บท 56: Chapter Twenty-Three: On Silver Wings (Part V)
Location: Bel-Haust, Capital hive of Hossak.
Date: 890.M30
The IX Fleet exited the Warp in a flash of impossible color and distorting reality. They had traveled along the current of ugly death forged by the Ghost Fleet's voyage. Gellar Fields and Hexagrammic wards obliterated the colony of Nurglic Daemons feeding on the psychic-trail of misery and death. Like some great spear thrown by a primordial god, the IX Fleet re-entered real space in battle formation. This was not a mission of peace or even the pretense of diplomacy. Mankind's wrath had come and it would make the stars tremble.
The Seraphim and its orbit of escort ships were the first to be noticed by Hossak's defenses. Cogitators screamed warnings of enemy contacts and targeting lasers locking onto the massive Flagship. The IX Crusader Fleet had warped into the primary Mandeville Point of Hossak which was in the range of two Star Forts, placed to guard the route from Hossak to Vostroya. For a split second, the Imperial fleet hung in the void as the Warp disgorged the last of its vessels. On the bridge of the Seraphim, Primarch Dante stood, peering across the Hossak system with superhuman and supernatural senses.
Of all the Primarchs, few possessed psychic senses even close to Dante. Where Magnus possessed the most raw power, and Kalib Kraad boasted control beyond compare, Dante had the sensitivity and aptitude to observe past, present, and future with incredible detail. The Primarch felt the unguarded thoughts, emotions, and activity of the entire Hossak System. Dante's perfect expression was a mask of beatific stoicism, hiding his thoughts as he let his shimmering soul spread out across the system.
He could feel it. The death, the hate, the misery, the sheer evil that infested this system. How men turned on each other for cursed power. Billions living and dying in city-sized death camps designed to keep a stable population of people as livestock. On top of it all, the gluttonous alien intellects of the Khrave slithered across the system, wearing stolen flesh and devouring the minds of innocents, leaving a cloud of broken souls to cover the local warp like some dreadful pall. The way the Khrave harvested… They did not simply kill. The title of 'mind eater' given to these Xenos was far too literal. As they consumed living prey, always living prey, the Khrave used their own psychic talents to feed upon the soul of whatever human was unlucky enough to fall in their grasp. Just as they sucked neural tissue out of broken skulls, the Khrave hollowed out there victims souls to increase their own warp-potency
Their horrific actions left untold billions of broken souls to wander the shallows of the Warp, violated in such ways they could not even find peace in the Astronomicon. These pour things, for to call them souls would no longer be accurate, existed in a state of broken death. They were but scraps of souls, suffering immaterial dementia. Easy pickings for the carrion-eaters of the Warp. Normally in places of horror like this, where unprotected souls filled the warp, the endless hunger of Chaos glutted itself on these lost spirits. In the Warp around Hossak, the Great Powers were uninterested. The discarded scraps weren't even enough to gain the attention of the thirsting gods. They left this miasma to their most pathetic Daemons, letting the Furies, Chaos Beasts and other spiritual vermin enjoy this bounty.
A single tear of stigmatic blood dropped from the Primarch's eye, splattering upon the granite floor and quickly fading from being. Unsheathing his twin blades, Dante read the minds of the traitors and Xenos upon the Star-Forts. Unsure of what was happening, they were afraid to open fire on a possible ally. Dante intended to enlighten them and ensure they died screaming. Raising up his left-handed blade. A cruel-looking thing of black-metal and a brutal pommel of red leather and rubies named Mephiston. Matched by a silver-bladed twin of cultured gold and other precious metals named Alatron. With his blade of wrath raised, the Primarch gave the order. "Show no mercy. Today, we are Angels of Death and we shall show them our wrath!"
At that signal, over a thousand different weapons were discharged. Fighter squadrons of Xiphons and other patterns emerged from the flanks of the Imperial vessels. Enough lance-fire to melt a country smashed into the void shields of the Star Forts. The shields held but barely. Auger scans relayed tactical scans of the Forts. They seemed to be derived from STC patterns, but with strange Xeno modifications. Tumor-like growths of metal and flesh stuck onto the Star-Forts, latched onto docking ports like eldritch leeches.
As the Star Fort's void shields attempted to recover from the lance bombardment, the second part of the assault started. A swarm of macro-cannon shells and solid ordinance shredded the Star Fort's shielding and blasting holes in the stations. Creating an opening for the final part of the Imperial opening salvo. Torpedos and Attack Crafts filled the void. Before the Star Forts flak defenses could respond to attack Imperial ordinance smashed into them. Armor Piercing Torpedos burrowing into its superstructure and ripping the Starfort apart. The Attack Craft barely had time to unleash their wrath before the two Star Forts were shredded to pieces.
