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Chapter Fifteen


	Lord Ranult Arden glowered at the data on the cogitator screen before him.  “I knew it,” he muttered bitterly. “I bloody knew it.”  He turned to the Librarian at his side and gestured angrily at the screen.  “Behold, brother, as Cloudburst crumbles.”

	Chief Librarian Covum, the eldest living Blue Dagger outside the Dreadnoughts, sighed unhappily.  “Be calm, my brother.  The loss is a serious one, but it is not insurmountable.  Feudal Worlds are notoriously hard to hold against space invasions.  You know this.”

	“Yes.”  Arden crossed his arms over his chest and glared holes in the holo display.  “Yes.  Damnation.  Damnation!  Gorum’s Folly is nothing but ashes now!”

	The two Marines stared at the report coming in.  A team of Astropaths was feverishly transcribing their apocalyptic vision.  The Chief Astropath had come to Arden sobbing, reporting that a world had fallen into the void.  Moments later, messages had streamed in from the system, telling tales of catastrophic defeat for the Imperium, and for the Blue Daggers.

	“A hundred brothers dead or missing, which means dead,” Arden snarled.  “Gone.  One twelfth of my Chapter, dead in two minutes.  Damn the xenos to the deepest pits of the Warp.”

	“I know, Ranult.”  Covum bowed his head in silent prayer for a moment.  “We can but regroup.”

	Arden looked over the final tally of losses for another few moments, fuming in silent rage, then turned away with a growl.  He all but threw his helm into a nearby seat and stomped over to the briefing chamber’s holomap.

	Covum’s heart was no lighter, but he kept his cool.  The Chapter’s senior members on dispatch to Dawn-Break had assembled in the chamber.  The room’s lights darkened as Arden approached the table.  Covum’s bitter frown softened as he felt Arden’s heart gird with flames.

	The low murmur of voices filled most of the room as the final senior Chapter members entered and surrounded the huge rectangular holotank.  Many of the Council of Masters were present, and fully a quarter of the Apothecarion and Chaplaincy.  The vaulted room had the Imperial Aquila embossed on nearly every surface, with censers on the walls, burning flickering incense.

	Paper scrolls with oaths of moment discharged by past Daggers hung from the edges of the holotable.  Arden stomped right up to the rim of the table and slammed his hands down.  “Silence!” he barked.  The room instantly fell quiet.  Some of the younger Brothers looked at each other askance.  They had never heard Arden speak like that.

	“Battle Brothers!  The enemy strikes at our hearts,” Arden said.  He was grinding his words.  He had to unclench his teeth.  “Even now, Solstice’s forces drag the carcass of their Cylinder from the doorstep  of our Chapter.”  Arden leaned over the edge of the table.  His face lit up from the thousand lights of the holotank and cast sharp shadows on his face.

	“And now we have grave news from Gorum’s Folly,” Arden said darkly.  “The line broke.  The Glasians have killed the world with their great Traverse Cores.”  He glowered into the room, though he was careful not to let his eyes linger on any one Brother.  “Only a few dozen of the hundred thirty Blue Daggers on the planet escaped.”

	Silence.  Dead silence.  Arden slammed one fist against his breastplate.  “I know that the weariness is clawing at us all,” he said curtly.  “The hate, the shock, the indignation.  It stings to hear of the death of our brothers.  Especially since Gorum’s Folly had half of our Scouts on it.  There is now so much to rebuild.  The war is not yet over now, either.  Orks and Glasians run riot over our Sector.  Our numbers thin.  And now we hear of Guilliman, awake.  Lord Guilliman, our gene-sire and Progenitor, awakens, but we may not live to see him.  The sky darkens.  Terra is lost to us.”  He leaned forward, and his face was cold ice.  “But we?  We are unbroken.  We are the Blue Daggers!  By the Throne, we shall not let ourselves turn aside from the course He set!”  He slammed one balled fist on the edge of the tank, and the image jumped.  “We are not the bestial Glasians.  We remember our dead.  Santoru.  Xaviel.  Coulden.  They join the ranks of our heroes, the fallen greatest.  Mourn them, and let your desire for vengeance burn brighter.”  He met each Daggers’ eyes in turn.  “We have always been out here in the cold, my Brothers.  We stand farthest from the light, at the very edge of Imperial Space, at the fringe of Terra’s glow.”

	Covum slowly walked up to the table as Arden’s voice rose.  “We have stood triumphant over every single Throne-Damned obstacle!  When the Hellwound opened on AJH345, we sewed it shut with blood and faith!  When the Orks assaulted Hangonne, we crushed them!  When the Glasians hit us and then hit us again, and again, and again, we BROKE them!”  The fury of his passion brought confidence back to the eyes of some of the Marines who had taken the news hardest.  He was animated by more than rage, and it suited him better.  “A SPECIES cowers when we raise our blades!” he roared.  “Heretics and daemons slit their own throats when they see us coming!  Shall we allow the darkness to keep us from our duties?  From our responsibilities?  From our appointed tasks?  Of course not!”

	He stood straight and bared his teeth as he spoke.  “I know that not one soul in my Chapter will turn from the Emperor’s will because of these wounds.  I need not even say it.  But neither shall we do our duty weighed down by solemnity and mourning!  We shall remember our fallen brothers, and we shall rebuild, but first we shall unleash our rage and our hate, and we shall scour Dawn-Break of the foul abominations that clog its surface!”

	The other Blue Daggers slapped their breastplates.  The noise was cacophonous, drowning out Arden’s words.  “We shall strike down the Glasian trash as they lash out at their betters!  We shall shield Dawn-Break from the beasts, and we shall not yielf!  Not one more world!”

	“Not one more,” Covum echoed from behind him.

	“Not one more!” the room shouted back.

	Arden raised his fists.  “We have drawn the line here!  There shall be no faltering, no hesitation, no more defeats!”  He took in the room with one last shout.  “Not!  One!  More!”

	The room broke into hails and Blue Dagger battlecries.  As the sound died down, Covum set a hand on Arden’s shoulder briefly.  His friend sensed the gesture and nodded.  “Now, Brothers, we shall speak of strategy,” he said in a normal tone.  “This map is of our current deployment in the Starlight Hollow,” he added, naming the system in which the planet Dawn-Break hung.  “Our ships have taken a cordon, reinforcing the Basilikon Astra in orbit and protecting the civilian populations while the Mechanicus secures the dig site.  Our forces are already engaging here, but they started late.  The Cylinder came in at the wrong angle to the star to fly directly to the planet, so they attacked only days ago.”  Arden scowled.  “The Warp is tumultuous enough that getting to Dawn-Break will be… unpredictable.  This and other ships in the flotilla may arrive separately, they may arrive with no formation, and they may not arrive at the Mandeville Point.  However, the Basilikon Astra has battleships here from the Mechanicus’ Cognomen fleet, as well as Titans.  It is also possible, from what we have seen, that Knights from worlds beyond Cognomen may be on the way.”

	He tapped the screen, and it zoomed in on the icy planet until individual continents resolved.  “The Glasians could attack anywhere, so we shall remain mobile.  Our brothers back home are holding the Space Hulk at bay for now, but it shall not remain immobile forever, so we must be done with this place quickly.”

	One of the other Daggers leaned forward.  “Master Arden, what shall the Brothers we sent to reinforce Gorum’s Folly do now that it no longer exists?”

	“Fly to Oglith, as per their orders,” Arden said.

	The Dagger nodded.  “Forgive me, but how then shall we destroy the Cylinder at Dawn-Break?  We have only four Terminators in the system, and that number will not rise when we arrive.”

	“Not true,” Covum pointed out.  “There are two Terminator Techmarines present.  Still, it is not enough to destroy a Cylinder.  The Mechanicus has that task.”

	“This Strike Cruiser, the Azure Death, is more than enough to get us there, and the Navigator from the Sharp Edge is present here in case the strain of flying with no vision of the Astronomican proves to be too much for the normal Navigator,” Arden said.  “Our fleets shall reinforce the security cordon around the planet, not supplant Magos duPree in his role of taking down the Cylinder.”

	“Are we sure duPree isn’t going to try to take the blasted thing intact?” one of the other Marines asked disgustedly.  “He’s a technophile among technophiles.”

	“He knows better.  If he didn’t try when one attacked Cognomen, he won’t do it now,” Arden scoffed.  “No.  We must press on.  Let the Navy and the Basilikon handle it.”  He straightened up.  “Once we arrive, we will have a few days to progress from the Mandeville Point to the planet.  We can use that time to create the correct troop deployments.  For now, take your individual tactical reviews and read them.  We shall reconvene once the Navigator gives us the arrival warning.”  He slapped his breastplate, at a normal volume this time.  “You are dismissed, my Battle Brothers.”


	When the Blue Daggers were filing out, Arden stood at the table in silence.  As the door hissed shut, he sighed.  “A bit of theater, perhaps.”

	“It worked.”  Covum walked out of the shadows to rejoin his old friend.  “The Space Marines here are no feeble mortals, nor over-enthused Scouts.  They are the veterans, the best.  They knew the second you turned around that we lost a hundred souls.  The ones who didn’t hear you say it saw it on your face.”

	“I know.”  Arden closed his eyes.

	Covum looked at the sealed doors beyond.  “They still needed to be reminded who leads them.  They know you meant every word.  That means as much as the words you were actually saying.”

	Arden snorted.  “How reassuring.”  He reached down to turn off the tac map.  The Strike Cruiser rocked in aetheric turbulence as they fought their way through the un-lit Warp.  The Azure Death was one of the best ships in the Sector, and even then it was a struggle to stay on course.  Arden sighed.  “My friend, when we founded this Chapter, when Augustus was still with us, we always had a sense it could be a line in the sand.  Us, a new Chapter, securing the future.  We had contingencies for everything.  Waaaghs, Thousand Sons, traitors.”  He glared at the unfair universe.  “We never planned for losing Terra.  How could we?”

	Covum ruefully shook his head.  “It seems like a worst-case scenario, to the extent that we never contemplated it.”

	“Were we deficient?”

	“Yes.  We should have planned for this.  Even if we had, though, this is something beyond.”  Covum listed the problems on his hands.  “A Glasian Migration, an Ork Space Hulk, and now this Warp Storm.  Plus, Lord Guilliman returning, Cadia’s loss.  We prepared for change, we didn’t prepare for everything changing at once.”

	“I suppose that’s my fault more than anybody else’s,” Arden said heavily.  “Poor Augustus.”

