General Blasser's Doom

Aerial picts from Thunderbolt 457 of 1023rd Squardron, Captained by Squadron Leader Toren Blose shows the Eris Hive TAPs as they camped out around Manufacorum VII, in the Charon Subhives.  While the fighters of the Imperial Navy had considerable success in the skies, on the ground poor leadership and sloppy watch pickets led to a disastrous engagement where the Eris TAPs brigade was lucky to survive a ferocious assault from unknown an unknown Xenos species.  General Blasser was wounded in this battle, after bravely engaging the enemy in close combat.  All his command squad were slain about him.

A chance photo shows possible identification of unknown Xenos as they rampaged through the Charon Subhives.  Despite chaos on the ground, these picts were quickly sent up through Imperial Navy command to the attention of the Ordo Xenos.  It appeared that they already had advanced warning, and a member of the Ordo was already on their way to Orion-89 Zeta.  

The Wych Cult of the Frozen Blood Defend Ynorrta Settlement Against the Necrons!

Xwe Kallathrax revelled in the sensation of the wind whipping through her hair as the raider sped at breakneck speeds through the winding ruins of Ynorrta Settlement. Moments before the raider’s pilot signalled that she had enemy targets on her scanner, Xwe had already spotted the shining figures in the distance. Necrons! Ancient enemies of the Eldar and foes truly worthy of the wyches’ close combat skills.

“Ready yourselves for the bloodletting,” she called out to her brothers and sisters on the raider and to those on the other two raiders who heard her over the communications relay.

As one, the horde of wyches drew syringes from leather belts and stabbed them into thighs and forearms. They simultaneously shuddered as the Hypex adrenaline flooded through them. Xwe herself noticed a sudden sharpening of her vision as if every edge of every shape she saw were outlined by a manic artist.

This zone of the small temporary empire the Dark Eldar had carved out was the site of a power generator that the warlord Desiato had been counting on to fuel the warhost’s transports and it could not be allowed to fall. Even now Xwe could see the Necrons syphoning power from the large structure.

The raiders slowed slightly and snapped off a volley of dark lance shots at the spider-like walkers that formed the frontline of the Necrons’ defences. Their aim was true but the lances of darklight were mostly deflected by shimmering shielding that surrounded the walkers. The only successful hit sheared one of its legs away and it steadied itself against a boulder, unable to move but still tracking the Eldar with its guns.

Then came the return fire; a brutal fusillade of lightning which wrapped around the raiders’ hulls, throttling them. Two of the three transports crashed to the ground and Xwe and her wyches leapt deftly from the skimmers’ decks moments before they impacted on the ashen ground. Ahead of her, the haemonculus, Gret, had summoned a webway portal and through it she could see nostalgic glimpses of the dark city where she was born.

The Battle for Eris Hive

Men of the the Command squad of Platoon 214, on dawn patrol, were the first to encounter Xenos forces and successfully raied the alarm.  Here they are shown scrambling back to the Hive.  It is thought that they were all killed before they could make it back safely.

While the manufactorums outside Charon Hive remained in Imperial hands, after Charos Hive fell, and the Charon 7th were scattered, the leaders of Charon Guard fell back in good order to Eric Hive in order to secure a home base for the expected Imperial support.  Their arrival came too late, however, as Xenos forces had already begun their attack -  Dreen Charon prooved too inexperienced for the task at hand, and the armies were temporarily scattered.  With two of the PDF armies in tatters, attention now fell on the commanders of the two army units still funcitonal.  The TAPs,Bridage, mainly of 2nd and 3rd Phase conscripts, who had been repelled by a screening force of Eldar warriors around a manufactorum, had so far managed to avoid major conflict.  The Eris Hive TAPs retreated up the Charon Isthmus, hoping to meet up with Charon Hive forces, but instead they ran into the most terrible of the Xenos threats to their planet: Tyranid infestation. 

The Gates of Charon Hive

Lord Marshal Uter Charon personally leads the defence of the Hive Gates

Ogryn mine-slaves form the vanguard

Uter Charon, Lord Marshal of Charon Hive, surveyed the pride of the planet's podf lined up before the gates of Charon Hive.  At the fore were the massed slave units of ogryns, who had been slated for the mines, before war came to Orion-89 Zeta.  Now they were slated to be the vanguard of the forces of Charon that day.