The Xeno tumors attached to the now shattered Star Forts split off. Undulating through the void like some primordial sea creature. These were Khrave Ships. As they moved away the vessels unfolded. Six 'wings' stretched from the main body as films of energy bloomed between each wing, forming a web of plasma and more exotic discharges. The wings had formed into a star-shaped sail at the vessel's bow. Dante considered giving the order to engage but did not want to send his subordinates blindly into the unknown. The Khrave web ships shot away from the Imperial Fleet, showing acceleration that outperformed all but the most specialized craft. Fleet cogitators and sensor arrays worked to dissect any and all information they could from the xeno vessels. It would be needed in the days to come.
At the Primarchs orders the Imperial fleet sailed towards Hossak, they would blast anything without an Aquilia on it to dust. It would have been well within the ability of the IX Crusader Fleet to blitz through the Star-Forts and reach Hossak before the infested planet could realize what was happening, but Dante wanted the Khrave to know he was coming. These were not mindless or twisted Xenos incapable of fear or panic. The Khrave were bizarrely and horrifically alien, but at their core, they were sentient parasites who from their earliest evolutionary roots had learned to fear one thing above all else: discovery and destruction by their host. Dante wanted the worms to know what was coming. He wanted them to understand that an armada they stood no chance against was bearing down upon them. The Primarch wanted some enemy cowards to escape deeper into the Rangda Empire and tell stories about what happened on Hossak. The Rangda and their vassal breeds had tortured the children of Terra without any consequences. Now they would learn to fear the Angels of Death.
After a few hours of steady travel, the planet Hossak grew from a speck of light to a world. The IX Legion had spent these hours making any last-minute adjustments and preparations for the inevitably bloody assault. As the orbital defenses of Hossak came into view the true void battle started. Three orbital stations circled the planet. These were not simple Star Forts, but floating cities meant to house the Khrave and their most elite servants. A squadron of escort vessels and cruisers of various designs swarmed the stations along with a single massive ship of Battleship weight class or higher. Where the fleet around the orbitals was an eclectic mix of Human, Orkish, Fra'al, Tallerian and other designs, the battleship, however, was distinctly different. It was bulbous, lacking in armament, and reminded Dante of the Terran pest called sowbugs. The sowbug ship had a small flock of transport craft rapidly leaving it, heading for the planet's surface. At that moment the Primarch understood what he was looking at. The Sowbug was not a carrier or battleship, it was a matter conveyor. A Xeno supply and trade ship of massive size. Gripping his twin swords tightly, the Primarch bared his teeth. Hossak was a livestock world for the Xenos. The sowbug was meant for taking slaughtered humans to market.
At Dante's orders, the Seraphim charged its Nova-Cannon. The superweapon was loaded with an adamantium shell and fired at near light speed. The Imperials would send a message to the Khrave and their masters. One written in fire and blood. The nova cannons' blast shredded clean through one of the orbital stations and split the sowbug in half, spilling its cargo and guts into Hossak's orbit.
The first squadron of Khrave escorts flew towards the IX Crusader Fleet's own escort craft. Destroyers and frigates exchanged light fire, a prelude for what was to come. The Imperials were curious about the nature of the Khrave fleet. It seemed a ramshackle collection of salvage, barely united in weight class and nothing else. It was not even close to matching the designs or weaponry of the webships encountered before. As a torpedo from an Imperial Cobra blasted open the side of a Khrave frigate, the nature of the ragtag fleet became clear. The Tallerian hull of the frigate split open, revealing a milky white shell of flesh-plastic hidden under the outer layers of the ship. The Khrave scrap-fleet was neither scrap nor Khrave. These were not salvaged ships, used out of opportunity or necessity. These were Rangda vessels, wearing the husks of enemy ships.
From the exposed Rangda core, the frigate extended a twisted nozzle. Swelling with alien energies, the turret discharged a gout of monochrome flames, smashing into the Cobra that torpedoed the Rangda frigate. The blast burned through the void shield-like acid, smearing itself over the Cobra's hull. The Imperial escort went dark, its cogitators, and crew going silent as the void. Yet the ship seemed only slightly damaged, scorched and twisted by some entropic weapon while still recognizably Imperial.
