Announcement I managed to get my ptop back in record time! (I'd lent it to a friend, cause I haven't used the damned thing since college). We are right back on schedule ... if this one doesn't commit ritualistic suicide too. The incense burners are up, burning sacred incense, and I'm bsting Noosphere music while writing this, so hopefully the Machine Spirit is pleased. In all honesty, Lorgath Maclir was rather hopeful. Not in victory, that would be impossible unless the God-Emperor himself descended to smite his enemy. No, he was hopeful that he could make taking the world of Spite a pyrrhic victory for the xenos and the traitors. He would make them bleed for every street, for every building, for every damned wall and fortification.

  The popution of this world was well-trained. They were like beaten dogs, eager to serve, though nowhere near as good at it as the serfs his Chapter had. Those serfs were the result of a culture, of selective breeding, of being raised to be obedient and competent both.

  Sebasticor Ebongrave didn’t seem to be the kind of man who wished his citizens to be competent. It was a shame, but it would do. He’d expected to be facing an uprising of xenos sympathisers, so it was a welcome surprise that only a small fraction of the popution rebelled. A foolish few who were now dead.

  Organising the popution into militias had also proved to be much easier than expected. Ebongrave had id the groundwork centuries ago, though his militias were tasked with hunting down xenos sympathisers and seditionists. It was easy enough to get the popution to obey the militias and to give their all when they got the order to train in the handling of weapons.

  His biggest problem was with how separated and isoted each city was. It made logistics a nightmare; however, it also kept potential rebellions isoted and prevented an uprising from spreading worldwide… not that Maclir was worried about that, but Ebongrave obviously was. Paranoid man. You help me as much as you cause me trouble, even from the grave.

  The civilians were obedient, but unfit to serve as soldiers. The spirit had been beaten right out of them; there was no spine to them, but they obeyed, and that would have to be enough. Maclir’s own men, his Brothers, had enough fighting spirit for a billion of these wretches, and they also had the Adepta Sororitas. They had more fighting spirit than wits.

  “Deploy the shields,” Maclir ordered, gring at the auspex dispy showing the approaching xenos fgship slowly cruising towards Spite. “The traitorous witch has some trick that allows her to teleport great distances. I want our Librarians scrying for any disturbance that would indicate a teleportation. The Void Shields might not stop her, but they will stop heavy ordinance and orbital bombardment.”

  It would be a drain on their generators, but not an overrge one. Void Shields were only heavy on energy intake when they were struck by something.

  “We will begin the rites, Chapter Master,” the Magos behind him said.

  “How long will that take?” Maclir asked. The Magi on his own ship would have deployed the Void Shields in moments, having done all the required rites beforehand.

  “Twenty-five Terran hours,” the Magos said without emotion. “The Machine Spirits of the generators will need to be appeased. They dislike operating for such lengths of time. I fear the Shield would falter before the enemy even arrived in orbit if we didn’t go through the proper ceremonies.”

  On the one hand, the ‘Sovereign’ would arrive in five days if it kept to its current approach velocity. On the other hand, teleportation. Emperor, damn these incompetent idiots.

  “Begin them immediately, and be ready to deploy the shields posthaste if I send the order,” Maclir said. “I’m sure the Machine Spirits will dislike getting blown to smithereens more than operating without being properly sanctified.”

  The tech priest bowed and left, leaving Maclir alone with his thoughts. His pns were set, and the deployment orders had been sent out. Everything was ready; all that was left to do was wait and see how first contact with the enemy would upend those pns.

  It wasn’t an issue. He was prepared for that; he’d been at war for centuries, he’d learned how to wage war and how to construct easily adaptable battle pns long ago. He knew this battle would be something new, something annoyingly novel. It always was when one fought powerful psychic foes; they always brought their own personal brand of madness to bear to twist the battlefield to their liking.

  The reports started streaming in. Greenish clouds spread over the skies all across the pnet, blotting out the local sun. Astropaths were divining some great catastrophe. The Librarians reported the weave of reality trembling. Then the conscripted militia soldiers started failing to check in on time, going dark one after the other. The squads sent up to check out what happened likewise failed to report in or respond when they were hailed through the vox.

  The Librarians managed to scry the answer, telling him that the cursed green cloud was putting people to sleep as it descended from the sky and bnketed the surface.

