Blasted with heat from its nearby red star, its thin atmosphere knew only two colors - a bright, arterial crimson during the day, and a dark, dry-blood red at night. The fierce bombardment of light across the spectrum, from gamma rays and X-rays to infrared and ultraviolet meant that nothing grew on its brittle, rocky surface. Wracked by the heavy gravitational forces of its parent gas giant, the crust of the planet-sized moon was ever in upheaval, shifting and cracking so that the hot mantle beneath came to the surface, sometimes in explosive fashion.
Of course, the very forces that left Monocerat IV all but uninhabitable also made it ripe for the plundering by the Mechanicus, and they came to the world in droves with their ore extractors and processors, prefabricated spaceports and hab blocks to store the human workers that would maintain the great machinery. The relatively weak gravity of the planetoid made it easy for ships to approach until they hung a mere span of meters above the ground, the massive cargo haulers hanging there as if pieces of the facilites had become detached from their parent complex.
Over the course of two and a half millennia, the interlocking creations of humanity grew in size and scope, spreading like a living thing over the surface of the rocky planetoid until nearly forty percent of Monocerat IV had disappeared beneath the structures, and the skies were forever altered by the constant release of excess gases. On Imperial maps, the place was marked with the signifier of a forge world - a world that produced the metals and machines needed by the Imperium of Man.
That didn't change the basic character of the world, however. Even after so much industry had been worked upon the place, the word most often used to describe Monocerat IV was 'hellish.' The oppressive heat, the red skies, the deadly atmosphere outside the habitation zones, the shifting, superheated ground - together, all of it produced a veritable hell-world.
Then the forces of Chaos arrived on Monocerat IV, and suddenly the place learned a new kind of hell.
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They'd come from the outer reaches of the Segmentum Obscuras, a full thirty capital ships, marked with the obscene runes of the Ruinous Powers and bristling with weapons. They sailed in-system from beyond the cometary halo, ruthlessly boarding any cargo ship that crossed their path and mercilessly destroying the system patrol ships that dared come within range. At the center of the flotilla was an immense battleship, impossibly ancient, impossibly lethal. Crimson in color, with the star of Chaos stamped across its prow, its name was Devotion's Death, and for millennia it had borne the forces of the Word Bearers' Twenty-Seventh Host into battle.
As the renegade fleet closed with Monocerat IV, the keepers of the forge world made ready their defenses. Every armed patrol craft was called in from all across the system to form a tight-knit weave of interlocking fields of fire around the planetoid. Ground-based defenses such as lance cannons and orbital torpedos were armed, while the populace was set to work shoring up makeshift barricades and fire-holes in anticipation of the inevitable planetary assault.
However, the priests of the Adeptus Mechanicus were not so foolish as to believe they could repel a force of such magnitude, let alone one spearheaded by the infamous Chaos Space Marines. As a result, before the first ranging shots had even been fired above Monocerat IV, the world sent out an astropathic distress signal, warning of the approaching enemy fleet and requesting any aid that could be given. Mere hours after the signal was sent, the skies above Monocerat IV were split by lance fire as the Chaos host arrived.
First blood in what was to be recorded as the Siege of Monocerat IV was claimed by the invaders as the system defense ships closest to the attacking fleet were fired upon. Smaller and less durable than the warp-capable behemoths, they were torn apart by the capital-grade weapons of the raiding fleet. Mere heartbeats later however, the defenders of the forge world punched back as hundred-meter-long torpedos exploded from their launch tubes, arcing high into the atmosphere of Monocerat IV in search of prey. Lured in by the weak gravity and pitiful atmosphere of the planetoid, the first elements of the Chaos fleet were caught with their metaphorical pants down and had no time to ready their defenses before the incoming projectiles struck home.
The first Chaos ship to make planetfall on Monocerat IV did so in the form of an escort crashing down atop an empty plain amidst a storm of flaming wreckage.
However, numbers and firepower were on the side of the attackers, and soon more ships began to descend to the ground, bearing within them the scratching, screaming spawn that would form the first wave of the ground assault upon the forge world. In the days to follow, these would soon be joined by the innumerable ranks of Chaos cultists and then worst of all, the armored forms of the Chaos Marines themselves.
Still, if the Chaos host had anticipated an easy prize in the form of Monocerat IV, they were to be sorely disappointed. The industrious techpriests had bent their considerable intellect and ample resources to the defence of the forge world, and so rather than a facility quickly overrun and plundered, the invaders were forced to fight for every meter of the territory they captured. Worse, as they retreated the forces of the Mechanicus left behind traps to sow confusion in the advancing forces.
Still, the loyalists could not hope to defeat the attackers, but rather the best they could hope for was to delay them sufficiently, tying the piratical flotilla to their world until reinforcement could arrive.
The first to arrive on the scene was Battlefleet Obscuras' Tertius Group - fifteen capital ships of the Imperial Navy, accompanied by a trio of Galaxy-class troop transports each containing four full regiments of the Imperial Guard. The battlefleet squadron soared out ahead of the slower transports, flying in-system to open fire on the Chaos ships even as their crews struggled to reorient towards the new threat. Once more lance beams and torpedos struck across the upper atmosphere of Monocerat IV. One Chaos ship at the edge of the flotilla was split in half as the torpedos of no less than four ships targeted it. Retribution came swiftly, however, as a Sword-class frigate found itself in Devotion's Death's field of fire. The deadly lance beams struck the port side of the smaller vessel and carved their way through the hull to leave the vessel adrift, little left but a husk of twisted wreckage.