Uter Charon slipped a finger under his collar.  Too much starch, he thought.  Either that or he had put on weight.  He sniffed and spat and looked suitably confident.  The stink from the ogryns was stronger even than the stink of prometheum fumes that the chineras and russes gave off, as their engines idled and the gun crews practiced feeding amo through the slots.

A damned bunch of novices, Uter Charon told himself.  Fine for parades and turning back thewarhosts of the other hives cities: but this.  A Xenos invasion.  He did not know if his men could turn this wave back to the sea. 

A dull blare of mechanical horns made the ogryns uneasy.  Uter's nephew was supposed to be encircling the city with his armoured regiments, but they were no where to be seen.  Uter felt like the grox heads hanging over the ceremonial dinner tables of the Charon 7th's offcer's mess: a life form about to be made extinct, by whatever it was coming up the hill towards him.

A commissar watches as the invaders overwhelm Uter Charon's forces

Sector Delta 04 and 12

The figure who sat before the data-screen had no face.  No face that anyone could see at least. 

The red hood hung so low, all that could be seen was two points of light - the green reflections of the data-pict lights.  His eyes had been optically enhanced and they scrolled along the data-streams that poured down the left side of the screen.

Xenos incursion. 

Inquistor Wodin Grime had spent his life fighting on the front line of humanity's war against the Xenos.  The ineffectual; the corrupt; the diseased; the mechanical; the obscene; the truly dangerous foes of human kind.  He had known fear many times, and yet the data he saw chilled him almost like nothing else he had seen. 

Xenos incursion: many types of Xenos incursion. 

He touched the hilt of his power sword, Barbarvenga, for comfort, and typed in his instructions. 

Across the ship his orders were read throughout: and silence greeted them.  Silence, except for the sound of his retainers taking down their guns and weapons, and the dull hiss as the adeptus mechanicus adepts unlocked the sacred hellfire rounds. 

In a black room with a dull red light, a shadow saw the news of the expected arrival on Orion 89-Zeta, and the vindicare assassin, that went by the name of Code IV, dropped from his ceiling perch, and landed soundlessly on the metal flooring.  He would not land with the others, but a landing pod would air-drop him in behind enemy lines to seek out the lynch pin of the foe. 

The head of the snake.  Which, when you cut it off - or put a hellfire round between it's eyeballs - destroyed the beast. 

Aerial recon image of Sector Beta 012

[Attn: Inquisitor Wodin Grime]

[Encryption level: Alpha 1]

[From: Strategic Intelligence Collective 827/II ]

Lord Inquisitor, another reconnaissance image has been brought to my attention taken by another squadron returning to Orax Point spaceport from a mission over Eris Hive. Yet again it seems to be the aftermath of a skirmish between Necron forces and this, as yet, unknown enemy. 

It is very clear that the Necron forces have been destroyed, which on one hand can only be a positive outcome. However, what is worrying is that we have no idea what has routed them.

It is important to draw your attention to the top right hand section of the image. This is neither battle smoke nor natural cloud and there are those in my department that have started drawing parallels with other forms of xeno parasites and rumours are circulating of a very disturbing nature. I pray to the almighty Emperor that these rumours are not true because if so we are truly lost.

Your humble servant, 

Magos Hoffman

Aerial recon image of Sector Delta 04

[Attn: Inquisitor Wodin Grime]

[Encryption level: Alpha 1]

[From: Strategic Intelligence Collective 827/II ]

 

 

Image taken by an aircraft of Thunderbolt Squadron 55a over Sector Delta 04 shortly after what is believed to have been a battle between recently awakened Necron forces and some as yet unknown assailant. Further analysis of the image is required before a more accurate picture of the situation can be drawn. Ideally, a ground level investigation should be performed but as yet the sector and indeed the entire region is considered too hazardous for any Imperial personnel.

Necron tech can clearly be seen in the top left hand and middle portions of the image but I can barely begin to make a guess as to what are the dark patches covering nearly the entire surface. If I had to make a guess I would say that it most certainly is not of any human origin.

We desperately need your assistance here on Orion 89-Zeta, the situation is rapidly growing out of control.

Your humble servant, 

Magos Hoffman