by Andy Clark
‘I am disappointed in Kurt’s judgement,’ said Danial. ‘His non-committal response to our plan was damning. He diminishes the honour of his house.’
‘Let’s hope he doesn’t also diminish our chances of victory,’ said Markos.
‘Orks will land in Minotos territory just as they do in ours,’ said Suset. ‘And as you say, we can count on the firm allegiance of House Pegasson. We will all fight the xenos, with the best plan at our disposal. And we will win.’
‘Well said, my lady,’ said Danial. ‘And therein lies our own thread in the tapestry, Markos. You and I are expected in full panoply at the Typor Battery within the hour, to rendezvous with the lances there.’
‘Best get to our steeds then, sire,’ said Markos, cracking his scarred knuckles. ‘They’ll be impatient for ork blood.’
‘Good hunting, my liege,’ said Suset. ‘I’ll make sure the ’spire’s still standing when you return. Please, be safe.’
‘My lady, I could wish for no finer Gatekeeper,’ said Danial. ‘Captain Bannoch and his men will serve as your honour guard while you command the defence here. I only wish old friends were here to march at our side in this fight.’
‘So do we all,’ said Suset. ‘In Excelsium Furore, my King.’
‘Wield the fires within, my lady,’ he replied, then turned and marched away with Markos at his side.
Elsewhere, Jennika Tan Draconis strode Fire Defiant across the rocky foothills of the Adrapotines. Three Knights marched in arrowhead formation with her – two of House Draconis, one of House Pegasson.
With every mile covered, they pressed further north and west, out of Draconis territory and into that once ruled by the disgraced House Chimaeros. Steady drizzle fell, slicking the metal skin of their steeds and draping a soft veil over the rugged terrain.
In her steed’s shadow, the inquisitor’s Charger lumbered along beside Sacristan Traxin’s Crawler. Massata had insisted that the Kasrkin, Sergeant Kaston, drive his vehicle, refusing to have any Adrastapolian-born aboard his transport. Jennika had to admit that the Cadian was doing a fine job, the hauler traversing the difficult terrain without a snag.
‘Inquisitor,’ voxed Jennika.
‘Lady Jennika?’ replied Massata.
‘Three days, we have been travelling. Yet in that time, we have spoken little and you have told me nothing of what you fear lies ahead…’
She waited, but was answered only by the hiss of an open vox-line. Irritated, Jennika pressed on.
‘We will aid you in your efforts, inquisitor, but I do not think it unreasonable for me to ask. What could be so important that it cannot wait until after the xenos threat is dealt with?’
‘That is not an unreasonable question,’ said Massata. ‘Yet, as an inquisitor, I am under no obligation to answer it. You are brave to have even asked.’
‘My honour compels me, inquisitor,’ said Jennika. ‘I respect your rank, but the Code Chivalric is clear. My lance and I are bound to aid you in your undertaking on behalf of our world. As the lance’s leader, I am required to gather all information I can about the threat we face, so that we can better acquit ourselves against it.’
‘Very well,’ said Massata, sounding irritated. ‘I have faced Chaos in many guises, Lady Jennika, upon many different worlds. It is never more dangerous than when it subverts good Imperial servants. It is not just the corrupted themselves who are to be feared, but the taint that their dark worship leaves behind. The roots of such corruption go far deeper than most would believe, deeper even than the reach of the most fervent Ministorum prayers.’
‘You fear that this corruption has taken root beneath the former seat of House Chimaeros?’ asked Jennika.
‘The sorceress Alicia Kar Manticos,’ said Massata. ‘She was Consort to Gerraint Tan Chimaeros for many years, and it is my belief that she was tainted by the worship of Chaos throughout all of that time. She had long decades for her evil to seep into the scions of House Chimaeros, and to poison the keep in which she dwelt. If I am right, then the Houses of Adrastapol may have been guilty of the sin of complacency. Believing the Great Enemy vanquished upon your world, you may instead have afforded it time to gather its strength and become a threat again.’
‘We cleansed the seats of Houses Chimaeros and Wyvorn with fire and faith,’ said Jennika angrily. ‘We could have done no more. There was no complacency on our part, sir.’
