Gazetteer III

Planet Helaerus III
Trailing Region
Subsector Secondus
Archenemy Attack +64.32 hour/units

The forest burned with the crashed wrecks of voidcraft and fighters.

The ironwood trees of Helaerus stood amongst it all, withstanding most of the heat - until the underbrush and canopy caught fitr, and spread choking smoke through the dense temperate forest. Enemy landers had punched through the orbital defences to land in the deep forest, but they hadn’t known the death world in several hundred years, and the planet made them pay dearly for the trespass.

The deadly flora - and even deadlier predatory trichosaurid fauna - that populated the planet made short work of isolated crash survivors - be they Imperial or Archenemy. The forest fed on the blood of war, unconcerned by the multitude of scars left by the shattered vessels: it would take more than breached reactors to poison a world whose very existence was to rebel against invaders who consistently attempted to claim the hives above the deep Helaerean canals that divided the surface into grid lines.

Humanity had no place here - without respirators or the right tools, the planet would easily dispatch a lesser warrior unprepared for the job.

First Lieutenant Harla Trill of the 96th Letiferen Murk-eels grinned behind her respirator, as the Stormlord rolled over another fallen ironwood. The superheavy transport was their rolling bastion in this deadly environment, and carried the entirety of 2nd platoon, her command. The platoon referred to the transport as ‘the bastard’ - because the low ceiling in the transport hold braining unprepared troopers; its crew, however, called it a more respectful Eelstown Brawler - in recognition of their home. Most of 2nd Platoon preferred to ride atop the ‘Brawler, crouched down around its multiple sponsoon turrets or hunkered down behind the primary command cabin - therefore, the crew had taken to painting hazard stripes across the front of the tank, to remind the troopers where they shouldn’t be, unless they wanted to have their eardrums burst by the noise from the hull-mounted Vulcan Megabolter that served as the ‘Brawler’s primary armament.

To Trill, the planet felt just like home - except with more trees, and the things that tried you kill you were a LOT bigger, and came out of the forests instead of the muck; but otherwise pretty much like home. She’d seen Duroveran regiments balk at going beyond the hive-gates - stuck up coreworlder pricks, the lot of them. She grinned again: feth them, she excelled out here, all the more glory for the Letiferens.

Hauling herself out of the firing platform at the back of the vehicle, she crawled over the surface of the superheavy to the main cabin. Ahead of her, the rotary barrels of the megabolter lay silent, and the tank commander, Haakon, rested against the copula with a pair of magoculars scanning the forest.

“And we’re frakking lost, aren’t we, Haakon?”

He started, then glowered at her through his respirator, his voice coming out clipped and posh - spire-dwelling git that he was: “Frak! How many times do I have to tell you not to do that? And it’s Commander Haakon to you, Lieutenant Trill.”

She offered an apologetic shrug; they had a good working relationship has far as she was concerned - she hadn’t slit his throat yet, for one. He sighed, “We’re not…lost. We’ve just been... diverted the long way, and the nav-system is on the fritz.” He straightened up. “We’ll find our way back before nightfall, just detour via the deep jun--gl..e….” He slammed his foot down four times beneath him and the Stormlord slewed to a step. Trill opened her mouth to say something, but he raised his hand in an imperious gesture for silence, listening. Haakon had a unique sense for danger, and she felt what had spooked him but moments later: a dull thudding that shook the ground around them.

A series of rapid taps with his foot, and a crane-arm swung out from the back of the tank, slamming an underground auspex probe down into the dirt.

Deep within the hull of the Eelstown Brawler her Auspex operator, Corporal Kaplan, listened to the auspex pings: “There! Footfall…slow, 500 meters out, weight composition…not clear.” She looked to the spotter’s display before her, and scanned for objects around the weight that the auspex was suggesting off the sonic-ping. Another footfall. “There, slow, they know we’ve heard them… Weight…” Her eyes opened wide, and she pulled the earphones from her head, then dashed out of her cradle to the central chamber of the Stormlord, yelling up from the pit: “Titan! Scout-class! 500 meters and closing on the left flank!”