Still, the Chaos forces had allowed their attention to be drawn by the Imperial forces' flyby tactic. As a result, while the renegade flotilla chased after Tertius Group's exhaust the trio of troopships were able to land virtually unmolested amidst the facilities of Monocerat IV. There, the doors of the landing craft opened to disgorge twelve regiments of His Divine Majesty's troops. With abrupt suddenness the invaders, who by now controlled nearly thirty percent of the forge world's surface structures, found themselves facing not simply ad-hoc militia and second-line skitarii defenders, but battle-hardened veterans. Despite the sudden increase in resistance, the momentum remained on the side of the invaders and their expansion continued, albeit at a reduced pace.
The next reinforcements to arrive in the Monocerat system did so with less fanfare. A single transport ship sailed in from the outer reaches of the system, quiet and watchful as it observed the void-fight around the planetoid. Inevitably the moment came that the Imperial Navy attempted a feint to draw away the strength of the enemy flotilla, and the transport seized its chance, drifting into orbit well behind the lines of battle and launching its compliment of shuttlecraft. Joining the defenders of Monocerat IV came the warrior-women of the Order of the Argent Shroud, Sisters of Battle bedecked in their sacred armor and with arms ready to join in the fight. Once more the invaders saw the defense of the planet redoubled, and for the first time their push to expand was brought to a halt.
At this point in the Siege of Monocerat, hindsight holds that it would have been in the best interests of the Chaos flotilla to cut their losses and withdraw. Though they still held the advantage in space, their momentum in the ground war had evaporated, and much of the prized raw materials they had come seeking remained in the hands of the loyalists. Of course, the fanaticism of the Word Bearers and their followers meant that an inglorious retreat was never even considered - rather they remained driven in their efforts to combat Tertius Group. The decision was even made to risk some of the precious ore as Devotion's Death fired its great lances down into the planet's surface, cracking open the rocky crust and annihilating entire buildings.
What the attackers did not realize - the crucial piece of information they did not have - was that even now the defenders of Monocerat IV played for time as they had since the very beginning of the siege. The forces of Chaos did not know that a third group of reinforcements were inbound; had it been made known to them, they may well have chosen the ignominy of retreat.
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Even through his armor, Captain Pylos could feel the throne of the Telamonian vibrating beneath him. Even without his helm, he could hear the distant roaring sound of her engines - and beyond that, a crackling sound as if a man had taken an endless sheet of paper and begun to slowly tear it, pulling the two halves apart so that the separated with a steady noise.
Perhaps affected by the sound, the crew of the bridge were all but silent at their stations. Pylos could see the moisture on their faces, smell the sharp tang of sweat. The bridge was hot, and the mortal crewmen could not help but be affected by it. That was why Pylos' helm rested on his knee - though he could have retreated within the self-regulated conditions of his armor, he showed his bridge crew that he voluntarily endured the same conditions they did. He shared in the presence of the oppressive heat, the ominous noise, and reminded them by his presence that he leant them his strength.
Beyond the men and their cogitators was the bridge's viewscreen. At most times, Pylos could look out through it and see the stars beyond - always in different combinations, of course, for the Telamonian and her family were great wanderers. Today, however, no stars were visible. Instead the width of the viewscreen was dominated by a single, impossibly massive object. At a distance, the gas giant had appeared a multicolored ball, smeared haphazardly with streaks of red, yellow, and brown. This close, however, the horizon stretched across the viewscreen in a near-straight line, and the proximity of the jovian world threw out a hellish light that flooded the bridge and rendered Pylos' crewmen silhouettes. The ominous glow was worsened by the scattering effect of the planet's atmosphere against the Telamonian's shields - the source of the endless crackling noise.
Only one thing stood out from the view of the simmering horizon. Even Pylos' enhanced vision had difficulty discerning it amidst the gas giant's glow - a tiny spark of pale blue light, haloed by a riotous aura of bright red. "Sensors," Pylos ordered, "give me an enhanced view of the Calydon." There was no reply, but abruptly the lower-right portion of the viewscreen flickered and was replaced by an image of a strike cruiser, positioned so that her aft port quarter was prominant in the display. Pylos studied the lines of the strike cruiser - a near-twin to the Telamonian herself. The ship's beige hull glowed a cherry-red under the constant assault of the gas giant, and from time to time portions of her shield were visible as the atmospherics played havoc with the envelope of energies.
But Pylos was not without a soul. The halo of energised particles was also quite beautiful. They transformed the kilometers-long vessel into a blazing meteor, and through the enhanced display Pylos could even see the contrail she left in her wake, formed by the displacement of the gas giant's atmosphere. This, he reflected, was what the common man imagined when he thought of ships like the Calydon - fierce bolts of power and flame soaring across the sky to deliver wrath and judgement.
"She is lower than we are," a voice noted from beside him. Pylos simply nodded. Unlike his captain, Demoleon had chosen to leave his helm in place, and so stood at Pylos' side like an imperturbable sentinel, his Mk.VIII armor gleamed as if fresh from the forges, having never known war. Pylos knew that to be a lie - Demoleon was quite fastidious and habitually repaired his wargear whenever it suffered a damaging blow. It was one of the reasons Pylos had chosen him for his command squad; the man's unflinchingly dutiful nature meant he served as a good example to the rest of Third Company. That Pylos had also seen him perform such feats as tearing the skull from a living genestealer's head had also bolstered him in the captain's estimation.
"Captain," a voice came from the crew pit. "Incoming transmission from the Daedelos Krata. Fleetwide."
"Put it on general broadcast," Pylos replied. The order meant that the exchange would not only be heard by the men on the bridge, but all throughout the ship.
There was a fizzling, popping noise as the communications channel was opened throughout the fleet, no doubt yet another effect of the gas giant's atmospehre as it played havoc with the tiny metal boxes that dared come so close to its vast bulk. Then came a deep, metallic voice, and even the miniscule amount of chatter amongst the bridge crew came to a halt as the master of the fleet spoke.