‘Yet the threat may remain,’ said Massata. ‘I only pray that I am not too late to do what must be done to save this world.’
Jennika’s reply caught in her throat as a dull rumble became audible, growing swiftly to a roar. She worked her auspex, sweeping for threats, unshrouding her guns. High in the sky, a light became visible. It swept closer, a blazing meteorite ploughing through the clouds. The bellow of its coming filled the world, and caused Jennika’s steed to shudder.
She watched as the huge mass of rock and metal rushed over their heads, wreathed in the flames of re-entry, arcing away towards the Valatane. Slowly, it receded. More hurtling projectiles could be seen now, carving their own lines of fire through the stratosphere.
‘That meteor had engines built into it,’ she said. ‘Guns.’
‘The invasion has begun,’ said Massata.
‘Whatever threat you believe is out here, we must face it quickly and be done,’ said Jennika. ‘Adrastapol’s fate hangs in the balance.’
‘It truly does,’ agreed Massata.
The orkish scourge fell upon Adrastapol with breathtaking fury. Their ramshackle armada filled the void. Upon the orders of High King Danial Tan Draconis, the Bastion Fleet retreated rather than face certain annihilation by a vastly larger force. The Adrastapolian surface batteries, on the other hand, let fly the moment the greenskins’ ships entered orbit.
It is estimated that over one hundred ork ships were annihilated by lance and missile fire from the surface before the xenos even began their invasion. It is a testament to the size of their horde – or ‘Waaagh!’ – that this did not even give the greenskins pause.
As their first waves of frigates and gunships were blown apart, and burned up in Adrastapol’s atmosphere, the craft behind them swept on unscathed. Many of these were invasion vessels known as Roks. Stolen asteroids fitted with crude thrusters, gun decks and controls, these warships fell upon Adrastapol in their hundreds. The tunnels and crew decks of each were crammed with thousands upon thousands of xenos, all filled with an unholy eagerness for butchery. They were, perhaps, comparable to a heretical perversion of our own noble Drop Keeps.
Of course, not all of these Roks survived their fiery descent from the heavens. Many failed to decelerate, slamming into Adrastapol with sufficient force to hurl plumes of debris high into the atmosphere, and to kill every last greenskin aboard.
Others broke up, or spun wildly out of control, dashing their passengers to ruin across the planet’s rugged mountain ranges or plunging them into the unmerciful waters of its oceans. More still were savaged by the Adrastapolian batteries, for the Roks were extremely large targets whose evasive skills could be likened to those of a vehemently flung brick.
Yet if even a full half of the orks’ Roks met their end, still this left many hundreds whose suicidal plunge was a success. Their fall cushioned by retro-rockets fired at the last moment, they impacted Adrastapol’s surface with great force.
Those that landed amidst open wilderness or agricultural land formed instant fortresses, their stony flanks unassailable and their gun batteries able to fire upon targets many miles distant. Worse still were those that – through sheer bad fortune – struck landmarks and sites of strategic value. The Umberan agriplex was destroyed by such an impact, the militia left to garrison it annihilated at a stroke. The void shields of Mount Imperius were overloaded by another such collision, its catastrophic shockwave killing more than half of Adrastapol’s astropathic choir.
A logger’s village in the south Valatane was destroyed and all of its inhabitants killed – just punishment perhaps for their refusal to follow the orders of their king. Yet there was nothing just about the subsequent landslide that the impact caused, that buried an orbital battery and the lance of Knights who guarded it.
Worst afflicted were the lands of House Minotos. Possessing naught but the most rudimentary of orbital defences, the Minotane lands presented an open portcullis to the greenskin ships, which fell upon them in great number.
The same was true of the northern and southern polar continents, Adrasal and Adoropae. Yet there the greenskins would find only dense and dangerous jungles, thundering volcanoes and voracious super-predators that must surely have greeted the invaders with a savagery even they were hard pressed to match.
For a day and night, the ork ships rained down. Wherever the invaders landed, they wasted no time in pouring forth, chanting the name of their warlord: a beast named in their crude tongue as Gorgrok Killfist. Though they adorned themselves in a jarring mass of gaudy colours and foul trophies, the overwhelming majority of the invaders wore vivid blue, and waved ragged banners of the same hue. White skull glyphs were plastered upon their armour, skin and war engines, the mark of a sub-species of greenskin known as the Death Skulls.