Auspex readouts could not make sense of what had happened to the Cobra. The Rangda weapon had doused it with a bizarre combination of hard radiation, necrotic energy, and grav-distortion. It was a foul concoction designed to destroy anything living upon the Cobra, melting tissue and bone into irradiated ash while leaving a contaminated shell for the Rangda to use.
The escort squadron charged the Imperial Fleet, but Dante would not allow them to get off a volley. The Imperial Fleet opened fire. Plasma and other more exotic munitions slammed into the Rangda ships, shearing off the stolen exoskeletons then blasting holes in the anthropic vessel. Milky white fluid bubbled from the wounds torn into the Rangda vessels, quickly congealing into a new section of the hull. The core Rangda vessels lacked armor, relying on their husks for protection. However, their techno-organic structure allowed surprising regeneration. Still, the tremendous firepower of the IX Fleet made quick work of the enemy defenses. Energy Weapons burned the Rangda Husk-Ships and Khrave orbital platforms into cosmic debris, creating a meteor shower across Hossak.
At the Primarch's order, the IX crusader fleet spread out across Hossak orbit, identifying chief targets and any humans unbound by the Khrave camps. All across Hossak, steel rain started to fall. Millions of drop pods and bombardment shells poured from the void. Astartes Companies with Auxilia reinforcements targeted the countless human-farms and traitor cities across Hossak. Stormbird flights deployed from Battle-Barges by the dozens, adding to the deluge of Imperial might. From the holds of the Stormbirds squadrons of Astartes lept. Techno-Organic Wings inherited from there Primarch letting them glide through the sky. A host of Angels ready to bring mankind's fury.
The Seraphim itself took geosynchronous orbit above the capital of Hossak. Bel-Haust, a country-sized Hive-Spire and center of the Khrave occupation. Lance Batteries opened fire on the Hives shields, relentlessly pounding the monument to Khrave enslavement. Fighter craft and squadrons of Attack-Drones poured from the Hive, exiting the void shield and engaging the Imperial forces descending from the sky. Bel-Haust stretched into low-orbit. It's top forming into a space-elevator from which Sowbug transports and other Xeno ships could dock. The burning wreckage of a Khrave orbital lay strewn around the hives outskirts. The void and ion shields protecting the hive had deflected or destroyed. The IX Legion would need to attack from the sides, where the shields were weakest. Destroy or deactivate the defenses if orbital weapons were to be used.
This suited the Astartes and Primarch perfectly. They were not built to man void-batteries or grind an enemy to dust through attrition. The IX Legion was a force of righteous fury. They would take to the skies and bring death to the Khrave, with Primarch Dante Uriael at their head. Giving command of the Seraphim to Barchiem, Ship-Master of the legion flagship. Dante summoned his Ophanim Guards and prepared to join the battle. With Azkaellon at his side, Dante arrived at the Seraphim launch-deck. Flanked by his Ophanim, the Primarch boarded the Lord of the Flame, A custom Stormbird designed to ferry Dante and his elect to the battlefield.
Alongside a host of thousands of similar Stormbirds, the Lord of the Flame departed. The golden color of the IX Legion craft shining in the bright sunlight as the Angel's host descended. Golden light rippled as they breached the atmosphere, in a formation that looked like a great pair of wings with a single Stormbird at the center of the formation emitting a star-like radiance. It was the power of a Primarch marshaling for war affecting reality itself.
Angelic light and a swarm of interceptors protected the host as it dived through the storm of flak pouring from Bel-Haust's spires. The host dove from orbit to barely a mile above the surface in a matter of minutes. As the dive reached its terminal point the host pulled up, unleashing G-forces that would have easily killed even the strongest mortal man. It simply caused the Angels of Death to grit their teeth and brace themselves. Moving at incredible speeds, the Stormbird host shot towards the base of the hive spire. The shielding covering the spire originated near its top and could be easily punched through here near the planet's surface. Barreling towards the shields, static buildup crackled across the Stormbirds. Lighting dribbled off its wings like raindrops. Turbulence increased massively as they collided with the edges of the Ion-Shields. Lesser craft would have been shaken apart by the ion field attempting to shatter the Stormbirds.
After less than a breath length, they passed through the Ion-Shield and pulled up, aiming to strafe along the near-vertical hive-spire, slowing as much as they could with the enemy fire still filling the air. The rear hatches of the Stormbirds opened up and the Astartes removed their restraints. One by one the Angels of Death lept from the Stormbirds, using their metallic wings to navigate upwards along the Hive using the updrafts created by the Stormbirds ascent and the Hive's massive size. The Stormbirds unleashed a flurry of Servo Skull interceptors to screen the Astartes' arrival before pulling off to weave in between the Hive Spires, providing covering fire.