"My brothers," the rough voice said. "Do you hear that sound of flames? Can you feel the movement of the deck as it trembles beneath you? Are your bones warmed by heat, even as my own?" Pylos could not help a small smile as he listened, knowing as he did that the owner of the voice carried more than a hint of metal in replacement of bone within his body.
"Do you know what causes this, my brothers?" the voice went on. "I will tell you. It is the work of the great planet below us, a world so vast you and I can hardly imagine it. One hundred and fifty thousand kilometers thick. Twenty-five times the gravity of Holy Terra. Nine thousand degrees as its liquid surface. Hydrogen, methane and ammonia that would kill a man even if the terrible pressure did not crush him long before he suffocated.
"And this planet, this great behemoth of a world...it wants to kill us, my brothers," the voice said in a dire tone. "It reaches out for us with great claws at this very moment, seeking to drag us down into its depths, the very whole of our fleet, so that it may crush us in revenge for our temerity. We tempt this terrible foe's wrath with our current course. We go so far as to harness its deadly strength for our own benefit. We place our heads in the mouth of a lion and dare it not to bite. One faulty calculation, one human error, one tiny misalignment in our course and we shall fall into its clutches to die in agony, an unenviable death far from battle.
"Why do we do this, my brothers?" the voice asked. "Why do speed towards death with reckless abandon? Why do we challenge odds that would see us dead with the tiniest mistake? Who amongst you can tell me?"
Pylos leaned forward in his seat and licked his lips. "This is Captain Pylos," he said aloud, "I can tell you why, chapter master."
"Speak, Pylos," the grim voice replied. "Why do we dare these odds?"
"Because we are the best of the best, chapter master," Pylos replied smartly, leaning back against his throne once more as he finished speaking.
"You are correct, Pylos," the voice responded. "We do this because we are the best. We succeed where others would but fail. Look about you, my brothers. We are garbed in the finest armor in the Imperium. We carry the greatest weapons known to man. We sail within ships of such quality that they are the envy of all that look upon them. Our officers, our crewmen, they are second to none throughout the galaxy." Pylos noted that a few of his bridge crew sat up straighter at their stations at this last and hid a growing smile. "Do any amongst you think that such a thing is mere happenstance? The High Lords of Terra make fierce demands of our chapter, and without fail we rise to every challenge. These suits of armor, these swords and ships and guns, these are but trinkets given in reward. Take them away and what have you? My answer, still the finest Astartes chapter amongst the stars!
"In mere minutes we shall reach the apex of our maneuver and begin the secondary burn that will carry our fleet around the bulk of our trecherous ally, and there deliver us into battle. We shall not be lost amidst the storm, for our strength and surety is second to none. And once we have bested the might of a gas giant, what man shall dare stand before us?
"We shall crush those who dare befoul the worlds of the Emperor. We shall bleed our foes dry, and teach them the lesson they should have learned ten thousand years ago - the Imperium will never fall!"
The channel suddenly crackled with feedback as innumerable voices roared, and Pylos added his own bark of approval to the cacophony, banging his armored fist against his breastplate. His bridge crew likewise raised their voices in a cheer. The chapter-wide roar ended as quickly as it began, and the channel closed as it trailed off. A moment later a dispassionate female voice announced - "one minute to secondary burn."
"Now we come to the moment of truth," Pylos said. "Status?"
"All sections show green, captain," the master of the watch replied. "Shields at full. Engine temperature's a bit higher than normal, but acceptable."
"Very good," Pylos said. "Helm, at thirty seconds to burn, begin roll maneuver."
"Aye, sir!" Even as the man voiced his acknowledgement, the view of the Calydon showed the strike cruiser beginning to perform the selfsame roll, turning to present its belly to the sky, its bridge tower pointed 'down' towards the planet. A few moments later the time-to-burn announcement came, and Pylos watched the horizon of the gas giant flip about as the Telamonian rolled.
"Ten seconds to secondary burn."
"The Emperor is my rock and my fortress," Pylos heard Demoleon murmur softly. "He is my strength, in whom I will trust; He is my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold and my refuge."
"Amen," Pylos replied.
"Final countdown for secondary burn," the Mechanicus representative said from his lectern. On the viewscreen, the image of the Calydon suddenly went white as her engines flared. "Quinque... Quattuorum... Tres... Due... Unus..."
The bridge seemed to take a collective breath.
"...engagus!"
A roar erupted that eclipsed even the fleetwide cheer of a minute ago and the Telamonian shook beneath Pylos' feet. The Astartes captain was rocked back in his throne as the strike cruiser leapt forward, and he even had to put out his hand to steady his helm before it slipped from his knee. The crackling of the shield scatter grew louder, adding to the bellow of the engines and threatening to drown out all else.
"Communications lost, captain, there's too much interference," the comm officer reported.
"Engine compartment temperature rising rapidly," the master of the watch warned.
"Engine temperature will not exceed redline limits," the tech priest replied in a calm voice.
"Status of the fleet!" Pylos growled, levering himself forward in his chair in defiance of the invisible forces that pressed down upon him.
"All ships remain above the gravity horizon," the sensor man replied. "Daedelos Krata has begun its burn."
"Show me the Krata," Pylos said.
The white field of the Calydon's engine burn flickered and was replaced by the image of a raging inferno. Beyond the bow wave of shield scatter, Pylos could just make out the bulk of the mighty assault carrier. By far the largest of the fleet, the gigantic ship was last in their formation, its tremendous mass throwing out a terrific disruption of the gas giant's atmosphere. Pylos imagined that from high orbit it would make quite a sight.
"Time remaining on secondary burn?"
"One minute, forty-seven seconds, captain," the tech priest replied.
Pylos suppressed a noise of displeasure and sat back once more, glancing at Demoleon as he did so. For a brief moment, as his second returned the look, Pylos saw himself reflected in Demolean's eyepiece - olive skin and close-cropped dark hair, a trio of service studs glinting from above one hazel eye tinged by crimson. "Now we wait," he said. Demoleon shrugged.