	“He is with the Emperor now, Brother.”  Covum leaned back against the table and set his psi-stave down beside him.  “We all failed to foresee such a thing.  Don’t blame yourself overmuch.”

	“Just enough to make sure it doesn’t happen again,” Arden said.  He rubbed his eyes.  It was no small feat in Power Armor.  “Well.  We should take the time to establish proper protocols for the loss of connection to Terra after all this over, then.  Implement them on the fly.  We have a line of succession seventy positions long, but clearly that can’t be enough by itself.”

	Covum peered at him.  “What do you think Quintus and Lerica will do?”  The Lord Sector and the Lady High Inquisitrix of the Sector Conclave were far more familiar with Arden than they were with Covum.

	Arden scoffed.  “Quintus will probably crawl to Lerica for aid.”  He hesitated.  “No, that’s not fair.  He’ll do his level best to keep order.  He just doesn’t have the experience to handle this catastrophe.  Lerica, I do not know.  She’ll probably empty the halls of the Palace at Maskos, trying to send all of her people out to handle things.  The wild card is Kimihira.  She’s a force of nature, but this will test the very limits of her power.”

	“No jest, brother,” Covum said.  “My psychic powers pale beside hers.”  He sighed.  “But enough.  We can speculate forever.  When we arrive, it will be time to act.  What should our next step be?”

	“Secure Dawn-Break against the Glasians, then move as many assets as possible to where they’re needed most,” Arden said firmly.  “And I will need your aid, Tolleair.  Can you still peer at the skeins of fate from our vantage beyond the light of Terra?”

	“Not comfortably, but yes,” Covum said.  “I can perform divinations to determine where to go next.  We shall simply need to focus on eliminating the Glasians as fast as we possibly can.”

	“As ever.  At least that’s something at which we excel,” Arden observed.  He turned to the exit.  “I may as well speak to the Navigator, see if she can estimate how much time we have.  See to your Acolytes, Master Covum.  We shall need their skills soon.”


Chapter Sixteen


	The war on Oglith ground to a smoking halt as Guilliman’s arrival turned things around for the Imperium.  Where before the Orks and Glasians had been at the very walls of the cities, or inside the walls in several cases, the arrival of the thousands of Space Marines and Imperial Guard elites shifted the balance.  Within a week, the Glasian menace had shrunk from two hundred thousand foul aliens to a mere thousand, and every suface Ork was dead or running for its life.

	The orbital battle was all over save the cleanup.  The Glasian flotilla had evaporated under the concentrated fire of a Gloriana superbattleship, and the Ork ships had either fled to deep space or followed the Glasians into oblivion.

	Guilliman had not spent one moment idle in his time in the Palace of Oglith.  From the second he had finished absorbing the strategic overlay, he had worked.  Officers had flowed in and out as he moved troop dispositions, reassigned forces to their optimal locales, and dispatched specialists to do the most good.  Not content to simply leave Oglith better defended, he also sent dispatch instructions to manufacturers, construction teams, and Techpriests across the globe, ordering them to rebuild what had been lost, usually better than it had been before.  The Planetary Governor had been less than pleased at first that Guilliman had been taking the time to plot new zoning regulations and factory orders in the middle of a war, but within a day had been left in awe of the changes, and the efficiency it would bring.

	By the time the Primarch was done, Oglith had gone from a collapsing Frontier World and Subsector Capital to the foundation of a new Civilized World, one that could serve as the outermost edge of Imperial Space in deed as well as in name.

	At the end of the week, Lord Primarch Guilliman stood on the lip of a broad concrete platform attached to the Imperial Palace, overlooking the central square of the capital, and thrust one fist into the air.  The one point two million Guardsmen watching in person, and the five hundred thousand watching on broadcasts, echoed the gesture with an overjoyed scream of triumph and affirmation.  The war for Oglith was over.

	Guilliman was so used to giving these speeches that it came naturally to his lips.  He spoke into a vox he had clipped to his gorget, and speakers broadcast his voice over the whole city in a thunderous echo.  “Warriors of the Emperor, lend me your ears!” he called, and the square fell quiet.  “The planet Oglith was in dire straits,” he said.  “The system had fallen under predation from wicked xenos, tainted beasts, and the brutal thuggery of the Ork!  But when the Emperor called for defenders, you, and the million of your comrades besides, did not hesitate!”  In truth, some of the Imperial Guard regiments present were conscripts or penal legions, but that mattered little.  “You answered the call,you flew across the void, and here you drew the line!”  He pumped his fist once more.  “Oglith stands!”

	The response cry shook glass in the windows of office buildings around the square.  Guildhalls around the square had thrown their doors open so the laborers inside could hear Guilliman speak, for fear of worker riots if they had been denied the opportunity.

	When the crowd died down a bit, the Primarch pointed out over them.  The city was a drab grey today, under laden clouds dropping sizzling rain on the void shields.  They would be formally lowered as soon as the last known Ork aerospace units had been hunted down.  From his vantage, Guilliman could see the colossal pile of scrap metal from wrecked Ork materiel outside the wall, which Techpriests were delightedly scurrying over.  The Glasian matierel sat unattended farther from the wall, awaiting a psychic Inquisitor or Adeptus Astra Telepathica specialist to assist in securing it to be flung into the sun.

	Guilliman looked over the crowd, taking the time to meet hundreds of sets of eyes.  “The war for the Sector is not yet over, my fellow Imperial citizens.  The Cylinders here, at Hapster, and at Septiim are gone, but three yet remain.  I must leave you now, to collect allies in my Indomitus Crusade to reunite the Imperium Nihilo with Terra.  I know some of you have already volunteered to join my Crusade, which warms my heart,” he said, which was an exaggeration but not much of one, “and I say this to you courageous volunteers: speak with your Brigade Command staff to see if your regiment may depart.  Others of you shall go now to battle against xenos at Foraldshold, at Forender, Dawn-Break, or elsewhere, and think no less of your efforts there.  Every single one of you who shall again wield a blade in the Emperor’s service are acting in His name, to secure the galaxy for us all.  Take heart, weary warriors, for you have bettered the Sector, and soon, we shall bring the xenos to heel once more!”

	Out of the corner of his eye, Guilliman saw an aide nervously fidgeting with a dataslate.  He decided to cut short his current speech, in case the aide was bringing him something that contradicted what he had just said.  “I know that this time of darkness and loss is pressing on us all today, but today is a day of triumph, warriors of the Imperium.  Take heart and look to the stars, for victory in the Rampart System is in reach!  Thank you.”  He slapped his breastplate in salute, and the entire crowd did the same as the square erupted in cheers.  He waved and smiled politely, then stepped back and turned off his microphone.

	He turned and met the eye of his aide, then tilted his head toward the back of the stage.  As soon as the Primarch rounded the corner into the Palace, however, the aide quickly raised the slate and showed the screen.

	Guillman’s jaw tightened.  He knew there was a good chance that the audience was still close enough for them to overhear his superhumanly loud voice, so he simply typed his reply.  The screen said ‘Second Glasian Cylinder appears at Maneville Point with several Escorts.  Honor moving to intercept, requesting all available backup.’  Guilliman typed ‘Approved.  Dispatch all Ultramarine ships.’  He gave the aide a grave nod, and the aide took off at a run.  The Space Marines who had stood behind Guilliman on the stage looked uncomfortably at each other.

	The silence was heavy.  They all knew what it meant.  An Imperial world had been destroyed.  They had received no Astropathic communication to that effect – had it not been sent, or just not sent to them?


	Once inside the secured strategarium of the Palace, Guilliman nearly slammed his hand down on the holo-table.  “Talk to me, Admiral Rendon,” he ground out.  “What is going on up there?”

	“Lord Guilliman, sir, this Cylinder is damaged,” the crackling audio feed related a moment later.  Transmission lag meant that the signal wasn’t instantaneous, which was not doing anybody’s nerves a favor.  “Its starboard Ruin Gun has had half of its power feed blown away, and it is visibly listing to starboard thanks to several torpedo penetration hits in its right-rear maneuvering engine.  Four of its point defense blisters have been destroyed by plasma, sir, Imperial plasma.  It is also short a few Escorts.”

	“How can you tell if it’s short on ships that aren’t present?” Guilliman asked.

	Static.  Eventually, the Admiral replied.  “Lord, this is the Cylinder from Gorum’ Folly, sir, I would stake my commission on it.  Its profile is the same as the one that the courier reported when they left to beg aid from Sector Command and the Rogue Traders.  I also see a crashed Blue Daggers interceptor on the hull, and there are no Cylinders the Daggers have engaged that they have failed to destroy yet known, but the Gorum’s Folly Cylinder had the weakest opposition.”

	Guilliman sighed shortly.  “Acknowledged.  Shipmaster Chelaron, are you there?”

	“I am, my Lord,” came the reply from much closer.  The Macragge’s Honor was forming up the Indomitus ships to follow the Navy into battle at Guilliman’s own order, but had not left high orbit.  “I concur with the Admiral’s assessment.  I also observe what appear to be macrocannon shots lodged in the hull on the port ventral sensor blister, but not deep enough to blind it.”

	“Very well.  Gather every ship you don’t need for orbital security and kill that thing at once, before it can land chalk on the surface,” Guilliman ordered.  “A second Cylinder attacking immediately after I tell two million Guardsmen that they survived the Migration will cripple morale for months.”

	“Thank you, my Lord,” Chelaron’s metallic voice replied.  “Vox, get me the Tetrarch Dolor and the Pax Ultramar on the flank.  Lord Guilliman, have you any final order before I move to engage?”

	“Negative, Chelaron, you know the business,” Guilliman sighed.  “In Ultramar’s name, and Terra’s glory.”

	“For their name and glory, Lord.”  Chelaron turned away from his panel and felt the faint vibration in the deck from the massive engines of the Macragge’s Honor thrumming to life.  “Once more, gentlemen,” he called out.  “For the Primarch!”


	Guilliman cut off the vox lines and turned to face the room.  “Keep the shields up, for now, and prepare all anti-air defenses, as well as all operational combat aircraft,” he said.  “I had been intending to depart for Dawn-Break, but that is clearly not going to happen now.  Not until this second xenos contraption is shot down and done.”

	“Thank you, Lord Guilliman,” the Governor said in relief.  “Shall we make the news public?”

	Guilliman sighed.  “Only if they get past our fleet defenses.  In the meantime, the purge of the Ork tunnels shall proceed.  I will leave behind three hundred Primaris Marines from the Unnumbered Sons and a team of Librarians from the Blood Angels to direct them, alongside the force of Scions and Stormtroopers from Lord General Halwart’s troops.”