The Upper Hive of Bel-Haust was the main center of the Khrave defense. It was an armored citadel perched upon the mountainous sprawl, a fortress-spire inhabited by the Khrave administrators of the world and their elite servants. Battery emplacements and docking gantries dotted the surface of the Spire, guarded by the most fanatical human soldiers of Hossak. These traitors scanned the sky, calling in sightings of the Stormbirds to anti-aircraft batteries. Armed with symbiotic armor and weapons gifted by their masters, they would fight to the death to preserve the Khrave world, hoping to achieve apotheosis into one of the 'nobility'.
These Bel Stormtroopers were the first to notice the second sun rising over Bel-Haust. From below the Upper-hive, a great light shone, growing with luminescence as it flew higher towards the hive. The Bel Stormtroopers turned their attention to this brilliance and saw their doom fast approaching. The Primarch of the IX Legion, clad in golden light and flanked by his Angels of Death had come to bring justice for humanity.
Dante was a new star. His wings shimmered with mystical light and in each hand, he held a sword. One as pale as ancient Luna the other as black as the void. The Ophanim surrounded him in a halo of steel. All who looked upon the Primarch felt tears well up, awestruck by his beauty and ashamed of their sins. Dante's brilliant blue eyes seemed to pierce the very souls of the Bel-Haust stormtroopers. Since the most ancient days of Terra, mankind had dreamed of angels. Now one in the living flesh came for them. Some of the stormtroopers turned their weapons on themselves. The full weight of the atrocities they committed bore down on them and they could no longer take the guilt or the strain. Others simply fell to their knees and wept openly.
With the force of a comet, the Lord of the Ninth slammed into the Spire's main dock. His impact bent metal and cracked the stone around him. Thousands of his sons landed across the Spire. A wrathful host came to break the Xeno grip upon Hossak. Squadrons of heavily armed and armored Stormtroopers, along with a pair of insectoid tanks and dozens of Khrave warriors poured out of the entry point to the inside of the hive as sirens wailed all around them.
The Stormtroopers halted as they saw what they faced. At the end of the dock were the Angels of Death with a demigod leading them. A larger Khrave spat orders in accented mongrel-gothic, snapping the troopers to attention opening fire upon these angelic foes. In the time it took the Bel Stormtroopers to pick a target and fire, the elite of the IX had launched themselves forward at speeds the human eye could not fully process. One moment the IX Legion stared down the Khrave soldiers, the next the stormtroopers died. Bolt shell and power blade weaved through the Hive Guards, a dance of death that shredded hundreds of traitors to death in a heartbeat.
Melta charges and plasma rounds ripped through the insect-tanks, blasting the Rangda vehicles into flaming bits. At the center of this carnage, the Primarch dueled the Khrave, fighting the lead Xeno that nearly matched him in bulk and three of its lieutenants. Dante spared a blade for each of them. The Archangel Primarch carried two blades but fought with four. Gossamer strands of silver that wove through his wings came alight with holy fire. The Primarch's mighty wings turned into two massive force swords. Imbued with psychic power, his great pinions deflected Warp-Glamour blades and struck out with divine strength. The three Khrave lieutenants were easily carved into pieces, their cut marks burning with golden fire, reducing the Khrave worms within to ash.
The lead Khrave started to panic. It twisted its form in ways unnatural to a human and dashed back towards the entranceway, scrambling on all fours like some nocturnal predator. With a flick of his wings, Dante fired a volley of his feathers at the escaping Xeno. Meter long feathers charged with psychic light nailed the Khrave to the floor. It ripped at its stolen flesh in a desperate attempt to escape the Archangel of Death approaching it. With his black blade in hand, Dante approached the trapped Khrave, the cruel blade of shadowed metal dripped stigmatic blood. Frantic, the Khrave begged for mercy, gibbering in dozens of tongues trying to bargain for its life. The Khrave twisted its head to look the Primarch in his eyes and froze. Instead of magnificent blue, it had seen before, Dante's eyes were blackened orbs with a blood-red iris. His beautiful features were forged into a rictus of fury. Speaking softly to the Khrave, Dante said: "I was born to be merciful. In extinguishing you and your evil kind, I will be a mercy to mankind's galaxy."
With that, the Primarch plunged his blade into the Khrave's chest cavity and burned it with holy flames. Raising his blade high to the sky, the Primarch proclaimed: "We are the Angels of Death! We bring the Dawn and scour away the Dark! Ave Imperator Ave Imperium!" With those words, Dante and the IX Legion charged into the Upper-Hive. Entering the heart of darkness with blades aloft and righteous fury in their hearts.