Pylos hadn't really anticipated any other reply.
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If there had been any mortal eye present to witness their passing, the fleet's maneuver would have proven spectacular indeed. Though thousands of kilometers apart, the six strike cruisers formed a V shape visible to the naked eye as their shields and hulls burned crimson against the backdrop of the gas giant. Contrails stretched out behind them and left streaks across the planet's surface. Behind them came the massive assault carrier, racing after the smaller strike cruisers like a mother hen chasing after her wayward chicks.
The fleet's burn carried them across the sunward side of the planet and around the far side. Their trajectory caused them to slingshot around the planet, using the gravitational field of the gigantic body to reach incredible velocity. By the time they escaped from the gravity well and the raging infernos that had blanketed their hulls faded, their speed made them resemble missiles rather than capital ships.
But their death-defying maneuver had had another purpose. The fleet had crept into the Monocerat system using the bulk of the gas giant to shield them from the sensors of their foes. Their dive into the atmosphere enabled them to hide from the Chaos fleet even as they came racing around the far side of the planet. As a result, the forces of the Archenemy were granted no warning at all until the moment seven warships roared into the battle around Monocerat IV. They ripped into the Chaos fleet with guns blazing, and the invaders had no chance to rally and prepare before the enemy was amongst them. Several of the smaller vessels were torn apart in the first seconds of the engagement.
Babbled transmissions and frantic requests for aid filled the ship-to-ship communications above Monocerat IV as the invading flotilla was thrown into disarray. Amongst their number, someone must have recognized the bronze hulls and the insignia of the bull's head upon their new foes, as before long the scattered transmissions were drowned out by a single voice-
"Minotaurs!" it screamed. "Minotaurs! The Minotaurs!"
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"Calydon and Mantinea," ordered the voice of the chapter master, "come around the rear of their fleet. Sweep up their escorts. Sybota, Leuctra, and Telamonian, begin descent to the planet's surface and prepare for drop at your discretion. Tethys and Daedelos Krata, target the Devotion's Death."
Already iron-hard, his voice took on even further edge. "Bring down that ship's shields. I want it laid bare."
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Ships wheeled about in the void above Monocerat IV as the Minotaurs fleet began the cull of the enemy flotilla. Even as the Chaos forces began to reorient to face this new foe, the Imperial Navy seized the moment to accelerate into the fray, guns blazing. Amidst the confusion of the battle, a series of flashes erupted from the sides of the Daedelos Krata as attack craft screamed from their launch bays. Against a Chaos fleet beleaguered by weeks of combat, the fighter squadrons found themselves in a deliciously target-rich environment with little to oppose them.
Their first victim was an Idolator-class raider, the forked bow shearing off under the impact of void-bombs and armor-piercing missiles. The series of impacts reached the ship's forward magazines and suddenly the entire vessel was ablaze as eruptions raced backwards along the hull ahead of the compartment doors, eagerly devouring oxygen, flammables, and crew. The attack craft scattered as the fires reached the ship's reactors and detonated them, ironically giving the hulk of the raider one last push along its course.
Even as the Idolator died, the assault carrier and its chosen consort navigated their way through the outer edges of the flotilla, closing inexorably with the vast bulk of Devotion's Death. The massive battleship began to reorient itself to meet the oncoming vessels only to find itself under fire from the opposite side as the Lunar-class cruiser Steadfast came in on an oblique angle, attempting to sweep past the larger ship's engines. As a result, Devotion's Death reoriented once more, presenting its starboard side to the Minotaurs' ships and opening up on them both with a wild broadside in an attempt to force them off their course. The sheer volume of fire might have warded off a lesser captain, but the Minotaurs plowed through it with single-minded determination.
The Tethys was the first to inflict damage upon the Chaos ship. The strike cruiser had held its fire until reaching optimum range, at which point its batteries opened up in a blaze of light, close-range missiles swarming from their tubes, their multiple warheads splitting off as they approached their target to batter themselves against the hull of the Chaos ship. An aura of crackling energy formed in the void off the front quarter of Devotion's Death as her shields attempted to repel the onslaught. Then the Tethys roared past the larger ship's bow, still firing furiously as it dared the wrath of the lance cannons.
Daedelos Krata opened fire at a longer range, adding to the halo of shield scatter around the Chaos vessel. At the same time, passing by the lower port side of Devotion's Death, the Steadfast exchanged broadsides with the larger ship, and through the Imperial vessel recieved the worst of the exhange - her port side quickly beginning to resemble something that a great beast had chewed on - the barrage proved to be the final straw upon the battleship's shields.
With a flash of light that extended into the infrared spectrum, the protective bubble of energy exploded, and Devotion's Death was indeed laid bare before her enemies.
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The bridge of the Chaos battleship was a cavernous chamber, three hundred meters from the forward view panels to the lifts at the back. A long walkway extended the length of the bridge, the crew stations set to either side. The room was dominated by the massive captain's throne, upraised upon a plinth cut with passages from the Book of Lorgar so that any who approached did so with their eyes upon the holy writ. A hundred mortal thralls and half again as many servitors occupied the place, watched over by a dozen sentinels in the crimson armor of the Word Bearers. And in the great throne sat a man similarly bedecked, though his armor was black as night, silver where more of the primarch's writ was etched upon the ceramite. In one fist he held the signifier of his station - the long golden staff topped with the geat wheel of Chaos.
Then there was a hard bang of air and a flash of light, and from thin air twenty new figures appeared on the bridge.