	“Tunnel fighting, then, my Lord?  The Brontian Long Knives and the Catachans would excel,” one General said.

	“I leave that to Lord General Halwart.”  Guilliman looked around, clearly wondering where he was.  Another General quickly spoke up.

	“Lord General Halwart is directing the Scions to marshal for entering the tunnels, Lord Commander,” he said eagerly.

	“Very well.”  Guilliman spread his hands out on the map and zoomed in to the capital.  The wrecks and tunnels of failed Ork assaults lay dotted about, or pierced the wall with blue underscores in places.  “The Cylinder, fate willing, shall be dead in two days.  Until then, I shall oversee our efforts to secure the world after all.”


	Ranult Arden stood beside the Shipmaster’s chair on the bridge of the Azure Death and watched the sensorium displays intently.  “Lord Arden, we shall exit the Warp in twelve seconds,” the Shipmaster reported.  On his other side stood a woman in an elegant uniform with a military cut.  She had custom boots with slots on the back to accommodate her mutant spurs, which would have been enough to mark her death on some worlds had she not also had a third eye.  Navigatrix Amandaer MacCraccen was the most experienced Navigator in the Blue Daggers’ fleet, and normally served Arden directly as the Naviagtor-of-Station for the Sharp Edge.  That ship was wrecked beyond any hope of speedy repair, however, thanks to an exploding Glasian Grand Cruiser, but she was determined to be useful in her own haughty way.

	“Hmph.  We’ll be there soon, as you say,” she sniffed.  She ahd made no show of hiding her contempt for Navigators of lesser skill than her, which by her standard was most of them.

	Arden ignored her and glared at the readout.  Trying to look into the Warp was death for a non-psyker, of course, but the sensors would begin displaying readouts the moment they transitioned.

	An alarm sounded on the ship as the transition crept closer.  The Shipmaster gripped the armrests of his chair and tensed.  When it happened, the transition was abrupt enough to lurch MacCraccen out of her pose and tug crew back against their restraints.

	“Something followed us through!” a sensor technician shouted.  The ship suddenly shook as something heavy slammed against the engine block.

	“Max power, forward thrust!” the Shipmaster backed.  “All guns, fire at will as soon as you have targets!”

	Arden grabbed his intercom cup.  “All crew, stand by to repel daemons!”

	The ship’s rear sensors came alive as the ship ripped out of the Warp and into realspace.  The vessel’s bridge crew desperstely overrode the viewpoer shutter and Gellar Field shutdown protocols, keeping the vessel in Warp travel mode.  A general quarters alarm sounded and the ship’s internal lights dimmed.  Faint colors appeared on the faces of bridge crewers as their console lights projected on them.

	“Lord Arden!  The thing that followed us through is trying to knaw at the rear of the ship!” a Techmarine called from the Operations console.  “It is not getting through.”

	“Where is my fleet?” Arden snapped.  “Did we translocate alone?”

	“Sir!  IFFs lighting up around us!  The formation broke in the Warp, sir, but I am detecting no losses yet,” one of the sensorium terminal crew reported.  An Ensign beside him caught Arden’s eyes.

	“My Lord Arden, we have a visual report coming in from the Cloudburst Triumph!” he said, naming an Escort Hunter destroyer that had followed them in the Warp.  An image appeared on the main viewscreen.

	The Shipmaster gagged.  It was a grotesque thing, all tentacles and teeth and flapping meat, outgassing a horrid yellow substance in the vacuum of deep space.  It had two huge fangs on meaty hooks, which it was using to tear at the hull.  It hadn’t broken through yet, but it was still trying.

	“Sir, it’s under the shields and unable to penetrate the Realspace effect of both our natural dimension and the Gellar Field,” the Shipmaster said after he had regained his breath.  “It may be able to batter its way in through sheer force, however.”

	“Slowly, but yes, I concur,” the Techmarine said.  Irritation hung on his mechanical tone.  “I recommend the Triumphant shoot it off.”

	Arden grimaced.  “I agree.  Get me its Shipmaster.”

	The comm officer ran over with a vox cup.  Arden grabbed it.  Cloudburst Triumphant, this is Lord Arden,” he said angrily.  “Can you get a clean shot on that… thing?”

	“Affirmative, Lord Arden!” came the immediate reply.  “Our Weapons Battery has a line on it!  In forty seconds, so shall the Nova Frigate Mailed Hand.”

	“Shoot it, Triumphant,” Arden commanded.  “Buy us some time.”

	“Aye, Lord!  Guns free!  Fire with precision!”  The line went dead.

	Arden watched the blurry camera feed for a moment, then a wave of dark blots appeared in space between the two ships.  The macrocannon shells disappeared into the messy creature ripping at the Daggers Cruiser, and it wriggled disgustingly.

	“Oh, Throne, that’s ugly,” MacCraccen said queasily.  “I’ve never seen an image of it before.  They’re usually just blurs in my Empyrrean Eye…”

	The monster’s roar of pain was silent in the video, but Arden heard a faint noise in the superstructure of his ship as it writhed in pain and lashed out with its fanged tentacles.  More blobs appeared on the viewscreen as the little destroyer fired its turreted guns.  Luckily, Arden did not have to demand that the Triumphant not use its torpedoes – against an unshielded Cruiser engine, the result could have been catastrophic.

	“Die, damn you,” Arden growled.

	A brilliant beam of light appeared between the edge of the camera view and the engine of the Cruiser.  The monster reeled and lost its grip, floating away in the vacuum, thrashing in rage and agony.  Two salvoes of bright blue light, chased by six thick beams of laser energy, penetrated the beast, and it disappeared in a blast of Warp energies.

	The vox cup in Arden’s hand crackled.  “This is the Mailed Fist contacting the Azure Death.  We have shot the thing with our Lances, followed by a barrage of mixed laser and macrocannon shells.  It seems to have disappeared.  Cloudburst Triumphant, please confirm kill.”

	A pause.  “That’s… a confirmation, Fist.  Our Navigator reports total loss of Warp signature.  Lord Arden, are you and your ship well?”

	Arden turned and cocked an eye at the Techmarine, who gave a silent thumbs-up with one hand and thumbs down with the other – functional, but damaged.

	“Well enough for now, Triumphant, thank you,” Arden said darkly.  “Good shooting, Mailed Fist.  I must consult with my Techmarines.  Please reconvene the fleet in defensive formation and secure the Mandeville Point for stragglers.  Arden out.”

	He dropped the vox cup in the cradle and sighed.  “Well, that’s blessedly rare,” he grunted.

	“How revolting,” the Shipmaster muttered.  Louder, he said “Lord Arden, it will take me over an hour to ascertain damage and shut down the Warp protections.”

	“I know.  Be about it, Shipmaster.  I must consult with my brothers,” Arden said, and he stomped off in a barely-concealed fury.  One delay after another.


	The Blue Daggers fleet slowly assembled at the Mandeville Point of Dawn-Break, limping and slow.  The Azure Death had been the only one to suffer serious damage, but it was not the only one that had suffered at all.  By the time the Space Marine flotilla had reassembled, and the Martian Escorts had begun approaching, their damaged ships tallied nine.

	“Only one other Strike Cruiser suffered anything more than the most cosmetic damage, Lord Arden,” a Techmarine reported to the Chapter Master.  They were standing in a tactical room, inspecting the armory for signs of damage or daemonic tampering.  There were none to be found.  “The Clashing Stars had… something scrape its way down the flank.  It scarred the paint and chipped the hull in a few spots, doing no real injury to its fighting capability.”

	Arden sighed.  “Very well.  Why have the Basilikon Astra not hailed us?  Is this some protocol of theirs?”

	“I believe they are accepting our IFFs at face value, and are waiting to see what we do next,” the Techmarine said.  Like all Blue Dagger Techmarines, he had studied at Mars in his youth.  “We should take the initative and hail them, in my opinion.”

	“Noted.”  Arden finished his inspection and collected his own weapons.  “We shall contact the nearest Basilikon ship and inform them of our intentions.”

	“Good.”  The Techmarine grabbed his Power Axe and his combi-pistol, checked its grav-attachment, and slid it into a plated holster.  “It is the Firestorm Frigate Systemic Overload, a Cognomen-berthed ship.  Its presiding officer is Shipmaster Felthine, a veteran of the Bloodtwist Nebular Purge.”

	“Hmph.  We had a few brothers in that skirmish,” Arden grunted.  It had been a quick and brutal affair, with Navy, Basilikon, and Daggers ships attacking a pirate fleet in the tumultuous nebula that separated the Drumnos and Cloudburst Sectors.

	“We did.”  The Techmarine held his gear in his mechadendrites and began affixing power feeds.  “I am pleased to report that no serfs died in the attack of the Warp-spawn.”

	Arden cinched his power pack belt and loaded fresh cells in his Conflagrator and Power Bastard.  “I know.  Finally, something goes right.”

	The Techmarine fell silent as he started tucking his weapons into his panoply of armor attachments and servo-harness.  “Do you think Terra is lost?” he finally asked.

	Arden grimaced.  “Hagen would never allow it.”

	“Chapter Master Hagen is an exemplary Marine, but he is one man,” the Techmarine said.  He finished stowing his gear on his person and turned to aid Arden in affixing his Iron Halo.  “…I wonder if Abbadon has reached Terra.”

	“At this point, I think we all are,” Arden said darkly.  “Speak not a word of it, Tech-brother.”

	“Of course.”  The two Marines walked out into the corridor.  Serfs hurried to and fro, carrying toolboxes and parts, under the careful shepherding of some of the ship’s Techpriest contingent.  The Blue Dagger serf uniform was universal, and every serf from the lowliest janitor to the Fleetmaster wore only slight variations on the theme.  Most of the serfs around them wore the blue and grey camouflage patterns of the ship’s basic crewers, while others added the complex belt and boots of tech-ratings or anti-boarding personnel.

	Arden loomed over them, and passed effortlessly amongst them.  He marched up to the lifts and rode to the command deck.

	The Shipmaster was standing behind the comms station when Arden approached.  He snapped off a salute.  “Lord, the Basilikon Astra ship is entering stationkeeping, three hundred kilometers from our forward batteries.”

	“Hail them.”  Arden turned to face the main communications system’s camera as a crackle of static came over the bridge speakers.

	The Shipmaster leaned over the console and spoke.  “Basilikon Astra vessel, this is the Azure Death, of the Blue Daggers.  Our flotilla has arrived from Septiim to lend aid.  Please respond.”