The Entrance into the Hive-Spire was a gaping maw, easily large enough to fit a Land Raider. Sunlight seemed to end the moment it crossed the threshold, forming a wall of impenetrable darkness. Without fear, Dante and his guard marched forward. The sixteen Astares of the Ophanim chosen by Azkaellon formed a ring of steel around the Primarch with Azkaellon himself at its head, always ready to fight and die for his Primarch.
The Darkness seemed almost solid, a substance that swallowed light. Leaving the IX Legion elite blind outside the aura of Radiance coming from there Primarch. Dante reached out with his spiritual senses and examined the darkness. It was a product of Alien warp-craft. A Miasma designed to give the Khrave the wretched Darkness they so loved. While capable of braving natural and artificial light the Khrave are naturally beings of the shadows. This pall of shadows would not do. He was the Emperor's Archangel and where Dante went, illumination followed.
Dante could feel the impure presence of the Khrave slithering in the darkness. Insectoid eyes and Xeno witch sight locked upon the Primarch. Umbric creatures assessing the Angels that had cut through there kindred. Strands of psychic energy reached out from the Khrave, looking for any weakness or crack in the Angels psyche. Some flaw or insecurity they could exploit. Such psychic arts made the hunt easier and the prey sweeter. The Primarch felt this web of alien intellect weaving around him. Unable to touch his light, but coveting him all the same. The Khrave consumed the mind and soul of their victim. Growing in psychic power with each meal. Devouring a Primarch would elevate even the lowliest Khrave to the elite of the Rangda Empire. Dane let the Xenos observe him as he analyzed them. In his earlier fight he had sensed something amiss.
The incredible psychic senses of the Archangel picked up "blindspots" woven through the Khrave. Gossamer holes in the warp, lines traced through the Xeno flesh that Dante was blind to. "Blanks" muttered the Primarch, it was like the Khrave had a singular organ system that was warp-neutral. Every sentient organism registered Warp positive as a Psyker. Neutral as a blank or negative as a Pariah. A being could lie anywhere on the scale but not at two places at the same time. And yet, the Khrave seemed to be part Blank. Like some separate organism infested its worm-body. It seemed the parasites had parasites of their own. No matter, the Adepts of Mars would pull the secrets from the Khrave once their stronghold fell.
Ending his observation the Primarch gathered his spiritual power, wrapping his body with an aurora of psychic light. Drawing the attention of the Khrave within the Hive-Spire entrance to him. If the first mistake the Xenos made was not running the moment the Emperor's Angels arrived, this would be their last. Dante let loose a blast of light. A psychic wave of warp-energy and photons brighter than an Atomic Weapon and more Divine than a million miracles. The Khrave screamed, screeching in agony in every way they could. Filling the air with a cacophony of Xeno screeches, warning pheromones and psychic discharges. The Light blinded them, rupturing unprotected insectoid eyes, scarring stolen ocular tissue and driving the Xenos warp tendrils back.
The Illumination drove back the darkness and revealed the chamber and its occupants. It was a great atrium and dockyard. Arched and ribbed like ancient Cathedrals and the bones of long-dead monsters. Hundreds of Khrave had hidden in the shadows. Shied away from the Primarchs light and looking to strike. Now they grasped at ruined photo-receptors and fled blindly deeper into the Spire. The Xenos had little time to suffer. The Steel of the IX Legion cut them down by the dozen. The Astartes did not suffer in the light of Dante. Instead, they were renewed, the power within their Geneseed invigorated by its source. The Primarch and his sons spread out, cutting down the blinded Xenos with calm precision. A tide of Astartes joined the Ophanim and Dante. An army of transhuman Angels eager to spill Xeno ichor.
Each squad of Astartes fought as one, forming whirling storms of death. Wings, swords and claws mowing down the Khrave. Some of the more capable Xenos started to react, summoning blades and shields of Psychic energy. These Warp-Glamours, as the Khrave called them, were adaptable and powerful. Capable of slicing through power-armor and violating any tissue it touched. Inflicting excruciating pain and requiring excision of effected tissue for any healing to occur. These weapons would not save the Khrave. Where each of the Xenos on average was stronger than an Astartes they could not face down the IX Legion elite as they worked in concert. Even though they were Angels the IX fought like every Legion was meant to, a wolfpack acting in unison to tear their enemies to pieces.
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