Henlock

Name	Henlock
Sub-Sector	Secundus
Type	War World
Population	approx. 1 million
Climate	Arid
Status	Archenemy Controlled

Henlock is a war-torn planet where a Machine War between the Archenemy and forces of the Adeptus Mechanicus has raged for decades. It is currently in Regency hands.

About Henlock

Not much is known about Henlock before M.41, the records having either been lost or destroyed thousands of years ago. What is known is that before its rediscovery by the Imperium of Man in the Prosperitas Crusade, Henlock was a technologically advanced world ruled by a man known as ‘The Overseer’.

When the Prosperitas Sector was reached by the crusade forces, it held out for almost a year before the Adeptus Mechanicus broke through their defences with a force comprised of no less than four Titan Legions. And so Henlock became intertwined with the God Machines. Whatever part Henlock may or may not have played in the Regency is unknown, and the world was largely forgotten by the Imperium until the Prosperitas Crusade was launched. In the early days of the crusade, the forge world of Ferraeus was retaken, and in its massive cogitator banks, they found tales of Henlock, the Titan Graveyard.

As the crusade continued, the world became a focal point for the Adeptus Mechanicus, the promise of the remains of the titans proving too much to ignore, and so it was war came to Henlock. The battles on and above the planet raged for months, with over a million Imperial Guard losing their lives for a paltry gain. In a warzone that was already suffering from low numbers of fighting personnel, the Crusade High Command began to make plans to pull out from the world. And then came the God Machines. Ten titans, released from the foundries of Ferraeus descended upon the world, led by the noble Imperator titan Magnus Rex; with them leading the charge, the Archenemy's hold over the world was broken, and Henlock was finally brought back into the folds of the Imperium.

As the crusade moved on, the Adeptus Mechanicus looked over their prize. The world was all but barren, huge deserts stretching across most of it, while small patches of habitable ground were the sole centers of the sparse population. More importantly however were the silos where ruined titans from the time of the Horus Heresy were housed, while further out the wrecks of yet more of the machines littered the sands, speaking of hellish battles of times gone past. The Adeptus Mechanicus believed they had struck gold, and sent out reclamation fleets, eagerly bringing the remains of the titans back to Ferraeus, while Legio Ferraeus stayed behind, patrolling the sands and searching for more wrecks. Huge mock battlefields sprang up in the parts that had been cleared of valuable relics, and soon Henlock became the training ground of the Legio.

The First Battle of Henlock

However, the good times were not to last. In 583.M41, a new threat now known as the Talons of the Way descended upon the world. In hindsight, these forces have been identified as an early expedition from the Archenemy armies that would later be known as the Regency. In the sudden attack, they captured a Reaver titan, turning its guns on its one time allies and then, supported by numerous Hereteks and Fleet Assets, taking the entire world. Scrabbling from the loss, the Prosperitas Crusade mobilised to meet the new threat, Legio Ferraeus was instantly committed to defending their training grounds, as were elements of the Sector Fleet and numerous Imperial Guard Regiments, and even Warmaster Ilyenós turned his attention towards Henlock once more.

The Second Battle of Henlock

Before the beleaguered forces on the ground could capitalise on their reinforcements however, the Talons played their hand. In a display of cunning and subterfuge, the Talons ambushed the reinforcements as they entered high orbit, targeting the vulnerable troop transports, while avoiding the guns of the battleships, who could not fire for fear of hitting their own ships. It was a massacre from which very few ships escaped, tens of thousands perishing in the space of a few hours, the most devastating being the death of the Warmaster himself. In the light of the destruction, all remaining Imperial forces were withdrawn from the world returning home badly bloodied and shamed by the defeat, as the Talons of the Way consolidated their gain. The Imperium had been badly bloodied on the soil of the Titan Graveyard.

The Third Battle of Henlock

In mid 593.M41, first the Demi-Legio Custodii Incudatem and then the Legio Ferraeus turned their attention once again to the planet, determined to retake the sacred soil. The Archenemy swiftly redeployed Heavy and Superheavy armoured assets to meet the Naximan assault.

Late in 593, in an unprecedented display of initiative, command of the Henlock front fell to General Adora Astara, a protégé of famed commander Ruprecht Janus. In a startling display of initiative, General Astara proposed a coordinated push against the planet by Crusade and Naximan forces. The combined Imperial-Mechanicus fleet assault devastated Archenemy forces in orbit, and Guard drop troops and Custodii Incudatem titans swiftly reached the surface. Shortly afterwards the Knights of Anaximund Alpha, re-routed from the Strayvian Gateway, descended upon the world. Accompanied by hordes of Techno-Barbarian bond-troops, House Qureshi Walked.

Recent History: The Withdrawal

Throughout 595.M41, Regency forces attacked supply lines supporting the Imperial and Mechanicus presence at Henlock. They exploited this in mid 595, with a coordinated assault on the planet. The Strategio-Cogitator used by Magos Secutor-Navpati Amytis-yazdah of Naximus calculated total campaign failure as approaching near-certain probability. To the horror of its rivals from Ferraeus and Castellum - as well as the Knights of Anaximund Alpha - the Naximan Armies changed from conquest to salvage tactics, sacrificing several Skitarii Legions to allow for Ordinatus-scale Salvage-rigs to recover wreckage from the battlefield. The Magi of Naximus Prime literally crack open the planet's surface in order to allow their Ordinatus to drag huge sections of buried machinery of unknown origin from beneath Henlock, and then began a rapid withdrawal.

Castellum and Ferraeus Forge forces attempted to cover the gaps in their battle lines left by Naximus, but it became clear that the Magi of the Ouroboros Omnissiah had gone to great pains to cover the extent of massive subterranean excavations from their partner-Forges - as atomic charges detonate and annihilate several of their allied forces. What little alliance there was between all three collapses, as Naximus’ fleet fled with its bounty.

Only one group of Naximan ships refused the withdrawal order - those tasked with transporting the Knights of Anaximund. The Magi-Captains of several ships were literally held at gunpoint by the Knights and their Techno-Barbarian Household Troops. To their credit, the Knights of Anaximund were the last forces to withdraw from Henlock, covering the withdrawal of Crusade forces still deployed there, and recovering several of their fallen Knights.

The retreating Mechanicus forces of Castellum and Ferraeus followed Naximus' lead, destroying what they could not salvage - both by demolition charges and orbital bombardment, right up until the Regency's Armies begin their translation into realspace.

The planet is now firmly in Regency hands, along with whatever riches the Naximan efforts failed to loot or destroy.