	The reply came back at once, as the main viewscreen kicked on.  Arden saw a white-robed Techpriest with extensive torso augmentics hovering on a grav-sled in the display, surrounded by red-and-black Skitarii in their distinctive Cognomen uniforms.  “Hail, Lord Arden,” the Techpriest said at once.  “I am Lexmechanic Astrologis Dumat.  We detected weapons fire the instant your vessel left the Immaterium, and have refrained from contact or approach as a result.”

	“Yes, indeed you did,” Arden said.  “We were followed by a Warp-spawned horror as we exited from the Warp.”

	The Techpriest bobbed on an air current.  Maybe that was the equivalent of a shrug for them; it was hard to tell since he did not seem to have shoulders any more.  “Your arrival is most helpful, Lord Arden.  We have had no Astropathic contact nor reinforcement since the Warp Storm to the galactic south opened.”

	“Are you aware of the return of Lord Primarch Guilliman?” Arden asked.

	There was a moment of general confusion on the other end of the line.  “What?  A Primarch has returned?” the Techpriest demanded.  Two humans with fewer augments and the uniforms of Cognomen serfs looked over in shock.

	“Then no.”  Arden nodded.  “The Lord Primarch Roboute Guilliman of the Ultramarines has returned to life and active duty, by the grace of the Emperor.”

	The Techpriest’s eyelids rose to his brows, and he threw up his hands.  “Praise the Omnissiah!  Joyous news!  No, we had heard nothing!”  His jubilant tone shifted slightly as urgent problems reasserted themselves.  “However, we shall have to leave the celebrations for later.  The Glasians are hitting us, and they are not relenting.  The surface militias are crumbling.  Titans from the Legio Congelatio are present, but even the God-Engines can’t hold back the tide.”

	Arden grinned cruelly.  “Then allow me to aid your forces, Priest, and we shall see the tide turn indeed.  I have brought three companies of Battle Brothers and over a hundred specialists from Septiim, with several Council of Masters members and their honor guards besides.”

	The Techpriest nodded.  “Omnissiah bless your circuits, Lord Arden.  We accept.  Please form up and engage your sublight engines to follow us into orbit.  The Cylinder is here, and it is damaged, but the battle is cooling into a stalemate.”

	“Then we shall.”  Arden nodded to the Shipmaster, who began barking orders.  Arden saluted and cut the channel.


	The light of the sun seemed bruised and sickly under the ugly glow of the Warp Storm.  Dawn-Break’s primitive tribesmen looked anxiously to the sky as the lights of the Blue Dagger flotilla joined the ones there already.  All wondered if this was an ill omen, or a positive one.

	Arden watched the tactical feeds with interest.  The Mechanicus was holding back on their long-range bombardment of the Cylinder, he noted, in favor of cutting off their flow of ground reinforcements.  The Mechanicus’ ships sortied their fighters to skim the very top of the atmosphere, intercepting transports, instead of assaulting the Cylinder.

	As he watched, he saw a flicker of light between the planet and the Cylinder.  A great beam of energy had fired, probably from one of the surface’s Defense Laser cannons.  No normal Feral World in the backwater Cloudburst Sector normally rated such a gift, but the prize the Mechanicus sought here was enough to justify it, it seemed.

	“They’re afraid of knocking the Cylinder out of the sky too quickly, or bringing it down on the satellite,” Covum observed.  He was peering at a surface map, with Mechanicus garrison and weapon emplacements highlighted.  “I can’t blame them for their caution, but it’s starting to cost them avoidable losses.”

	Lord Dunvraith, the Master of Sanctity, thrust his Stave Arcanum at the map.  “Here, brothers, is the goal of the Mechanicus, and their most heavily fortified point,” he said.  His basso rumble darkened with anger.  “The beasts threaten thousands of lives in the Mechanicus labor camp.”

	“Which they don’t even need any more,” Arden said flatly.  “The Heliopolis is all but ready to deploy.  The Mechanicus should have shipped out its workers to Foraldshold by now.”

	The highest-ranked Techmarine present for the conference, Lord Trebain, Master of the Forges, spoke softly.  The others might have had to strain to hear him if they didn’t share his superhuman senses.  “The enemy’s numbers wax and wane as the Skitarii draw blood,” he noted.  “See how they have abandoned attacking some of the tribal cities?  This Mechanicus base has gone similarly unmolested.”  He made the sign of the cogwheel.  “Perhaps the Machine God has blessed their occupants, or perhaps the ships meant to besiege that city were simply shot down and no replacements were found.”

	“Well spotted, Kell,” Arden said.  “Are these Glasian transports returning to their Cylinder?”

	“They are.”  Trebain pointed at a tiny blip of holographic light in the map.  “See here, they fly up to orbit.”

	“Why would they do that?” Arden asked.  “At the sieges of Septiim, they left the transports on the ground to serve as firebases.  It’s their usual tactic.  Why change it up here?”

	Dunvraith sneered under his skull mask.  “The ways of the Tzeentch-cursed are indecipherable most of the time, Lord Arden,” he growled.  “Seek you not a pattern in their actions.”

	“Unless they know something we don’t,” Trebain corrected gently.  “No disrespect intended, Etienne, but the Glasians are not daemons.  Nor have they have forgotten all of their tactics.”

	The Chaplain scoffed, but could not disagree.  Arden cleared his throat.  “Straight down the line to them, then, my Battle Brothers,” he said.  “We shall deliver this world from the weight of their evil.  We shall do so here, first,” he said, pointing at the map.  A broad, deep plateau of over forty kilometers on a side and a smooth surface rose from the holo-plate.  “This plateau is where the Legio Congelatio engines have offloaded.”

	Trebain smiled slightly.  “Ah.  We shall walk in the shadow of God-Engines.”

	“So we shall.  However, the Titans have all departed from here.”  Arden pointed next at a large, rectangular building near sea level on the desert below the plateau.  “The Mechanicus has posted forty five individual Ruststalker snipers and pursuit units here, protecting a facility excavating components that fell from the huge satellite.  There is a single Titan there, the Stellar Gifts.  It is protected by a Secutarii unit from Cognomen.  Master Dunvraith, I need you there to battle the Glasian hordes pressing in from the beaches.”

	“And so it shall be,” Dunvraith said gravely.

	“Master Trebain, you will take all but a handful of our Bikes and both Dreadnoughts, and you shall reinforce the Mechanicus’ principal dig site,” Arden continued.  “There are three Titans there.  There are the Warlord Shattered Denials, the Reaver Hero’s Welcome, and the Warhound Swift Terror.”

	“Who names these blasted things?” one of the other Masters muttered.  Trebain ignored him to salute Arden.

	“My pleasure, Lord,” he said quietly.  “The dig site shall survive.”

	Arden nodded.  “And I shall lead the remainder of our forces into the very heart of the Mechanicus camp.  The other two Titans are there, the Warhounds Holy Motor and Speeding Victory Along.  They are protected by the rest of the Secutarii not shielding the Warlord.  Here,” he said, gesturing at the map.  “I shall land here, with the Land Raider Memories of Honorium.  The Terminus Ultra is a tank-hunter the enemy cannot match, and I shall bring Centurions with me.”

	Another Master spoke up.  “Who shall protect the ships in orbit?”

	“We need not protect anybody.  Our Strike Cruisers shall remain in orbit to provide cover fire and evacuation,” Arden said firmly.  “Only the Nova and Hunter ships shall engage the enemy fleet directly, and only then when they need to even the field to give the Mechanicus the advantage.”  He straightened back up and leaned his hands on the holotable.  “The Mechanicus and two Rogue Trader fleets are already peeling back the Cylinder’s Escorts.  The Navy has ships from Battlefleet Celeste skirmishing with the Cylinder itself.  Once its barriers are down, Magos duPree shall attempt to kill the Cylinder with his battleship Lucubrate.”

	“Shall we attempt a boarding?” Dunvraith asked, though he suspected he knew his answer.

	“No.  We have no Terminators.”  Arden looked around.  There were no more questions.  “Very well.  Go to your commands, and prepare for battle, my Brothers.  We deploy in two hours.”


	Lord Guilliman smiled vindictively as he watched another Cylinder vanish from the holotank.  “That’s two,” he said evenly.  “Well done, Admiral.”  The room dissolved in cheers as the image of the Cylinder exploding appeared on other consoles throughout the strategarium.  Guilliman straightened up and looked around.  Techpriests were clapping Generals on the back, Stormtroopers were settling into chairs and burying their heads in their hands, and Commissars were watching the whole affair with satisfaction.

	The Primarch was already running a tally of the cost in his head.  A few transports had made it past the screen in the Cylinder’s death throes, and it had managed to kill the frigate Espandor’s Eyes in its final moments, but overall, the casualties had been light.  Now the surviving Glasian ships were scattering in a panic.  The Imperial formation was breaking up now into wolf packs, chasing each Glasian ship off into the void.

	That meant one thing: it was time to go.  The Indomitus Crusade’s ships were no doubt probing the defenses of the pirates and raiders that lived in the border zone between the Drumnos and Cloudburst Sectors even then, getting ready to cross into the dark Sector and determine the cause of its silence.  He had meant to join them days ago, but the appearance of a second Cylinder, almost as long in beam as his own Gloriana, meant the exhausted defenders had needed him a little longer.

	In fact, he had not found his time on Oglith to be so terrible.  Having spent the last two days in the strategarium had been almost comfortable.  Mopping up the surviving, leaderless aliens on the surface and starting the tunnel battles had been an absurdly easy exercise for his skills, leaving him time to work on getting the planet up and running better than ever, which was something he at least enjoyed.

	Now, however, his task was done.  He paged Lord General Halwart’s Leviathan from the holoterminal, and moments later, the old officer’s face popped up on his screen.  Halwart immediately snapped off a salute.  “Lord Primarch, sir!” he said crisply.  “May I take from the massive radiation discharge above that the second Cylinder is dead?”

	“You may, Lord General.  I would still advise that its existence be not made public knowledge,” Guilliman cautioned.  “The people need not know how close Oglith came to total disaster.”

	“Begging your pardon, my Lord, but with you here, there was little risk of true disaster,” Halwart said.

	“Hmm.  If only.”  Guilliman looked around at the dying celebration.  “I think it is time for me to fly to the next conflict zone, Lord General.”

	Halwart bowed.  “We are terribly sorry to see you go, my Lord,” he said.  “May I convince you to bring some of the forces of my Army Group with you?”

	Guilliman shook his head.  “No, Lord General.  I have taken the chance to review the Sector’s overall strength distribution in my time here, and I see another opportunity.”

	“Do tell, my Lord Primarch.”