It has been observed by Imperial authorities that this particular caste – or clan – of orks possess a remarkable talent for debase larceny, and the heretical retro-engineering of other races’ technologies. Such soon proved to be the case upon Adrastapol as, alongside wave after wave of bellowing infantry, hurtling aircraft and ramshackle ork vehicles, there advanced countless stolen Imperial battle tanks.
Such technological heresy was an affront to everything in which the Knights of Adrastapol believed, yet still it was not the worst. Looming over the greenskin hordes and shaking the ground with their tread came mighty greenskin war effigies, bloated giants of scrap-iron armour that dwarfed even the proud steeds of the Adrastapolian Knights. Clearly these mechanical monstrosities were meant to personify the gods of the greenskin creed. Wherever their heavy tread fell, they profaned the very soil of Adrastapol with their presence.
For all this horror, in spite of the tide of foes that befouled their world, and the swarms of enemy voidcraft that rained fire from on high, still the Knights of Adrastapol marched out to meet the xenos with their heads held high. They marched in full panoply. They followed the finely crafted battle plans of their assembled leaders. They made the enemy pay in blood for every forward step they took. For weeks, they took the fight to the greenskins and held them at bay.’
Extracted from the writing of Sendraghorst,
Sage Strategic of Adrastapol,
vol XXI ‘The 2nd Ork War’
Oath of Flame advanced at a steady stride through the burned remains of an olidarne copse. Blackened trunks passed by on either side, jutting up from the soil like accusing fingers. Many still smouldered, and drifting smoke fouled the air. Danial sat in his throne mechanicum, its neural jacks and haptic gauntlets linking him to his steed and filling his mind with ghosts.
Five Knights accompanied Danial, a full lance of House Draconis steeds. The High King advanced at the far right of their staggered line. Markos’ Knight Warden, Honourblaze, marched to his left, flanked by Sire Nauman in his Gallant, Crimson Blade, Lady Melessa in her Knight Errant, Dracon’s Ire, and finally Sire Roget in his Knight Crusader, Fires of Valour.
Cherub-like servitors skimmed overhead, grav impellers humming and eye-lenses scanning the smoke as they fed information to the Knights below. The macabre creatures were a maniple of House Draconis’ Heavenly Host, controlled remotely from the Sacristan Crawler that lumbered along half a mile behind the Knights’ advance.
Ahead of them, an ork Rok squatted like a shattered mountain amidst the smog and the grey dawn light.
‘Keep your eyes on your auspexes and your fingers on your triggers,’ said Markos. ‘The greenskins can’t be far.’
‘There’s no movement yet,’ replied Sire Nauman. ‘Perhaps this one’s abandoned.’
Danial heard the hope in his comrade’s voice, and sympathised.
‘We’ve been fighting for days now, I know,’ he said. ‘We are all tired. We are all shaken by the mindless ferocity of this foe. But don’t allow false hope to disarm you. The enemy are here, and they will make themselves known soon enough. Be ready, my Knights, and we will slaughter them as we have done a dozen times already.’
‘Yes, sire,’ came their replies.
‘Distance to Rok now three miles,’ said Lady Melessa. ‘Energy signatures on the auspex, confused returns.’
‘I see them,’ said Danial. With his mind connected directly to the sensorium of his steed, his perception of the world was vastly augmented. He saw everything that its auspex, vid-feeds and data siphons did, a three-hundred-and-sixty-degree panorama overlaid with information feeds, thermal filters and noospheric calculations. The avalanche of input would have driven an unaugmented mind mad.
For Danial, conditioned since birth and fitted with the finest augmetics his house could provide, it was akin to omnipotence.
‘Picking up movement on the strategic overlay,’ reported Sire Roget. ‘They’re out there all right, sire.’
His words were chased by a series of muted flashes amidst the smoke, far away near the foot of the Rok.
‘Shields,’ ordered Danial.
His Knights angled their ion shields to the fore. Artillery shells whipped out of the smog to detonate against them, raising sparking blue flares.