Each of them was a match for the Word Bearers in size or even greater. Half of them towered over even the Chaos Marines, their terminator armor lending them size and strength unmatched by their foes. The others wore the gleaming Mk.VIII plate of the Adeptus Astartes, the finest armor produced by the forges of the Imperium. The twenty warriors in bronze and crimson armor formed a circle, facing outwards, and even as the flash of light from the teleport began to fade, their weapons began to chatter and roar as they opened fire upon the bridge crew of Devotion's Death, concentrating on the hated Chaos marines.
The first to die was the ship's master of ordinance, who found himself face-to-face with one of the giant terminators. The mighty warrior didn't even bother to dispatch the mortal with a weapon - an armored boot kicked out and caught the mortal man, crushing his skull and knocking him to the deck.
As the battle was joined, one figure stepped from the tight-knit circle. A beast of a man, in his gleaming bronze plate he stood taller even than his fellow terminators, a great red crest adding to his height. His armor was worked with devotional sigils, the polished bronze edged in silver, and at his shoulder he bore a gleaming rendition of the Crux Terminatus, the skull-rune that signified his right to bear the armor. In one hand he clutched a mighty storm shield worked with the sigil of a great bull's-head. In the other he held a spear longer even than he was tall, topped with a heavy ebon blade that thrummed with power.
He was unmistakable. He was Asterion Moloc - Chapter Master of the Adeptus Astartes Minotaurs.
He paid scant attention to the battle that raged behind him, but rather fixed his gaze upon the throne and the armored figure there, lifting his spear in challenge. In response, the dark apostle tightened his grip upon the sacred crozius and flattened his hand upon his armrest, standing and stepping down from the great plinth. "You have made a grievous error, coming here," a sepulchural voice filtered from the skull-faced helm the apostle of Lorgar wore.
"We shall see," Asterion's iron-hard voice replied. The master of the Minotaurs lifted his shield into a ready guard and took a step forward, followed by another, and another. An odd bobbing motion came into his movement as he pushed off the deck with each step taken, his speed increasing as he closed with his counterpart.
Behind the skull-helm, the eyes of the dark apostle widened slightly. It was all but impossible to run in terminator armor - even with its strength-enhancing muscle fibres, the sheer weight and ponderous bulk of the suit made reaching a dead run a feat unheard of. Apparently nobody had thought to inform Asterion Moloc of this fact, however, as the armored man came barreling towards the Word Bearer with a speed and single-mindedness reminiscent of the mythical beast whose name he carried. Still, the dark apostle did not shrink from the coming fight, but rather activated his crozius' power field so that the wheel of Chaos alighted in a halo of crimson flame.
The two came together as the Chaos Marine brought his weapon down upon the face of Asterion's shield with an eruption of crackling power. Asterion lifted his shield against the blow, throwing the Word Bearer back a step and striking out with his spear, the humming blade screaming as it tore a furrow across the apostle's pauldron. The apostle swung his crozius around as he reeled from the assault, the sizzling head of the staff delivering a retaliatory blow to Asterion's side, tearing metal and defacing the gleaming armor.
The two men stepped back from another, still in their respective stances. Asterion stabbed out with his spear, only for it to be deflected by the apostle's crozius. "This is bad comedy," the Word Bearer spat. "Tell me, Minotaur, do you even know whose blood runs through your veins?"
"A son does not choose his father," Asterion replied without hesitation. He leveled his spear to point the blade at the Word Bearer. "It is merely his choice to forsake him."
"Oh, how very clever," the apostle spat. He stepped forward and once more slammed his crozius into the face of Asterion's shield, kicking out to catch the armored chapter master in the knee and driving him back a step. The two men continued to exchange blows, power fields arcing and screaming as weapon and shield met repeatedly. "You cannot even comprehend the magnitude-"
"So be it," Asterion interrupted. With a sudden motion he stepped forwards and swung his shield, catching the Word Bearer's crozius and knocking it aside with a scream of energy as the power fields collided. With a quick move of his hand he tossed his spear, catching it in a reverse grip and stabbing it forwards. The Word Bearer attempted to step back from the blow, but the Minotaur's strength drove the weapon into the vulnerable point of the dark apostle's armor between helm and breastplate. The blade of the spear forced the Word Bearer down onto his knees and the golden crozius fell to the deck with a clang of metal as the master of the Chaos flotilla reached up with both hands in a vain attempt to staunch the wound. "And now, you die as you lived, Word Bearer," the chapter master ground out. "On bended knee." The master of the Minotaurs drew back his spear and then slammed the edge of his storm shield into the skull-helm of the dark apostle. The blow knocked the Chaos marine backwards, sprawling at the foot of the plinth. His fingers twitched once and then his armored form went limp. His helm had been reduced to scarcely more than half its former size.
Asterion turned from the corpse to survey the bridge. His away team had made short work of the hapless bridge crew, the guardian Word Bearers following shortly afterwards. "Matthaios," he barked. "It's time."
"Aye, chapter master," a metallic voice replied. One of the armored figures leapt from the central walkway down into the crew pit. Unlike the others, his armor was entirely crimson and marked with the cogwheel of the Mechanicus, with a heavy servo-arm affixed to his back. The techmarine pulled one of the many corpses away from where it had slumped against one console, letting it drop to the floor as he began to strike the keys with surprising dexterity.
"Lukas, guard duty. Everyone else, plant your charges," Asterion growled. The armored figures were already moving to execute their tasks, all but for one terminator who broke off from his fellows to stand behind the techmarine, lifting one hand to aim his stormbolter at the back of Matthaios' head. The techmarine seemed to take no notice of the armored figure, his hands still working at the cogitator, but both men knew that the moment Matthaios exhibited signs of corruption during his interface with the Chaos-infected machinery, Lukas would kill him.
Despite that, the techmarine continued to work at rapid pace, his armored fingers flying across the keys with a speed no mortal could hope to match. Abruptly he lifted one hand and closed it into a fist, a long spike unsheathing from his gauntlet which he drove into a waiting terminal. The cogitator's screens began to flash in rapid succession as the techmarine continued to tap at the key controls.