	Guilliman lifted a dataslate.  “I have concluded that the Thimble and Septiim systems are somewhat overstaffed, Lord General.  With but a few tweaks of their infrastructure and local government, each could contribute over a million troops to my Indomintus Crusade without significant overall loss of force protection.”

	Halwart drew his head back in surprise, looking incongruously like a cat.  “I say, Lord, a million?”

	“Closer to one and a half million, actually.”  Guilliman set the slate down.  “I have prepared a courier ship to fly to each system and explain the instruction, as well as establish a deadline for the recruitment and dispatch of these men.  They shall fly to Baal to rondezvoux with Lord Regent Commander Dante, the man I have entrusted with leadership of the military forces of the Imperium Nihilo, and from there, fly out to the border of the Segmentae Solar and Ultima to begin assaulting Huron Blackheart’s miniature empire.”

	Halwart nodded knowingly.  “Ah, the Corsairs’ time has come, then, my Lord?  Fitting.  Well, by all means, my Lord, and do let me know if I or my forces can contribute.”

	Guilliman ruefully half-smiled.  “Oh, I anticipate Cloudburst being given a chance to shine on the galactic scale soon enough, Lord General, especially if the current Ork and Glasian problem is resolved quickly.”

	A proximity alarm beeped in the corner of the room.  Guilliman looked over at it and squinted.  “Lord General, are there any other Blue Daggers ships expected for this containment mission?” he asked.

	Halwart blinked.  “No, my Lord.  The vessels that Lord Arden sent all arrived, albeit a month late.  If I may, sir, why do you ask?”

	“Because nine of their ships and a Mechanicus tithe barge just appeared at the Mandeville Point, all damaged,” Guilliman said.

	“Oh dear.  Perhaps chasing the Cylinder from Gorum’s Folly, Lord?” Halwart said uncomfortably.  “Or perhaps they were survivors of the planet-destroying engines they use.”

	“Perhaps.”  Guilliman turned back to Halwart’s flickering hologram.  “I shall be in touch, Lord General, keep up the good work.”

	Halwart saluted with a beaming grin and cut the channel.  Guilliman walked over to the orbital control terminals and watched in silence.  Sure enough, a Strike Cruiser, a Luna Cruiser, four frigates, and a trio of destroyers had appeared in deep space.  They were already broadcasting their IFFs, and from the look of things, a frantic distress call.

	An image popped up on the comm terminal, flickering and hazy.  Guilliman looked over at it and saw a Blue Dagger with metal bands wrapped tight around his armor’s joints at the elbow and wrist – broken arms being rapidly healed by Mechanicus medical systems, then.

	“Hailing Rampart Battlefleet and Oglith PDF Command, come in at once!” the Marine said.  A nasty cut on his throat lent his voice a croak.  “This is Brother-Captain Aresain of the Blue Daggers Third Company, calling from the Wrath of the Stars.  Please respond, over.”

	The Lexmechanic at the comms operating board tweaked a few brass levers and poked a button, and a microphone detached from the console.  The operator scooped it up with a look at Guilliman.  “Aresain, Captain, we read you.  This is Oglith Liberation Command.  We have your flotilla on scopes.  You seem battle-damaged, over.”

	Several minutes passed.  Before the message could get there and Aresain could compose a reply, Guilliman watched the background of his shot.  Much of the camera feed had Techpriests and bridge crew tampering with equipment, raising shields, yelling status reports to each other that he couldn’t hear.  Aresain must have been giving his report through his gorget microphone instead of using the bridge comms.

	Sure enough, in a few minutes, some of the stress on Aresain’s voice faded as the report from Oglith arrived.  “Praise the Throne!  Oglith Command, Aresain here.  Our forces are heavily damaged, we have taken eighty percent casualties of ground forces and close to ninety seven percent in space.”  Guilliman’s jaw tightened.  That was a slaughter against Astartes.  What had happened?  Aresain continued unaware.  “The Cylinder arrived on schedule with a vast force of Escorts, Oglith Command.  They brushed aside the ships from Battlefleet Celeste and sunk the Battlecruiser Far Skies.  The Rogue Traders assisting us departed when they saw the flagship go down.”  Aresain’s face darkened with pain and anger.  “I honestly can’t blame them.  The Battlefleet went down fighting, scoring many hits on the Cylinder, but… with only two Terminator Suits, we didn’t have the forces needed to affect a boarding.  Reinforcements from Sector Command arrived too late to help.  My Brothers on the ground were mostly Third and Tenth Company.  They did not… fare well against the enemy.”  He paused.  “I will provide a full report in person to whomever commands the Blue Dagger contingent on the ground.”  Suddenly, a panicked aide arrived in the shot, frantically shoving a dataslate in front of the taller Captain.  Aresain broke off his recitation of woe and read the slate, and then his eyes bugged out.  “Er… Oglith Command, we are reading the presence of a Gloriana battleship in orbit over the planet, surrounded by debris and unknown ships.  Please inform us of your strategic situation, over.”

	Guilliman half-smiled and leaned over the vox controls.  “May I?” he asked.

	The operator immediately handed him the microphone.  Guilliman stepped in front of the camera.  “Brother-Captain Aresain, this is Lord Commander Guilliman.  We read you, and I would like to receive a report from you in person.  The ship you are reading is my flag vessel, the Macragge’s Honor, in from the Indomitus Crusade and aiding in the destruction of the two Cylinders that have attacked this planet.  I am releasing you to navigate to the planet from the Mandeville Point.  Please approach orbit and enter a slot of the Orbital Command’s choosing.  I will await you on the ground in the capital.  Have you any battleready Brothers aboard your fleet?  And where are the survivors of the non-Astartes vessels from Gorum’s Folly?”

	He set down the mic and waited.  He had precious few joys in his life in this ugly, stupid time, but seeing his gene-sons react to his personal arrival was one of them.  He wondered if it was hubris.  Theoretical: such adulation had been something Horus and Fulgrim had enjoyed immensely, too.

	He shrugged off his concern and waited.  The screen was busier now.  He could read lips, and so he knew that the serf holding the data-slate was explaining that the Gloriana had Ultramarine markings, the debris was Glasian, and the Orks were diminished greatly.  Then Guilliman’s message arrived, and the entire bridge went still for a moment.  Some people seemed to remember that they were on camera on a dying ship, and so went back to work at once, albeit beaming.  Others dropped to their knees or clutched icons of Ultramar and Terra to their breasts.  Others yet punched the air and whooped, and one leaped high enough to slap his hand on the ceiling in delight.  The two Marines he could see at the back of the bridge looked at each other, their faces unreadable under the helms, but their body language suggesting total shock.

	Aresain’s eyes boggled, and a smile forced its way past the pain and tiredness on his face.  He had a tear in his eye he couldn’t wipe with his broken arms, so he spoke through it.  “Yes.  Yes, we read you, gene-sire, Lord Primarch.  Yes.  We are approaching orbit at the fastest safe pace.”  He sighed shakily.  “The Navy forces and last surviving SDF boat are somewhere behind us in the Warp, lacking our gifted Navigators or… or any Navigator, I suppose, for the SDF boat.”  He coughed.  “Er, yes.  My report will be… I shall speak to you, my Lord, as soon as possible.  I have gleaned much intelligence on the activities of the Glasians, including their vile planet-cracking FTL engines.  I think it to be a hybrid of their race’s Traverse Core propulsion system and an Exterminatus-equivalent machine they use to deny worlds to the Tyranids.”  He sighed again, but fixed his eyes on the camera with a hopeful smile.  “I shall arrive with all due haste, your Lordship.  Thank you.  Wrath of the Stars, out.”  The picture ended.

	Guilliman raised the microphone.  “So be it, Captain Aresain.  I shall await you.  Oglith out.”


	Two armory serfs carefully aligned a pair of lasers with the barrels of the Blessed Rotary Cannon.  Lady Inquisitrix watched them from the catwalk overhead, trying not to fidget.  The pain in the back of her mind was not leaving.  It wasn’t getting worse, but it wasn’t leaving.  Even in the ship’s Gellar Field, even behind layer after layer of hexagrammatomatic seals and holy oils, she could feel the pain occasionally kicking her inside her skull.

	She and her staff had been flying away from Celeste for days now in the spasming Warp.  Reports had rolled in to her crew from the second the Warp Storm overhead had opened, and none were good.  Bones of the dead amalagamating on Septiim Tertius.  Warp-spawned things on Celeste, Cloudburst, and Obelisk 2.  Riots on Cognomen.  A Daemonic incursion on Maskos.  Chaos pirates on Hangonne.  Glasians assaulting six systems, Orks assaulting at least three more.

	It was anarchy.  The damned thing of it was that that constituted fewer than half of the inhabited systems of Cloudburst.  Others reported nothing worse than psychic children waking up screaming, wallpaper ripping but no Warp-Spawn emerging, or apparently natural earthquakes.  Some didn’t even have that, just civic disturbance.

	There was no pattern.  There was no signal or purpose.  It was just chaos.  Chaos.

	Mizuki Kimihira’s lip twisted.  Chaos.  What were they getting from all this?

	A pair of Sanctioned Psykers walked up behind her on the armory’s oversight catwalk and paused respectfully.  “My Lady?” one asked quietly.

	That was a bad sign.  Kimihira’s psychic senses were so vast that there was no way either of them needed to announce themselves normally.  This had to be urgent.

	She forced a placid look on her face and turned to face them.  “Yes?”

	The speaker bowed.  She was an Astropath, with stress lines on her face from the burden of constantly receiving encrypted Inquisitorial psychic communications.  “Lady Kimihira, we are continuing to receive messages from Maskos.  The Palace is secure, and Scions are securing most of the cities, but at least one will need to be purged entirely.”

	Kimihira scowled.  “A blasted waste.  Any word on what that Storm is?”

	“No, my Lady,” said the other Sanctionite, a Scholastica Psykana Battle Psyker.  He served as Kimihira’s Sanction option, in case Kimihira herself ever lost control of her powers.  “It is simply there, like a bruise on reality.”

	“Or a sucking chest wound,” Kimihira growled.  Below, the armorer serfs ticked the barrels of Kimihira’s cannon over by one and started laser-sighting them again.  “How far out are we from where Lord Guilliman’s orders said we should fly?”

	The Astropath shrugged awkwardly.  “Three days from exit, although with the instabilities of the Warp… who can say?  Even the best Navigators aren’t totally reliable when flying without Terra to guide them.”