The crew didn’t wait for orders - Kaplan had to grab hold of a support strut as Driver Veth slammed the left tread into reverse and the right tread forward; the Brawler slewed around towards the oncoming titan, as her Vulcan Megabolter spun up, before the howl and thud of the immense bolt-shells fed into the giant rotary weapon unleashed an absolute cacophony of noise. For a second it seemed as if they were firing at nothing, before the purple flare of void-shields illuminated the shadows under the trees, outlining the immense shape of the Traitor Warhound Titan.

The troopers of 2nd platoon were already sprinting for the cover of the firing platform when its weaponry flared; a glancing hit evaporated several of them in a blast of plasma - and leaving Trill with plasma flash-burn along her right side, as she dove onto the hard metal winding a split second too late: “Back the frack up, Haakon! We’re not a Titan-killer!

The Brawler’s las-canons fired from their turrets as the Stormlord’s tracks slammed into full reverse. The Traitor Titan came loping through the ruined corridor that the megabolter had carved in its first salvo. The crew hooked up a second feed - it came to life with another loud burst of fire and shells, spattering across the void shields. The Titan howled sinful nonsense that made Trill’s ears itch, and its shots went wide once again; it seemed to snarl in annoyance like a living thing.

For a moment, it felt like they were gaining ground -- but the Brawler lurched suddenly, her back end dropping hard, a loud splash of water announcing they’d driven back into one of the rainwater basins dotted throughout the planetary forest. The Stormlord tried to slam forwards, hurling mud into the sky as its tracks struggled to push itself out of the water. As if realizing what had happened, the Titan slowed, howling in victory as it stalked towards them like prey. Trill was about to start yelling for her troopers to disembark and flee, when something distinctively odd happened.

Once it had been called Luce Facem; once it had marched alongside the Noble XVII; once it had carried a crew, a family…

But years of loyal service to the Dark Gods had warped it, its rusted carapace bearing twisted flesh-metal growths; its crew now lived half-lives, wrapped within the living mass of mutated flesh that had become a part of it.

It called itself Blackhound, now - the name bore no meaning, but it cared not. What had once been a noble Titan, was now a daemonic monstrosity, a rabid dog… and that was its undoing. For as it crowed and played with its kill, it ignored the half-auspex senses -- and when the eyes across its carapace swivelled around to see the threat, it was far too late.

An immense trichosaurid dropped from the trees: a Sabyr, as the locals called it – it was named after a feline species of old Terra, but it was a distant echo from it: it was feathered rather than furred, a coat of black, filament-like feathers covering its form, and with bone-like growths armouring its surface. It might have looked like a cat from a distance to early Imperial settlers of the planet, but that’s where the resemblance ended; the huge reptile was at least the size of the Stormlord tank, and slammed into the top of the Titan with enough force to flip it to one side. The Blackhound lost its balance and toppled, and trying to right itself when the Sabyr landed atop it, slamming it back into the earth.

Trill watched with wide eyes, as beast and Titan fought, a bizarre enough sight. She was snap back to herself when the guns began to whirr up, making her she yell out, “Hold fire!

As they watched in muted silence, the Sabyr’s neck-filament parted, and three shapes slid from its back. Their skin glistened in what little sunlight made it through the canopy - wide amphibian eyes glanced towards the idle Stormlord and her confused Guard Troopers; one of the figures stepped a webbed foot atop the baying head of the Titan, and levelled what appeared to be a javelin at the top of it. There came a sudden sunlight-bright flash, and a spear of energy lanced through the machine-beast, making it go deadly still - like a shot to the brain.

The frog-like xenos met her eyes again, for a moment. She swallowed and crawled over the hull to Haakon, slapping his shoulder, “Drive on out…”

“But… Xenos…” He motioned towards the figures.

“Who have very kindly not shot us for wandering into their frakking area of the planet. Drive.”

“But… the Commissar…”

“We’ve got frakking hours to come up with a story, Haakon. Drive.”

“Com…”

“I don’t frakking care, Haakon! Right now, you frakking drive and you can write me up later, or I swear to the Emperor I will string you up with your own intestines!”

He swallowed and nodded, stamping his foot on the accelerator plate, as the Stormlord slewed around and away from the strange creatures… and their kill.

Archenemy Attack +70.20 hour/units

“We just lost the Dauntless!”