  The forces he had deployed close to the surface, but behind heavy fortifications strong enough to withstand an artillery barrage, started losing contact too. He had every outpost and ptoon hailed then, making them all stay on the vox with someone from his headquarters. He had them show all active militia forces on his three-dimensional holographic map.

  “Mark anyone not responding to hails with red, keep the rest of the militia green, Astartes blue and the Sisters yellow.” He ordered, gauntleted fingers starting to make indents in the edge of his command table.

  What he asked his Brothers to accomplish would have been called impossible by lesser men. He had billions of different veteran and newly conscripted civil militia ptoons all over the pnet. Hailing them all, organising the responses and categorising it all quickly would have been a grand undertaking, beyond five hundred regur men. Good thing his Brothers were Astartes then, and the most competent ones to boot on this side of that accursed Warp Gate. They did it; they fulfilled his orders without dey or compint.

  Soon, the results started showing up on his map even as he dismissed the whining tech priest who came to compin about the abuse he was putting the communicators’ machine spirits through. The red was spreading, creeping in from above, seeping into the pores of each Hive City and steadily advancing further and further inwards. He, however, noticed that it was using hallways, tunnels and other airways to travel.

  “Enter lockdown,” Maclir ordered after but a second of consideration. “Employ Terminus grade anti-pgue procedures and measures. It seems to be some viral agent spreading through the air. Treat it as if a virus bomb has been dropped on each Hive City.”

  They are softening us up. Proper power armour is air-sealed, so it will probably have no effect on any Sororitas or Astartes combatants who had been taking care of their gear. It will devastate our regur troops, however and decimate our unarmoured support personnel. Maclir analysed, scarred brows pulling together into a tight frown. Insidious. They could be trying to starve us out.

  Water wouldn’t be a problem, the generators and the water filtration equipment wouldn’t be affected, and even in the worst case, Astartes could subsist off of corpse starch indefinitely … unless the viral agent the enemy was using made the remains of the fallen poisonous, or otherwise inedible.

  Of course, things started devolving into an absolute mess. There were precious few bunkers that were air-sealed, and they would barely be able to hold the most minuscule fraction of the regur militia. The problem was, they knew it too, and as obedient and beaten-down as the conscripts were, they feared death. All it took was for the whispers of a virus bomb being deployed to spread for utter pandemonium to erupt.

  Obedience did not mean competence. Only in a few pces did the veterans from Ebongrave’s civil militia manage to conceal their motives as they speedily retreated into bunkers. In most others, it was a bloodbath as everyone scrambled to get inside. Perhaps it was a mercy then that the green mist spread swiftly and put most of the chaotic mobs around the world down before they could murder each other.

  It was a great blow, though Maclir was more worried for their supplies and logistics than the loss of billions of militia ‘fighters’. They were just chaff, weaklings. The strong of mind and spirit had long joined the Imperial Guard, though even those wouldn’t be able to measure up to the warriors of his homeworld, from whom his Chapter drew its recruits. He had five hundred Battle Brothers on hand, and they were worth more than any number of chaff. They would make the enemy bleed all the same.

  Maclir activated his vox, connecting to the command channel and flicking on his authority override, projecting his words to every Battle Brother he could reach, whether they wanted it or not. “Battle readiness, Brothers. The enemy this time will be a tricky one; we do not know when or how it may strike. It is yet another test put in our path so we may further hone ourselves. A test I’m sure we will prevail over. To arms, Brothers. For the Emperor!”

  “For The Emperor!” The response resounded through the rockrete bunker he was in, coming from a hundred mouths close and far away.

  He flicked over to the other channel, connecting to his senior Techmarine. “Inform the Sororitas detachments of this complication and my orders for them to enter combat readiness. If they value their lives, they will wear their helmets and live in their armour from now on.”

  He could have ordered it, but it might be five more days until actual combat began, and it would have been counterproductive to starve the Sisters and deprive them of their ability to drink or take care of other bodily needs. They were just regur human women underneath the armour, no matter their zeal or fighting spirit. He would leave assessing the risks to their own commanding officers.

  “Brother Librarian Astyr, have you concluded your divinations?” Maclir asked, gncing up at the Chief Librarian. Astyr had been known for his talent at foresight and divination long before he took over the rank of Chief Librarian, and the Ward-Master hoped his test readings might shed some light on their future prospects.