	“Of course,” Kimihira sighed.  Of course, as a beta-psyker herself, she could have aided the Navigator, in theory.  In practice, well, you could theoretically spread butter with a chainsaw, but it is better to use a knife.

	“We can drop out safely, soon, but we will be between stars,” the Astropath said.

	“No, we press on.”  Kimihira slowly shook her head and looked thoughtfully into the distance.  “I admit, I am interested in Lord Guilliman’s personal interest.  I suppose I should be flattered.”

	The Battle Psyker twisted his brow.  “We do not answer to him, my Lady.  The Inquisition answers to none save the Emperor.”

	“As does the Ecclesiarch, the Custodian Guard, and the Lord Provost Marshal, but they’d still be fools to turn aside the counsel of the greatest logistician in recorded history,” Kimihira said lightly.  “I imagine Guilliman isn’t fool enough to command me, but I still want to know what he wants to say.”

	The Battle Psyker bowed.  “As you command.”

	Kimihira turned to walk up to the very edge of the catwalk andgrabbed the railing.  She peered down into the armory and saw more serfs scurrying over the weapons of her senior staff.  As a beta-psyker, she was well outside the range of controllable psychic power in the current models of human evolution.  Quite how she had made it to two hundred years of age without going mad or being possessed was something of a mystery, even to her.  “How goes the refit?” she asked.

	One of the serfs below looked up and shielded his eyes against the glare of the bright lights.  “We will be ready in under twelve hours, my Lady!” he called up.

	“Got it.  Good.”  Kimihira moved towards the exit.  “Ready.  Hmm.  This shall be interesting.”


Chapter Seventeen


	One variable.  There were so many constants in his experiment, and all Tzeentch needed to do was change one variable to learn so much.

	He did so.  Deep in the warren of cages and tunnels that was the livestock refuge beneath the surface of Dawn-Break, a man frowned as he heard sudden whispers.  He looked around in confusion, and saw nothing.


	Roboute Guilliman leaned back in the massive metal chair behind the desk of his private office on the Macragge’s Honor, regarding his guest with a patient smile.  “Captain.  Your wounds have been taken care of?”

	Captain Aresain flexed his fingers.  Between his enhanced healing factor, a square meal, and the extensive repairs that Belisarius Cawl’s team of Techpriests had made to his armor, he was feeling far better.  “Almost as good as new, my Lord,” he said reverently, bowing again.  “The upgrades to my armor were especially welcome.”

	“And a brief diversion, in the eyes of the elite of Mars.”  Guilliman gestured to the larger of the two rows of chairs between the door to his office and the desk.  There had been three, once, but there were few men of stature great enough to use the largest chairs of all.  In both senses of the word, actually.  “They enjoy that sort of thing.  Please, do sit, Captain.  There is much to discuss.”

	Aresain did sit.  As ever, the silent Ultramarine Apothecary and Techmarine behind him watched.  “My Lord, sir, I bring news and information from our drubbing on Gorum’s Folly,” he said.

	“So I understand, Captain.  What happened, precisely?”

	Aresain’s shoulders sagged, but his gaze did not waver.  “My Lord, the aliens came in the numbers we anticipated, but the System Overlord Mhuja was unable to collect enough assets to defend the system.”

	Guilliman raised an eyebrow.  “‘Collect,’ Captain?  I was under the impression that the distribution of forces to worlds in anticipation of the Glasians’ arrival was the product of careful foreward planning by Lords Quintus, Beraxos, Lerica, and Arden.”

	“Traditionally, my Lord, yes, but the System Overlords are encouraged to raise whatever force they can to protect their own world.”  Aresain shifted uncomfortably.  “Levies of PDF, local officers training militias, deals with Rogue Traders, hiring mercenaries, whatever it takes.  Normally, that is a trivial affair, since the targets of the Glasian Migrations are usually worlds of immense strategic importance.”

	Guilliman looked over the list of past targets that the Ordo Xenos had provided him in the Naxos Sector.  “Indeed.  A Forge World, a Sector Capital, an Astartes Home-system, and several Subsector Capitals besides.”

	“Aye, my Lord.  This time was different…” Aresain paused to collect his thoughts.  He looked around the room in the lull, trying to find the words.

	The office was vaguely familiar to him, perhaps similar to one he had seen in images of Macragge.  The whole chamber’s furnishings were clearly scaled to three different body types: Human, Transhuman, and Primarch.  The trim was wood from Macragge, hewn from the trees that grow below the crown of the great mountain that looms over Magna Macragge Civitas.  Something about the pattern distracted him.  Were the wood lines in a vaguely six-sided pattern?

	“Yes, the trim has hexagrammatic seals to prevent psychic intrustion,” Guilliman said drily.  “Silver lining, too, if you look close enough.”

	“I see.”  Aresain looked back to his gene-sire, and Guilliman noted the sadness in his eyes.  “My Lord Guilliman, we did everything.  The System Overlord Lady Mhuja, and myself.  We contacted passing Rogue Traders.  Only a few lent aid, and only then if we paid well in advance.  We begged aid from Battlefleet Celeste.  Only a few ships came, too late to make the difference.  We tried hiring mercenaries.  There were none to be found.  We pled our case to the Mechanicus of Solstice and Syracuse.  They were too far, or couldn’t spare the men.”  He looked away as he said the last, not in guilt, but weary disappointment.  “We couldn’t save Gorum’s Folly, Lord.  Perhaps there are more ships on the way now, but they will arrive to naught but ash and death.”

	“I see.”  Guilliman looked over the list again.  “There are a few Feral or Feudal Worlds on the list this time.”

	“Yes, my Lord.  We do not know if that is a machination of foul Tzeentch, or pure happenstance,” Aresain replied.  “The spread of ships is also troubling.  Far fewer Escorts, and six whole Cylinders.  We did not know there were that many to spare.”

	The Primarch set the data-slate down and looked the Captain in the eye.  His throat was healing well.  “Captain, how well can your Chapter recover with so few Scouts left alive?”

	Aresain winced.  “Not… well.  My Lord… we have a standing policy of assiduous gene-seed harvesting, as frequently as the progenoids can withstand.  We have sufficient gene-seed stocks to survive this devastation, but as to how long it would take, I do not know.”  Aresain sank back into his reinforced seat.  “I am no Apothecary.  It will take over a decade at the minimum, more realistically… thirty, perhaps forty years.  Years we do not seem to have.”  He scowled.  “Accursed Warp Storm.”

	“Then take heart, Captain.  I have brought you reinforcement,” Guilliman said.

	The Daggers Captain blinked.  “Oh?  Has the Inquisition released our gene-seed stocks on Macragge or Mars?”

	Guilliman’s head snapped up.  “Wait, what?  What does the Inquisition have to do with this?”

	Aresain shrank back from the intensity of the Primarch’s stare.  “Er, the Inquisition’s policies, my Lord,” he said awkwardly.  “They are standard protocol for Chapters founded to counter Chaos directly, sire.”

	“Those being?”

	“Well… we pay a five percent gene tithe, of course, like all Chapters, and they are taken to Mars in stasis bottles with the name of the contributing Brother attached,” Aresaid explained.  “Then they are tested by Warp-Savants of the Inquisition and Mechanicus for signs of Chaotic mutation, and if none are found, they are put back in stasis and kept in vaults on the Red Planet, and the Progenitor Worlds of the Chapter’s gene line.  In this case, yours, Lord,” he said.

	Guilliman sat back in his seat and started rummaging through his desk drawer.  This one had seen much use lately.  “I suppose that’s not so bad,” he muttered.  “No, Captain, I did not bring geneseeds from the vaults.  I have instead brought Primaris Marines.”  He set a small holoprojector, one of many identical dozens, down on the table and switched it on.  A hologram of a huge Space Marine appeared.  “These are the new form of the Emperor’s masterwork, crafted cooperatively by myself and Belisarius Cawl of Mars.”

	Aresain watched in astonishment as the holo slowly spun.  He saw the classic Space Marine implant organs, with the progenoids and the Bletcher’s Glands, and all the pieces of the body he had had added to his own long ago.  What he did not recognize were three more in Mars red, implanted in the chest and wired into the muscles.  “Lord, what am I seeing?” he breathed.

	“The new Marine.  The Space Marine designed to prosecute the wars against those of our gene-kin that have traded their souls for power.”  Guilliman sat back and watched the holo, too.  He had seen it thousands of times, and still felt a bit conflicted.  “The Emperor’s Space Marines were the epitome of gene-craft at the time, but times change.  The Emperor did not anticipate that the Imperial military would have to kill hundreds of thousands of its own elites, after all.”  Guilliman pointed at the head of the hologram.  “The Primaris Marines can endure greater shocks, impacts, and wounds, and they are all but immune to the corruptuous powers of Chaos.  They do require more food, and their equipment is more expensive and less flexible, at least for now, but they can outfight a Chaos Space Marine on even footing in the vast majority of cases.”

	Guilliman felt his heart sink as Aresain’s face drooped into a highly familiar look of hurt and unease.  “My Lord… are we obsolete now?  We of the Adeptus Astartes?”

	“Certainly not, my son,” Guilliman said, the reponse coming to his lips by rote.  “The Adeptus Astartes are the scions of the Emperor Himself, crafted by his hand and guided by his vision.  The classic Marines, if you will, are also more flexible in your weapons and tactical profile, and have far more experience.  The Primaris Marines are able to mature their geneseeds faster, but you and your Brothers are still the Space Marines that stand longest against the darkness.  Rest assured, I have no intention of rendering the Marines obsolete.”  Guilliman gestured at the hologram again.  “The Primaris are an augmentation of the Astartes, not their replacement.”

	Aresain was not wholly mollified by this, but nodded anyway.  “I… see.  Then what of the future, Lord Primarch?  Can a present Marine become a Primaris Marine?”

	Guilliman considered that.  “Become?  Hmm.  I suppose, although it would be quite painful and take a while… it would involve some risk, and extensive gene therapy,” he said.  “I do not intend to force it on anybody, regardless.”  He sat forward.  “I have brought three hundred Primaris Marines for your Chapter, Captain, and they will be a more than adequate replacement for the Scouts you have lost, as well as the Battle Brothers your Chapter has seen defeated in battle.  The Blue Daggers will be strong again, and ready to resume their duties of protecting the Cloudburst Sector from its many foes.”

	“I see,” Aresain repeated.  Guilliman felt a twinge of irritation when he saw that the Captain was still feeling unsure of it all, but he forced his irritation back.  He would have felt the same if new Primarchs had come into being without the Emperor telling him.  “Then I thank you, my Lord, for this gift, and this strengthening,” Aresain chose to say instead of voicing his actual feelings.  “However, I should caution you that I am perhaps not the best person to tell of this.  I am but a Company Captain, and unused to commanding a force of many hundreds in battle, especially unused, as I am, to their tactical capabilities and weapons.”