The seconds ticked by as the techmarine continued to work, the clicking keys filling the void of silence left behind in the aftermath of the fight. One report after another came in from the squad members setting their charges, the techmarine's efforts continuing all throughout. The tapping went on interminably, and a frown formed on Asterion's face as he watched his mission clock. "What's the problem, Matthaios?" snapped the squad sergeant, echoing the chapter master's own thoughts. "You can hack faster than this." The techmarine did not reply immediately, his hand still flying over the controls.
When Matthaios finally spoke, it was a blessed relief. "Reorientation beginning now," the metallic voice said aloud. There was a distant hum and the view of Monocerat IV outside the view panels began to shift. "Course set," the techmarine said as he withdrew his interface from the terminal. "My apologies for the delay. Devotion's Death has a number of dark mechanicus aboard. I was forced to lock them out of the system before enacting course change. Course correction can now only be enacted from this station." He turned away from the terminal to look into the double barrels of Lukas' stormbolter.
"Say it now, and say it right," the terminator growled.
"Create in me a clean heart, O God-Emperor," Matthaios recited cautiously, "and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from thy presence; and take not thy visage from me. Restore unto me the joy of thy strength, and uphold me with thy indomitable will."
"Very good," Asterion pronounced. "Gather up." As the away team pulled once more into their knot, he added, "Matthaios, you are assigned fifty hours of fast and prayer upon completion of this action."
"Yes, chapter master," the techmarine replied, now working at a keypad affixed to his vambrace. "Beacon acquired," he reported a moment later. "Devotion's Death beginning maximum burn in twenty seconds."
"Get us out of here," Asterion ordered.
With another flash and a bang of air, the Minotaurs vanished.
---------------------------------
Moments after the Astartes escaped the bridge of the Chaos vessel, the engines of Devotion's Death lit up and the vessel began to accelerate out of formation. Unresponsive to the hails of its flotilla, the massive battleship appeared to be simply departing the fight. Then, without warning a fireball appeared at the apex of the ship's bridge tower, exploding out from the windows into the void. Trailing smoke and scrap metal, the ship continued to accelerate, breaking orbit from Monocerat IV.
And making a straight line for the gas giant.
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The Minotaurs' 3rd, 4th, and 6th Companies' drop onto Monocerat IV took the form of a squadron of Thunderhawks that departed from the trio of strike cruisers as they passed over the combat zone. The dropships entered the atmosphere with hulls blazing a bright red, flames licking at their wings as their speed ignited the air around them.
As they descended, they were met with ground-to-air fire from the weapons the invaders had brought with them to the forge world, as well as the emplacements they had captured from the defenders. Despite the volume of fire thrown up by the Chaos forces, it was all for naught as the dropships' speed carried them ahead of the guns' attempt to traverse, and as a result the eyes on the ground could follow the Minotaurs' flight by the way the sky lit up behind their ships.
"LZ in thirty seconds," a voice boomed over the announcement system of the lead thunderhawk.
"Load weapons," Pylos ordered, and a series of snapping and humming sounds filled the compartment as the Minotaurs slammed clips home and activated power coils. "Demoleon?" he called out.
"Sir," the man replied.
"My memory deserts me. Who are we?"
"We are the Minotaurs, my captain."
"And what is it we do?"
"We destroy the enemies of the Emperor."
"And how is it that we do this?"
"We are the best of the best."
"What are we?"
"The best of the best, my captain!"
"WHAT ARE WE?" Pylos roared.
"THE BEST OF THE BEST!" the men roared back.
"MINOTAURS!" the captain roared, feeling the motion of the dropship as it slowed and swung around.
"BLEED THEM DRY!" his men chorused.
There was a jolt as the thunderhawk set down and the doors began to cycle open, the ramp extending. Dull red light flooded the compartment. "By squads!" Pylos ordered. "Roll out!" The Minotaurs snapped the releases on their harnesses and stampeded from the gunship. They had set down on a landing pad normally used by the gigantic haulers used by the Mechanicus, and as a result the entire landing force fit neatly onto the broad apron. Within moments of touchdown the landing pad was filled with the armored figures of the Minotaurs as they streamed from their dropships. Several of the thunderhawks lingered in the air, explosive bolts going off to detach the payloads they carried - land raiders and the armored figures of dreadnoughts.
"Nikolaos?" Pylos asked over the Minotaurs' command channel.
"Pylos," replied the growled voice of the fourth captain.
"There's a battery of orbital lances to the south of us."
"I'm aware, captain. They fired upon us during our descent."
"That offended me," Pylos deadpanned.
"An unwise thing," his fellow captain agreed. "Shall I balance the scales?"
"I would be honored, my friend. Captain Anthimos?"
"Captain Pylos," a more mellilfuous voice answered this time.
"I noticed a large comm station to the southwest as we made our final approach. It seemed to be missing a few Imperial flags."
"Clearly an unacceptable state of affairs, captain," Anthimos replied. "Sixth Company shall rectify that situation. By your leave."
"Granted," Pylos replied before switching over to his company's channel. "Third Company," he ordered. "Your orders are simple. Hit them hard. Bleed them dry. Move out!"
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The Minotaurs slammed into the battlefront at a dead run, a stampede worthy of the bull-myth for whom they were named. Bolters roared and chainswords screamed as the armored warriors charged through the lines of Monocerat IV's defenders and overran the invaders' forward positions in mere moments. Lasfire and solid shot alike glanced harmlessly from their plate as they waded into the fray. The mortal followers of Chaos were hardly a threat to the armored space marines, and little better were the squealing warp-things they had brought with them. The Minotaurs culled them equally, leaving gore and bloody wreckage in their wake. Only the Word Bearers could give them pause, but the Chaos Marines were outnumbered and gunned down ignominiously as they attempted to enact their last stands.