  “I have,” said the Librarian grimly, clutching his focus-stave. “The portents are dire. Divining our foe was … challenging, like trying to predict the movements of distant pnets just by observing the shifting tides. She resists direct readings, and attempting to push through has resulted in nonsensical readings. What I know is that I have drawn The Fool when divining our present and The Storm as our future. A great danger comes, one that we’d been foolish enough to rouse.”

  Maclir stared at the Librarian, looking into his judgmental grey eyes shining faintly under his ragged hood. He turned away without a word, returning his attention to the holo map.

  “She comes, Ward-Master,” his Chief Librarian called out in a gravely tone not one full minute ter. “A new star blooms within the darkness of Spite, and its fmes seek to scour us from the pnet.”

  Maclir didn’t doubt the man; he merely grunted and grabbed his trusty power spear fashioned after the hunting spears used by the primitive tribes of his home world. He could just barely recall forging his own from the bones of a great beast and a fallen branch nearly seven centuries ago. The weapon he now wielded had little in common with that shoddy thing, being a mastercrafted power spear able to shear through power armour, and yet he wielded both with the same pride. Tests of strength, of leadership, of valour had shaped him over the years, honed him into the man — the weapon — he was today. He would not fail.

  “Space is rent asunder,” the Librarian said, a grimace clear in his voice. “She is at the gates.”

  “The enemy is at the gates!” He bellowed, his voice bring through the command channel. “To me, Brothers!”

  The fortress he had taken over as his command center used to be Lord Commander Ebongrave’s headquarters. It was one of the most well-made fortresses Maclir had ever seen, another benefit of the man’s endless paranoia.

  He briefly touched the pouch hanging from the back of his waist, containing his very own Storm Amulet. Any who weren’t from his homeworld would dismiss it as useless sentimental objects, but he knew better. It protected him. It protected his soul and his mind, allowing his unyielding will to stand tall against daemons and witches alike. Every single one of his Brothers had one too, though he wasn’t sure if theirs protected them as well as his Amulet did him. There had been many Storm Wardens to fall to the forces of the Ruinous Powers or rogue psykers, after all, so the protection wasn’t impregnable by any means.

  By the time he reached the front gates, the Chief Librarian had indicated, a sizable number of his battle-brothers were already gathered there, along with the captains of the first and the seventh companies. He gave each a tiny nod, taking position front and centre. He was their Ward-Master, and as much as he expected excellence from his men, he held himself to an even higher standard. It wouldn’t be a lie to say he was both the longest-serving and most decorated of his Chapter's Ward-Masters, though said history had been mostly erased after the Nemesis Incident that saw his predecessor interred in cryostasis and his homeworld be branded as Forbidden to all.

  The gates, capable of withstanding a directed orbital barrage, caved in with a torturous shriek of metal. Maclir knew that thing had the same toughness as the armoured hulls of a battleship, and yet it gave way when faced with a seemingly unstoppable force.

  The Librarians stumbled back, some screaming, others falling to their knees. Only the Chief Librarian and his own veteran Sorcerers stood tall, their focus-staffs held out as they worked their warpcraft. In a second, a massive dome of iridescent energy smmed down around the Astartes, and the screaming Librarians fell silent.

  Maclir gritted his teeth and activated his power spear, causing it to give an electric thrum as energy bzed to life along its bde. The gate, a circur bulkhead the size of a tank, was split down the middle and its two sides bent inward just enough to leave a human-sized gap between them. Through that gap came a woman with flowing white hair, wearing an alien brand of power armour. She was strutting like a noble, but in her arm loosely hung a bde that made the Ward-Master’s hackles rise.

  It was not a power-sword, nor a phase-bde. Maclir knew the feel of both. This was something else, something new, and something dangerous.

  He stepped forward, uncowed by her attempt at intimidation. The traitorous witch — because who else could this be? — merely smirked in response, running her gaze across his gathered battle brothers before returning her gaze to him. She seemed … unimpressed, almost like a predator considering how to make an easy kill enjoyable.

  His fingers tightened around his spear's shaft, and he kicked off the floor, leaping forward like a missile. She would regret ever being born by the time he was done with her.

  P3t1