	“I know, Captain.  However, you are present, and with the Oglith contingent of the Blue Daggers in tow, you represent the largest force of your Chapter I have yet encountered,” Guilliman pointed out.  “To whom else could I relay the information in person?  Astropathic messages are disappearing at random into the ether around the Sector; Terrra is cut off.”

	“That is a fair point.”  Aresain looked at the holo more carefully for a moment, then shook his head.  “I trust you, my Lord,” he said firmly, clearly convincing himself as much as anybody.  “We shall press on in greater numbers.  I understand we take flight to Dawn-Break?”

	“Yes.”

	“That is wise,” Aresain said.  “Dawn-Break was on the receiving end of dire portent in the Emperor’s Tarot before the invasion.  It spoke of a great tide of foes, many in number and foul of disposition.  We assumed them to be a priority target for the Glasians in the Migration, but with this Warp Storm befouling all it touches, who knows?  Perhaps it, like Foraldshold, Forender, and Oglith, shall be assailed by dread xenos from space.  Orks, alien pirates… there is no shortage of minor, hostile alien factions in Cloudburst and its surroundings.”

	Guilliman nodded.  “Indeed not, my son.  I shall stay in Dawn-break long enough to destroy the Cylinder if it is still there.”

	“That would make three Cylinder kills for this ship, yes?” Aresain asked.

	“Correct.”

	Aresain snorted.  “Remarkable.  You’ll be in the Sector for a month, and one ship of yours will score as many kills as our ancient flagship against the beasts.”

	Guilliman half-smiled.  “I can assure you, my son, I did not anticipate massive hybrid Colony Ship-Warship constructs from beyond the galaxy assaulting us when I encouraged the Navy and Astartes to stop using such massive ships in the aftermath of the Scouring.”

	“Oh, nobody’s blaming you, my Lord…” Aresain trailed off when he realized Guilliman was joking.  “Hmph.  Well, anyway… I thank you for your support.”

	“You mentioned you had a report to give about the Glasian FTL engines?” Guilliman reminded him.  Aresain wordlessly slid a dataslate over to his Primarch, who tucked it into the drawer to read later.  “How are your arms, Captain?” Guilliman asked, changing the subject.

	Aresain flexed his fingers again.  “Much, much better.  Thank you.”  He sensed his dismissal and rose to his feet.  The eyes of the two silent Ultramarines behind the desk followed his every move.  “By your leave, my Lord?”

	“Granted.  Get some rest, and share what I have told you with your brothers.”  Guilliman handed him another of the identical holoprojectors.  It was like a coin in his hands, and a grenade to Aresain’s.  Aresain gingerly took it; his arms weren’t completely healed.  “Go, Captain.  Thank you.”

Part Three
Chapter Eighteen


	Wolf Scout Holgein listened quietly as Watch Commander Domack related the words of the Primarch to them.  Guilliman had given Domack one of the little hollprojectors, too, along with orders to destroy it if the likelihood of its capture by Tzeentchian forces was too high.  Three Kill-teams stood in the briefing room of the Deathwatch Cruiser Teutur Innosens, joined by Domack, Paris, and all of the specialists that had attached to their formation.  Kill-team Steadfast had heard it all before, but Copperhead and Bloodline had not.

	For once, the old Wolf was the first to speak.  “So this is what obsolescence feels like,” he said quietly.  “I do not like it.”  He had thought long and hard about this on the flight to Oglith, and come to his conclusions after the unsatisfactory dialogue with Guilliman.  Resentment had been building up in him since then, and now it was spilling over.

	“I do not think we are obsolete, Brother,” one of the Copperhead Marines said.

	“Bullshit!” Holgein snapped, startling the rest of his team, who knew him to be more reserved.  “Guilliman comes up with new Marines that take less time to make and do our jobs better than we do?”

	“Lord Primarch Guilliman, brother Holgein,” Paris said firmly.

	Holgein bared his teeth, and did not back down.  “Sorry, Watch Captain, but either I’m the only person in the room who isn’t blind, or you all know something I don’t.  Look at this shit!” he said, throwing an accusatory arm at the hologram.  “New Marines!  Ones immune to Chaos and can pratfall ten stories?  Don’t tell me we’re not being replaced!”

	“I didn’t say we weren’t being replaced,” Paris said softly, and now Holgein could hear the hurt in his voice.  “I’m just saying the Lord Guilliman deserves some respect.”

	Holgein scowled, but the pain in Paris’ voice had drawn the venom from his.  “Captain Paris, this is an abandonment of the Emperor’s design.  It is nothing shy of blasphemy!  The Emperor perfected the Space Marines leven thousand three hundred years ago!  Why does Guil… Lord Guilliman think that he and this Cawl fellow are somehow the Emperor’s betters?”

	“I suspect they don’t,” Ly’tren mused.  “I suspect that they think desperate times call for desperate measures.”

	“Times are always desperate.  This is the Imperium,” Holgein said sourly.

	“Quit your bitching,” Calrus grunted.  “The Lord Guilliman’s right.”

	Holgein was silently on his feet in an instant, but Calrus and Holgein each shot him a disgusted look.  “Oh, give it up, Holgein, seriously,” Calrus groused.  “Look at where we are!  Cut off from Terra, worked to the bone, reeling from two alien invasions at once!  Would things be so bad if there were more of us, and we were tougher, smarter, harder to corrupt?”

	“Except there’s been no word of making us into these Primarises,” a Bloodline Assault Marine pointed out.  “Just adding them to us.  It is… awkward.”

	Watch Captain Paris raised his hand to quiet the room.  “My kindred, I do not claim to know the heart of the great Primarch any better than you do, but I do promise you that the Lord Primarch has no love for the current shape of the Imperium,” he said in a tone he hoped was soothing but not condescending.  “Would he even contemplate making these Primaris Marines if he did not suspect the Imperium of Man is dying on the vine?”

	“Of course he would!” an Apothecary in Copperhead snapped.  All eyes turned to the Emperor’s Falchion medic as he raised his hands, palms up.  “Do you think that the Lord Guilliman somehow, without anybody on Terra or Mars knowing: reprogrammed a building’s worth of cogitators, abducted hundreds of thousands of young men, drained genetic banks of the Emperor’s own laboratories, waylaid an entire company of Techpriests and surgeons, built a huge gene-vault somewhere, constructed a LEGION’S worth of Power Armor he designed himself, manufactured gigatons of ammo and grav-tanks, AND found time to bioengineer three entire human-compatible organs… in three years?” he listed.  “No!  Throne, no!  He probably gave the order for all of this to be done in secret and on a smaller scale before Fulgrim put him in the ground,” he said disgustedly.

	“Watch your tone, Brother,” an Ultramarine in Bloodline said darkly.

	The Apothecary opened his mouth to snap back when Domack’s quiet rejoinder cut him off.  “I agree, brother Apothecary.”  Domack hung his head.  “I agree completely.  He has no doubt been planning this for millennia, his plot interrupted only by his infirmity.”  He shifted his shoulders.  “This Cawl fellow he mentioned before probably carried on the plan in secret all along.”

	“So then what do we do about it?” a Raptor Kill-marine asked.

	Domack looked up at the group.  He seemed centuries older than he actually was, and it didn’t suit him well.  “Not a thing, Brother.  Not a damn thing.  Because, you see, I think he is right.  The galaxy is swooning.  It is ripped in half.  What choice do we have?  Even if we object to the measures he is taking, Lord Guilliman’s plan has given us the numbers we need to find a victory over the forces of disorder and corruption that swarm among our stars.”  He clenched his Guardian Spear’s haft and tried to work the tension out of his jaw.  “I will hear no talk of refusal, nor of disobedience.  The Space Marines have provided enough dissention and division to the Imperium so far.”  He looked around and met each Kill-Team leader’s eyes in turn: Gregorius, sulky but quiet.  Skilander, pissed off and on the verge of an outburst.  Theirin, hopeful and placid.  “Do you not agree?”

	“After Horus, no, I imagine the Inquisition would brook no dissent,” Skilander said sarcastically.

	“Forget Horus.  Think of Huron,” Ly’tren remarked, earning a few rueful nods.  “It pains me to see such conflict among Brothers, but think of what the rest of the Imperium would feel.”

	“Thank you, Brother Ly’tren, for demonstrating my point,” Domack said gratefully.  “The Badab War, the Horus Heresy, the Dragon War, and a thousand other conflicts besides.  No, Space Marine versus Space Marine just leads to heaps of human corpses and the Emperor’s glory dimming a bit more.”  He turned his eyes on Holgein.  “Brother Wolf, did the Emperor truly perfect us if we find ourselves coming to blows so often?”

	Holgein glared, but looked away.  “No.”

	“Brother Skilander, would the Emperor have made us into twenty Legions if he did not want us to be diverse and open to change?” he asked.

	The grizzled Sternguard’s angry stare could have burned holes in ceramite, but he slowly shook his head.  “…No, damn you.”

	That was not a disrespect Domack intended to endure while trying to impress unity on his Brothers, and he clenched his fist on his spear until the metal of his fingers clicked a spark from each other.  Skilander put his hands up at his shoulders at once.  “No, no, I apologize,” he said.  He was still pissed, but his voice bespoke contrition.  “No, Watch Commander.”

	Domack glared at him for a moment longer before turning to the enraged Apothecary.  “And you, Brother Ghelano, do you imagine the Imperium can long survive if we are so beset by enemies and rent by Warp Storms that we can no longer see Terra at all in the northern half of the galaxy?”

	“Yes!” the Apothecary insisted.  “The Imperium has a million star systems under its control!  We have the resources to outlast this storm, and twisting the Emperor’s gene-craft is not the way to do it!  We overcame Horus, we overcame Vandire, the Beheading, the War of the Beast, the Star Plagues, the Harrowing, the Rangda, the Cythor Fiends, the Cacodominator, and a hundred horrors lost to time!  Why should one Warp Storm of abnormal size prevent us from getting our tasks done?”

	“Because things have changed since the days you list,” Domack said coldly.  “We did not have to worry about Tyranids, Glasians, Necrons, Tau, or the Red Corsairs when we overcame those threats.  That, and our technology is decaying as the Mechanicus sinks deeper into dogma and away from science.”

	“I’d be offended by that if I didn’t agree,” Jergal muttered bitterly.