Ridea Holtz scowled, “Tell me something that a senior Naval Officer hasn’t heard at least twice in their lifetime. Bloody stupid name to keep reusing for a ship.” It was hardly the most helpful retort, but it made her feel better about the whole affair of this battle. “What about the Astropathic codes that the Letiferan Inquisitorial Agent gave us. Any response?”

“No, Ma’am, but the debris field from the battle is dense, and the Archenemy seem to be silencing our Astropaths with some kind of kriffing heresy – I passed the codes to the planetside choir, but they’re having the same issue.”

The ship took another impact to its void shields, sparks flying from the bridge consoles. Holtz did her best to adjust her sweat-stained Vice-Admiral’s tunic, and stagger her way back towards her command platform and the immense holotank that sat upon it. The orbital battle was not going in her favour – they were badly outnumbered, and if the battle were to end now, she could be proud of that they had held themselves despite superior Archenemy numbers. Still, she had to order ships to withdraw from specific battle areas, and surrender those orbital zones to the Regency fleet.

For now, she had only had to give up non-essential orbital estate areas - where the Regency would have to brave the dogfights in the air, or risk dropping their troops into the deep woods if they wanted to land. She was more than happy to oblige the deathworld by letting its native life glut itself on the enemy, as far as she was concerned. But, with their numbers as they were, she would have to start surrendering more prime orbital zones - especially those where the Archenemy was pushing her Captains harder. Eventually, she knew, they’d be in position to begin landing forces closer to the hives, or even level the arcology-structures from orbit.

She glared at the holotank as if it could bring her deliverance and answers - for years, she had been Naval Intelligence; for years, she had schemed and plotted and struck with the tactical advantage. The Archenemy had her at a disadvantage, making her fight a brutal brawl, while trying to out-think them.

Her mind wandered back to the Naval Academy, at Polarnus. As young students, they’d devised a test of their skills - six rounds of regicide alternated with five rounds of mixed martial arts in Zero G. It had been nothing but a stupid game at the time - but using it as a totemic memory helped her steady her thoughts and look over the array of battle.

There was the ship she needed: “Lieutenant, hail the Lord’s Confidence. Send it the astropathic codes the Letiferen handed to us - and order her out of the field. She’s fast enough to outrun the Archenemy guns, and get the signal out.”

“But that’s a Privateer vessel, Ma’am. We don’t need their kind of…”

She cut him off with a glare. “Lieutenant, if you are so dense that you look at her clearance codes and licence and not see written between the lines ‘Inquisition vessel’ written in bold blazing lights , then I probably need to review your position aboard my bridge!” she growled, and stalked towards the front of the command platform, steadying herself as another blast hit her ship. She grasped the rail of the command platform: “Helm, bring us about full. Run out our broadsides, and make to rendezvous in the Capital Hive Orbital Zone with the rest of the fleet. I will bleed the Archenemy white before I give up Helaerus to them.."

Archenemy Attack +72.43 hour/units

“The Coiling Ones surround us in the void!”

“They guide our path, and show us the way!”

“The Coiling Ones pass through us!”

“They guide our hands, and coat our blades with poison to defeat our foes!”

“The Coiling Ones put venom into our veins.”

“Through our blood, they bless us and set us free!”

Principal-Priest Voord rose from the pool of oils, a thousand perfumes running down his naked form, the overpowering scents emanating from him, as he took the hands of his attendants and allowed them to lift his dripping form from the pool. From behind him, his familiars rose from the oily liquids and wrapped about him, hissing a sibilant siren-song. Their coils and scales brushed across his oiled flesh, rustling their vibrant neckfeathers, as they shed the oilbath.

Most members of his cult were only ever blessed one such familiar, but Voord had been favoured by six - one for each of the six Coiling Ones, one for each of the six virtues of sensation.