In panic, the invaders attempted to organize a fallback strategy, but the Astartes crushed the defensive points even as they were chosen. Worse, the sisters of the Argent Shroud seized upon the Minotaurs' momentum, figures bedecked in dove-grey armor moving in to support the Astartes. Where the Minotaurs broke open barricades and crushed strongpoints, the Argent Shroud massacred the remnants of the invaders, clearing the occupied facilities block by block.
A rune flashed in the corner of Pylos' vision and he opened the indicated channel, idly pulling the trigger of his bolter and exploding the head of a deformed man-thing that had been ineffectually spraying the Minotaurs with low-velocity slugs. "This is Captain Pylos," he said aloud.
"Your enthusiasm is commendable, brother," a clipped female voice said in his ear.
Pylos grinned. "I am gratified, sister. Who am I addressing?"
"I am Canoness Preceptor Johanna Meyr of the Argent Shroud," the clipped voice responded.
"That's quite a mouthful," Pylos replied, motioning for his men to continue forward. "Shall I address you as Canoness?"
There was a long pause, the woman perhaps surprised by his manner. "That will be acceptable, captain. The Imperial Guard has agreed to follow in our wake and enact lockdown procedure in cleared sections of the facility. Keep your men moving forward and the Argent Shroud shall support you however we may."
"My thanks, Canoness," the captain replied.
"It is my duty," the woman's voice replied evenly. "The Emperor protects."
"The Emperor protects," Pylos echoed, and closed the channel.
----------------------
In the end, the progressions that had taken the invaders weeks to achieve were undone in mere hours. The Minotaurs culled tens of thousands in their brutal charge, the sisters of the Argent Shroud and the men of the Imperial Guard finishing off whatever they left behind. The last compartment of the facility to be cleared was Hangar 3.41.B, the very place where the Chaos forces had first made landfall, and here the last of the Word Bearers collected what few followers remained and made their final stand. Even as they gathered in preparation, thousands of kilometers above their heads the mighty flotilla they had assembled was fragmenting under the subjucation of repeated boading actions by the Minotaurs still in space, as well as torpedo volleys and devastating barrages from Tertius Group. With the sudden and inexplicable retreat of Devotion's Death, the flotilla found itself leaderless and at the mercy of the Imperial forces.
The Minotaurs and the Argent Shroud offered the followers of Chaos no quarter. They attacked the hangar from all sides - the Minotaurs' third and sixth companies pushing in from the flanks while the fourth, bringing with them more armor and heavy firepower than their fellows, tore through the very door the place, cutting it away and exposing the chamber to the planet's atmosphere as they attacked. At the same time the Sororitas dropped in from the roof of the building, pouncing upon the heretics' very heads.
It was a confused, anarchic battle conducted at blistering speed. Pylos saw a massive terminator leap from an upper gantry, dropping down onto the floor with meteoric force and then uppercutting a Word Bearer with a blast of energy as his power fist connected, sending the armored figure flying backwards through the air.
One of Sixth Company's apothecaries caught hold of a cultist's arm as the man charged him with a bladed implement, swinging him about through the air with the ease of a child's toy - at least until he struck the nearby wall and his spine snapped like a twig.
One of the Minotaurs was felled by a smash from a Word Bearer's hammer. The heretic moved to plant one foot upon the Astartes' chest before he could rise, lifting up his weapon in preparation for a killing blow. Before he could do so, however, the armored figure of a retributor stepped in to press the muzzle of her multi-melta to his back. A moment later the heretic marine was immolated in a burst of liquid flame. The prone Minotaur kicked the remnants of his foe away and accepted a hand up from the armored woman, snatching up his chainsword as he did so.
Another Word Bearer weilding a twin pair of chainaxes retreated from a pair of Third Company marines, deflecting their blows with enviable skill. Unfortunately for the heretic, his retreat carried him right into the inexorable claws of Venerable Alexios. The Fourth Company dreadnought closed his power fist around the Word Bearer's backpack and, without ceremony, lifted him from his feet and dashed him to the floor with a resounding crash that left the steel deck of the hanger noticably dented, and the armor of the Word Bearer shattered.
With slow surety, the noose tightened around the heretics. A few loyalists fell, but they were hollow victories in the face of certain defeat. In the end, the last reports of combat came from the roof of the hangar, and Pylos made his way up there with the intent of ending the battle personally. To his surprise, as he followed the sound of steel on steel, he found not a final nest of heretics but a pair of figures locked in a duel to the death.
The sister wore the armor of a seraphim, but she had obviously disengaged the winged jump pack at some point, the better to move and react to the fight. Her helm was scored with the burn of a power weapon, but it seemed not to deter her as she fought, her sword clashing with that of her opponent twice, sometimes three times per second. Said opponent was a Word Bearer, his crimson armor ornate and marked with the ubiquitous texts that Lorgar's legion so favored. By the markings, Pylos could tell that he was of superior rank, likely the captain that served at the side of every dark apostle. He racked his brain for the word the Chaos Marines used - the Coryphaus.
At a glance, the Word Bearer clearly outmatched his opponent - he was faster and stronger than the woman, his armor capable to deflecting blows that would cut a lesser man in half. His reach was greater as well, and he used it to full advantage, battering at the woman's defenses mercilessly. To Pylos' surprise, as she shuffled backwards she proved capable of deflecting or dodging away from every blow the Coryphaus made, her power sword crackling as it clashed against his daemonic weapon. Pylos mentally complimented her strategy - despite her admirable skill she was clearly the lesser of the two duelists, but her defensive set meant that she was able to concentrate her focus on staying alive, while the heretic was forced to expend much more effort in attempting to slay her.