	Perhaps realizing the futility of his complaints, the Apothecary folded his arms and fell silent.  Domack addressed the room.  “Regardless of how anybody feels about the issue, this change has come, Brothers, and how we respond to it shall be a test of our worth as Imperial servants,” he said.  “We are not mere Initiates, clawing at the walls of tradition and locked in step with history.  We are the Deathwatch, the elite of the elite.  The tides of history are not a threat to our survival.  We shall welcome these new brothers into our ranks and be stronger for it.”  He tapped the table for emphasis.  “Our new kin deserve better than to be ostracized as soon as they join us.  Do you not agree?  Acrimony in the ranks is intolerable.  If nothing else holds true in this age of madness and upheaval, surely our honor remains intact.”

	“Hear, hear,” a Keeper remarked, and there was a general nodding of heads.

	Domack gestured towards the bow of the ship.  “Now, then, brothers, the Navigator of this ship tells me that we shall arrive at Dawn-Break in one more day.  We follow in the wake of the Macragge’s Honor, and we shall relieve and collect our Brothers in the system Starlight Hollow.  Each Killteam shall be led by one of the Dascomb officers; either myself or a Watch Captain for Steadfast and Copperhead, and Keeper Ghundren for Bloodline.  Any questions?”

	“Are we using teleporters or gunships to get to the ground?” somebody asked.

	“Oh, gunships.  We haven’t enough Teleport Homers nor Terminator armor to teleport everybody.”  He looked around.  Nobody else had a question.  “Very well.  Break up by squads and prepare to enter the crucible of battle.  Deathwatch, dismissed.”


	Lord Arden felt the air around his Thunderhawk shake from a nearby detonation.  The enemy had been pelting the area around him with proximity-fused rockets from the second he had entered the lower atmosphere.  The whole low orbit region of the planet’s space had been a glaring battlefield as soon as the Blue Dagger ships had arrived.  Hundreds of billions of pieces of debris, from pin-point scraps of steel to paint chips to a derelict Cobra destroyer, spun madly around the planet.  They left yellow streaks in the upper atmosphere when they slowed enough for Dawn-Break’s gravity well to suck them down to the planet below.  Navigation without void shields or a huge amount of armor was suicide.

	“Lord Arden, we approach the primary landing zone now, but our escort fighters report incoming dumbfire rockets from above as well as below,” the Techmarine piloting the Thunderhawk reported.  “Mechanicus fliers are closing to assist, but they can’t see the origin of the OTH missiles.”

	“Acknowledged.  Lose altitude if needed, and keep the turrets powered,” Arden ordered.  He looked over his shoulder at his Brothers, but they were champed and ready.  His Honor Guard was rested and ready to fight, as were the squad of artificer plate-clad Vanguard Veterans and Apothecary tagging along.  Behind them in the cargo bay sat two Rapiers with their quad heavy bolters, and a pair of Covum’s Codiciers.  Behind them were the final occupants of the Thunderhawk: a pair of Master Carache’s Devastators, outfitted with lascannons and plasma pistols.  The rest of their squad was following with the remainder of the forces Arden had assigned to the Mechanicus Camp.  The Land Raider Terminus Ultra hung from clamps in the back of a Thunderhawk Transporter flying at the center of their formation.

	A brace of missiles flashed past the Marine aircraft at supersonic speed, shaking the gunship again, then fireballs erupted below it.  A Glasian fighter dove madly through the formation, spewing their sick purple lasers.  One struck the flank of Arden’s Thunderhawk.  An alarm shrieked in the passenger compartment and wind started whipping through as the hull opened to the air.

	“We’re hit, sir, laser crease amidships, port flank armor,” the copilot reported.  The cabin door swung shut and locked automatically as the cockpit sealed itself off from the bay.  “We’re airborne, but we can’t make space like this, it’ll boil us.”

	“Good thing we’re landing in a Mechanicus camp,” Arden said flatly.  He switched channels to address the other Daggers in his transport.  “Are you all well?”

	“Zero injuries, Lord,” somebody reported a moment later.

	Three Mechanicus Thunderbolts ripped past, spewing lasers at the Glasian fighter, which promptly exploded.  All three fighters peeled off as more missiles soared past from over the horizon.  Below, the Mechanicus camp came into view on the pilot’s scopes.  A Techpriest beside him twisted some bronze knobs and the vessel started firing off flares.

	Below, Skitarii guns lit up on the alien missiles, shooting them down before they could slam into the transports.  Arden’s Thunderhawk limped in, trailing smoke and oil, and settled onto a pad with a cough.  The rest of the transports soared down to land behind it, while the escorts peeled away to protect the camp from the air.

	Arden slapped the release and exited the transport with all due haste.  His brothers poured out and secured the immediate landing site.  It was a real mess, Arden noted.  Burning rubble dotted the area.  A canvas tent at the edge of the landing field had a smoking hole through it.  At least the Mechanicus had had the decency to not leave the dead bodies of their servitors and sefs lying around; Arden saw those tastefully covered in canvas next to the crematorium.  A handful of Rangers in Cognomen russet and gold trooped past the landing site, paying the Astartes no attention.

	A plume of heat and exhaust kicked out of the back of the Land Raider Terminus Ultra as it rolled out of the clamps.  Several Techpriests made the sign of the cogwheel as it rolled by.  It was of the classic Mars pattern, three lascannons per side plus two in the front hardpoint, plus a storm bolter and missile launcher on the turret.  It was the dedicated armor hunter of the First Company, and had served the Novamarines for a glorious thousand years before that.  The Centurions behind it were not Novamarine, however.  They were either brand new from the forges of Cognomen or had come from the Angels of Fury.

	Arden searched the landing site for high-ranking Cognomen clergy as he moved.  Nobody was fool enough to stand near a damaged aircraft.  Arden could see the hands of the cabin crew racing over the controls in his head.  His pilots were well-trained.

	A series of loud, flat claps of air rustled flags and hair around the field.  Arden glanced north to see the battery of fifteen Imperial Guard Basilisk self-propelled guns poking their muzzles past the top of a small cafeteria, flinging shells off towards some Glasian somewhere.  The sight of Astartes, Skitarii, Ordo Xenos personnel, and Guard working so closely together under Mechanicus leadership was an odd one, no mistake.  The Techpriesthood was notoriously insular, even in war.  Arden supposed that was the crux of their circumstances, after all: the Mechanicus was just that desperate to preserve the Heliopolis-class Pseudostar.

	A bevy of Techpriests with the long blue sashes of Electropriests bustled past the edge of the landing zone and into a flat-bellied troopship of a model he didn’t recognize, then lifted before the ramp was even up.  Overhead, four Skitarii ornithopter gunships soared past, their encgines belching smoke.

	At least the Techpriests were taking things seriously, Arden thought to himself.

	Still, for all the noise and movement of the camp, the most eye-catching thing of all was stock still.  Looming over the entire area and shining sickly, coruscating light in the harsh dawn was a War God.  The great Warhound Speeding Victory Along sat still in an armored cradle at the south tip of the encampment, ringed by over a hundred Techpriests and tech-Adepts.  They were swarming over the huge machine, daubing it with oils and tinkering with its metallic innards.  Arden saw its pair of Moderatii sitting on the edge of the open cockpit, shouting orders down to the repair teams below.  Each had data-slates in their hands, and were apparently consulting schematics.  The Techpriest and Princeps who actually ran the thing stood on the ground by its splayed left foot, speaking in low voices.

	The Princeps recognized Arden as the Chapter Master approached.  He broke off his discussion with the Techpriest and waved his hand.  “Lord Arden, sir, welcome to Dawn-Break,” he said.  “You are a welcome sight for weary eyes, my good fellow.”

	Arden did not like such a familiar tone one bit, but let it slide.  Princeps were a rare breed.  “Hello, Princeps Stuart,” he said politely.  When he was in range, he accepted the handshake, trying not to harm the man with his powered grip.  “How goes the defense?”

	“Ah, well, the Ruststalkers and the Imperial Guard are holding them for now, but it’s harrowing out there,” Stuart said gravely.  Despite his hair being shock-white and lines covering his face so thoroughly that it looked like he fell asleep on a screen door, Stuart was a man of only forty years of age.  Bonding with his God-Engine was stressful.  “The rest of the Cognomen Skitarii are moving out to the perimeter now, along with the Electro-Priests and… well, I understand your lads will be joining us?”

	“My Battle Brothers will be assisting for now, yes,” Arden said.  He looked around.  “Where are your Corpus Secutarii?  I have never seen a Cognomen Titan field without one.”

	Stuart waved a hand indistinctly deeper into the camp.  “Oh, the Titanshields are around, sir, they’re around, you know.  They’re so busy.  Even the Secutarii need to eat and sleep once in a while, after all.  The Glasians may not be the most durable foes, you know, sir, but they are so very persistent.  And courageous, I’ll give the bastards that.  They charge right up to the line, you know, firing their accursed guns at my lads.”  The Titanshields were as fiercely protective of their Titans as the reverse, which made sense after the mauling the Legion had suffered the one time they had been separated in the Corumbino Nebular Liberation.

	“Very well.  Our tactical scans have reavealed that the Glasian Escort force has taken enough losses to allow surface-to-air fire to impede the landing of enemy transports,” Arden said, getting down to business.  “I understand some cities have managed to avoid enemy landings entirely?”

	“Indeed, Lord.  Several,” Stuart said.  “I shan’t count on it continuing.”  He looked to the sky.  “Dare I ask if you managed to kill that blasted Cylinder on the way in?”

	“We did not.  We shall leave that to Magos duPree.”  Arden looked south over the plain.  “Unless there is something we should know that was not contained in the tactical brief, my Brothers and I shall depart south, to Phase Line Sigma, and lay into the Glasian hovertank columns that threaten the Skitarii positions.”

	“Then may the Gods of Mars and the Omnissiah be with you,” Stuart said with a jaunty salute.  Arden jogged away and leaped onto the side of a passing Rhino.  Several Guardsmen in the camp cheered when they saw him roll by, Power Bastard at the ready.


	One variable.  That was all it took.

	A man in the evacuation tunnels frowned as he idly sketched in his notebook.  He liked to draw in it when he was stressed out.  It was so soothing.  He would draw his family, he would draw the animals he husbanded below the surface when the aliens attacked, and he would draw icons of his world, his God-Emperor, and his faith.

	Drawing this nine-sided image that had been stuck in his mind for the last several days was more fun.  He was drawing it over and over, and it gave him a thrill in the stomach when he did.  Others were giving him funny looks, but how much did that matter?