He reached to stroke his hand along the top of Théama’s snout, then over his eyes. Théama gave them sight with which to witness the divine acts they did in the coiling one’s name. Akróasi brushed against his head, as it coiled further - the bringer of hearing, through which they might enjoy the music their deeds brought forth. Osfrisi lent forwards, forked tongue lashing out to catch the scent of the bringer of smells. Géfsi, alongside its sibling, lashed its tongue as the taster of delicacies. The largest of them all, Angigma, the prime sensation of touch, coiled around his torso. Finally, the last of them, Yperfysikós, slid along the floor besides him - an aspect of the sixth, hidden sense. He reached down to scoop up the serpent, and shuddered as visions and warp-sight was granted to him by the psychic familiar.

He walked across the deck of the bridge, drawing a robe around his body, as his familiars slithered and shifted around him, to allow him to clothe himself. He looked at the orbital map tattooed onto pulsing flesh stretched across the frame on his command pulpit. He traced the shapes of ships, closing his eyes, and letting the Coiling Ones guide him - before stabbing a long-nailed finger down on the map. Blood welled immediately around the sharp tip and ran down the living canvas, “We push here,” he turned his eyes to the Shipmaster of the vessel, “The Coiled Ones sense portents of doom. Be aware.”

Archenemy Attack +75.31 hour/units

The Imperial fleet was burning.

Although the vessels of the Imperium were newer, easily outmatching their foes salvaged vessels in speed and weaponry, the Archenemy were more than willing to pay a bloody price and sacrifice as many of their own to win the system - Regency Serpent Cultists turned their own shipdeaths into bonfires of heretical fanaticism, ramming their burning vessels into the Imperial fleet, or turning them into burning orbital projectiles to pelt the Hives defended by the fleet.

The Transcendent Pleasure broke from the formation, the Regency ship bearing down towards the Imperial flagship. Aboard the vessels, the warning of the Coiling Ones came too late - they had sensed a threat, but had been blinded to its existence – when simultaneously every Priest cried out a warning.

But it was too late.

Sixteen black-hulled vessels burst from the Warp, icey warpfrost boiling off them as their shields rose, and massive bombardment cannons opened nearly point blank into the flank of them Regency warships, swarms of strikecraft surging from their bays.

Aid unlooked for.

Sixteen unseen and unknown Astartes vessels translated into a space nearly impossible to calculate.

The Bards-- no, Librarians -- she corrected herself, for that was what the thin-blooded Astartes of this age called their psykers, focused in a circle beneath her. The effort of using the arts of obscuration to conceal their passage from the Archenemy, the effort of delivering their ships so close to their foe saw six transhuman forms collapse as the translation completed and their ritual duties ended. The Apothecaries would tend to them and return them to battle soon enough - a temporary sacrifice to deliver the fleet to where it needed to be.

They did not outnumber the Archenemy, but they did not need to: they were far more experienced, and the element of utter surprise allowed them gave them an advantage that would be the slimmest to anyone else. To them? It allowed them to kill without restraint or mercy - and as they crashed past them like merciless waves, the vessels of the cultists who had soiled her home for millennia burned.

It wasn’t accurate to say she felt young again - Medb had been forged from Annwfyn stock, one of the first Knights of the Circle to make the journey from their home to Luna, high above the Tyrant’s World; where she was reforged by the gene-wrights of the Selenar cults. She was not of the thin-blooded stock that strode the stars today; age did not leave its mark on her as it did on those who had not been able to make the transition to the Legion, those friends she had watched wither while she remained ageless.

Perhaps it would be more correct to say she felt ‘alive’ again. After millennia of idleness watching over farmland, letting her skills go unused, the perfect clarity with which she remembered every combat lesson she had ever had, every scrape, every duel, ever battle to the death was a testament to how she had been forged. Every single moment a perfect, crystal-clear memory. As if it had been yesterday that she had stood on Terra, killing and bleeding in exchange for the promise of a pardon that the Avenging Son had denied them.

Her fingers moved to the unfamiliar ‘Chapter’ icon on her pauldron as she stared at the starfield - her transhuman senses picking across the blinks of light. There was some petty amusement of falsely claiming heritage from the scions of Ultramar to obscure their true legion and name. There had been those who had seen the mortal’s suggestion as a grievous insult, which was to be expected; there had been clamouring and shouting, but then again, since when wouldn’t disagreement to be expected when family came together? Her fingers moved to the pelt lining the collar of her power armour - carefully preserved it had been, like her, millennia ago - from a kill she could remember still.