More of the Minotaurs and Sororitas followed the sound of the duel, a loose ring beginning to form around the pair as the impromtu display unfolded. Neither seemed to notice, as their entire efforts were bent towards the unfolding fight.
"Captain?" Pylos tore his gaze away from the drama to turn his head towards Demoleon. The veteran gestured towards the pair with his free hand. "Should we intervene?"
Pylos shrugged, replying over an open channel. "I'm certain that the honored sister of the Argent Shroud would be insulted if we dared steal the glory of her kill," he said.
The seraphim turned aside an overhead blow, her boots skidding across the roof as she dropped back, falling onto one knee with her sword readied for the next blow. "Actually," said a feminine voice breathless with exertion, "I wouldn't mind at all, brother."
The Coryphaus straightened in surprise, his stance slipping. "You b-"
"Very good, sister," Pylos cut him off, and without further prompting he leveled his bolter and fired. Several of his men and a number of the Sororitas alike joined in, a storm of bolt rounds slamming into the Word Bearer and spinning him around with the force of their impacts, blowing holes in his precious armor. His sword clattered to the ground and moments later, so did the smoking hulk of his corpse, his helm blown out by one particularly accurate shot.
Over the open channel, Pylos heard a voice state, "compartment secured."
A cheer went up amongst the men and women alike, and Pylos stepped out from the impromtu ring, slinging his bolter and reaching up to disengage his helm, breathing in the sharp air of Monocerat IV. "That was a superlative display of skill," he said, offering his hand to the seraphim. "What is your name, sister?"
She accepted his hand up, and once she had gained her feet and sheathed her blade, her hand went to unlock her own helm and pull the damaged piece away. She was breathing heavily, and sweat had matted her tawny hair, but her green eyes were alight with fire, and her grip on his hand was surprisingly fiece. "Etain, brother captain," she replied. "My name is Etain Khione."
Pylos was stopped from replying further as he heard Nikolaos shouting. The normally even-tempered captain rarely got excited, and so his repeated shouts of "Look! Look up! Look up!" drew Pylos' attention imemdiately. His gaze followed the captain's pointed hand and he turned his attention upwards to where the gas giant hung like a great, lidless eye above the moon's surface.
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Devotion's Death plunged into the thickening atmosphere at breakneck speed. Any chance at halting the battleship's death dive had been crushed with the destruction of her bridge. Given time, her crew might have been able to re-route her controls elsewhere, but techmarine Matthaios' course had ensured they were not to be given such a luxury. A few souls, the truly desperate, had bailed out of the ship and put their hopes in the tiny chance that the Imperials might choose to capture them. The rest had either resigned themselves to their fate or else simply wailed and gnashed their teeth, broken by the knowledge of their impending doom.
The gravitational field of the gas giant wrenched the hull of the mighty battleship, metal tearing and screaming as it fought the inexorable foe. The superheated atmosphere flooded the openings in the ship's hull, mercifully burning her crew to death long before they could choke on the unbreathable gases. A magazine on her starboard side exploded, causing the ship to begin tumbling and hastening her death.
At long last, the crushing pressure began to crumple the Devotion's Death, and her agonizing demise was ended as her reactor chamber gave way to inevitability.
------------------------
From the surface of Monocerat IV, the death of the Chaos ship appeared first as a growing point of light upon the surface of the gas giant, intensifying sharply until it appeared bright as a star. A ripple went through the painted clouds of the jovian planet, the shockwaves released from the battleship's violent explosion shifting the atmospherics for thousands of kilometers in every direction.
All across the forge world, men wept, cheered, or prayed - or sometimes did all three. Tertius Group played We Salute Thee, Imperator over the open fleet channel, and even the stoic Minotaur fleet broadcast the words of Reclusiarch Enkomi, the chaplain's grave voice reciting passages from the chapter's prayerbooks.
And on the roof of Hangar 3.41.B, the mingled voices of the Minotaurs and the Argent Shroud were raised in triumph. Someone even let off a bolter round, an act that was quickly rebuked by Captain Anthimos. Amidst the cheering, Pylos felt a tap at his pauldron. He turned to find Etain's sharp green eyes regarding him, and then with little warning the Sororita reached out to clamp one gauntlet around the collar of his breastplate, her tall frame permitting her to easily lift herself to his level as she planted a firm kiss upon his mouth. For a long moment she pressed her lips to his, the taste and scent of her alike washing over him before she pulled away, with a grin that Pylos could have sworn was not quite complete without fangs.
"That was for your assistance, captain," she said as she released him and rocked back on her heels. "My thanks." Then she turned smartly and departed, leaving Pylos with a bemused grin as he watched her go.
He heard the noise of a throat clearing and turned to see Demoleon stepping into his place beside him. "Hm."
"Don't say it," he warned.
"I wasn't going to," the man replied dryly.
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Imperial history records that the Siege of Monocerat ended with the defeat of the Archenemy champion by Sister Etain Khione of the Adepta Sororitas.
The Adeptus Astartes Minotaurs were credited with the destruction of the infamous Devotion's Death as well as their invaluable efforts in bringing the siege to a quick end.
Battlefleet Obscuras (Tertius) claimed the destruction of nineteen enemy vessels, the remainder falling to the Minotaurs and planetary defenses.
Wreckage from the orbital battle is still known to orbit both Monocerat IV and its parent gas giant - a hazardous-navigation warning remains in effect to this day.
An estimated twelve million lives were lost in the defense of the forge world. In memorial of the many sacrifices, an obelisk carved from the moon's own iron ore was commissioned by Forgemaster Berokal of the Adeptus Mechanicus. It is three hundred and fifty meters in height and inscribed with all the names that could be found from the rolls of the dead.
Monocerat IV continues to be a major supplier of raw materials for the inner systems of the Segmentum Obscuras.
The Imperium has not fallen.