‘Cogitating trajectory,’ said Markos.
Targeting data filtered into Danial’s peripheral vision, and crimson lines traced back through the smoke.
‘All Knights, halt,’ said Danial, reining Oath of Flame in as his comrades did the same. ‘Markos, Roget, reciprocate.’
‘With pleasure, sire,’ said Roget. A swarm of stormspear missiles leapt from the launcher atop his carapace, and his long guns roared. Markos’ avenger gatling cannon howled up to speed, a stream of high calibre rounds whipping away through the smoke. Danial smiled grimly as he saw distant explosions.
The response was instantaneous. Distant klaxons rose in crescendo. Danial’s audio-receptors picked up the roar of bestial voices and the throaty revving of crude engines.
‘That roused them,’ said Markos. ‘Hundreds of separate power signatures are registering.’
‘Three war effigies,’ said Danial, studying his auspex returns. ‘Moving slowly in this direction, tightly grouped. They’re smaller than Stompas.’
‘I’m reading energy spirit agitation from the Rok,’ said Lady Melessa. ‘Beware its artillery.’
As though summoned by her words, a rippling string of muzzle flares lit the Rok’s flank. Shells and energy blasts rained around them, blowing apart burned trees and hurling rock and soil into the air. The shockwaves tore the smoke to tatters.
‘Their accuracy is as terrible as ever,’ commented Danial.
‘True enough, but their guns are just as potent,’ said Markos. ‘Complacency and death are passionate bedfellows, so mind your shield discipline.’
Danial watched his data-manifold closely, picking out multitudinous ork signatures drawing closer. The data-tapestry had no secrets from him. ‘From energy signature dispersal and seismic reverberation, I estimate… over five hundred, less than seven. Low armour density, but confirming that trio of heavy walkers. Coming straight for us, no attempt at manoeuvre.’
‘What’s our plan, sire?’ asked Markos.
‘Jaws of the Dracon,’ said Danial. ‘Sire Nauman, Lady Melessa, you are the lure. Hold position and engage as they come to you. Markos and I flank right, Roget left.’
‘Understood, sire,’ said Roget. He turned his steed and strode away.
‘Sacristan Banaxos,’ voxed Danial.
‘Yes, sire,’ cam
e Banaxos’ voice.
‘We are engaging,’ said Danial. ‘There are a lot of them, Sacristan. Be prepared for overspill.’
‘Our guns are unshrouded and their spirits bellicose,’ said Banaxos.
‘Good hunting, all of you,’ said Danial. ‘In Excelsium Furore!’
‘Wield the fires within!’ they shouted.
‘And may the Emperor watch over us all,’ said Danial, feeding power to his motive impellers and steering his steed out towards the right flank.
The orks loped through the skeletal woods, firing their guns into the air as they came. Each alien was a muscled killer, clad in scavenged armour and leathery green hides daubed with blue-and-white warpaint. Danial reflected that, for all the tales he had heard of them before this invasion, none had truly done justice to the orks’ mindless ferocity.
Lumbering battle-tanks dotted the ork lines. At their backs towered the three huge walkers, fat-bellied mounds of armour, guns and claws that were classified as Gorkanauts and Morkanauts.
The horde was preceded by a swarm of light vehicles, ramshackle bikes and buggies that hurtled over the rough terrain. The orks sped into battle with no thought for their own safety, and as they came, their oversized guns hammered.
Nauman and Melessa’s shields flared blue as the fusillade hit them. Melessa seared craters in the greenskin charge with her fusion blaster while Nauman raked them with his heavy stubbers, waiting for the foe to close so that he could employ his thunderstrike gauntlet and reaper chainsword.
‘They’ve taken the bait,’ said Markos as he and Danial strode out around the flank, toppling burned tree trunks with every step.
‘Not all of them,’ said Danial, blink-highlighting several mobs of greenskins on the auspex. Having spotted the Knights attempting to outflank them, the orks had turned and were heading their way. In their midst came self-propelled artillery pieces. Smaller orkoid creatures, the scrawny slave-caste known as gretchin, could be seen hefting shells into the guns’ breeches.