Life before she was what she had become was but scattered memories - those like her had to be broken before being made anew, but she remembered her loyalty, her bond to humanity still – that was why they had agreed to this venture, why they had left home that had protected them in exile, the place that had given them the peace they had enjoyed for millennia, that no other of their brethren could have, quietly allowing the world to pass them by.

“Open me a vox link to the Imp--allied fleet.”

She could remember her combat skills like it was yesterday; likewise, she could remember millennia of bitter anger at their exile. That would be a challenge to conceal and forget. A light clicked on in the collar of her armour, indicating she was patched into the vox-link.

“Servants of the Imperium!” she drew on speeches she had once made to the Imperial Army, “This is the Gáe Bolga. We have received your distress calls. The Scions of Guilliman answer your call. The Lions of Nemea answer your call. Please, adjust your flight trajectories and support our push through the Archenemy fleet.”

She cut her comms, and reached to her side, her silver sword singing as she drew it from the sheath at her side, leveling it towards the oncoming Regency vessels. This time, the comms were opened to the shipmasters of the Fleet, and the other Astartes.

“Lions of Nemea we may call ourselves now, but never do we forget who we truly fight for. We remember, we remain, we are the living memory forgotten deeds. Make ready for void combat. May your blades never dull, may you always find your way in the dark.” While none voxed back, she could feel them, sense them hanging from each and every of her words: “And let the Great Enemy know…” she smiled and slashed the blade down, as her ship loosed another salvo.

“We have returned.”

Prosperitas Gazetteer III – The Die is Cast

Hope

For a moment the forces of the Prosperitas Crusade offer themselves the opportunity to know its taste.

The arrival of the hitherto unknown Space Marines of the Lions of Nemea Chapter came as a surprise to all but a few individuals within the Prosperitas Conclave. They had a brief contacted the enigmatic Chapter after an encounter with their vessels near the planet Finisterra in the Rimward Marches. This news came as a rebuke from the Inquisition towards Lady-Governor Durovera - who had previously voiced a desire to return to the world after being driven off by the mysterious Astartes during her first expedition there. The Astartes allies of the Lady-Governor, the Void Hounds, remain at her side, however, and there are rumblings and rumours that they are suspicious of this Chapter.

The Lions of Nemea claimed heritage from that greatest of Imperial Astartes bloodlines, the Ultramarines, although their names are not recorded in the Apocrypha of Skaros. The matter is not settled yet, but the backing of Inquisitor Corvinus, the current Inquisitor-Militant of the Prosperitas Crusade, guarantees their help, woefully needed, is accepted without too many questions.

It is not known the extent of the Lions of Nemea forces, but alongside a large fleet of sixteen vessels deployed at Helaerus, strike-teams of the Chapter appear in other warzones striking swiftly and then fading before they can be thanked for their aid. The Chapter seems to be able to be everywhere and nowhere.

Helaerus holds. With the aid of the Lions, it has resisted against the bulk of the Regency fleet; but fresh vessels arrive daily, and a number of small fleets and ships have been able to break out of the system’s core-ward jump point. Naval patrols hunt for these wayward Archenemy vessels before they can threaten the vital worlds of the Prosperitas Sector, or the shipping routes that run from the death-world.

Rumours from Imperial Guard forces fighting in the deadly forests deliver report strange sightings – the native saurian trichosaurids are observed to lash out specifically at the Archenemy forces where normally any life in the forest would be their rightful prey. Perhaps even more bizarre are the reports of xenos humanoids riding the trichosaurids – tall tales of humanoids resembling terran toads armed with both primitive and advanced energy weapons. These rumours are heavily suppressed within the Crusade forces by the Officio Praefectus, the Commissariat, but are passed on to the Ordo Xenos representative in the Prosperitas Sector, Lady-Inquisitor Duplesis.

Curious eyes turn towards the deep woods of Helaerus - that a sentient xenos species has thrived there despite Imperial settlement is no surprise: Imperial colonisation is limited to the Hives and colonists are unable to successfully colonize the forbidding forests of the world that fight back ferociously against invaders.

Though the Xenoforms are, currently, not a threat to Imperial forces, the Ordo Xenos has now turned its watchful eye on the system.