The Cemephon Expansion: Hidden in the Hills

Ana’Li held the passive actuators in her four-fingered hand and worked it with the dermal shunt to tighten it.  The piece was part of the arm servo of her stealth suit.  She had been tinkering with the actuators systems ever since she had come into possession of the suit.  There were only a few members of the Earthen Caste in her small cadre and they spent all their time on critical repairs.  Her suit was not in that category.  It worked fine, she sought to make it work better.  Her “cadre” made it’s base of operations in a small agricultural plot in the  Chalchuk Mountians.  They had been on the run for about eight months now, probably more, since the last of the Cemephon command structure collapsed.  Her and a couple of dozen fire warriors with a few devilfish had been fighting a guerilla war against the humans all that time.

She sat in an old human farm-house, a low adobe block of a building, that she had made her headquarters.  All about the adobe structure hung screens and monitors.  Most were off.  One showed an incoming picfeed from a sentry drone and another a list of repair requests.  Data cables snaked across the floor and the soft hum of solar transfer units could be heard.  Her stealth suit was spread out on the table before her and her support drone floated above illuminating her work.  She was perched on a high stool so that she towered over the table, the suit, in pieces, was laid out before her.  Her heels were hooked onto a high bar beneath the seat of the stool so her knees were raised high about her.  Her elbows rested on them while she worked. Her small blue lounge was poised on her lower lip while she concentrated on the repair.

She paused and looked out one of the narrow windows across the small agricultural plot that they had co-opted as their current base of operations.  She could see firewarriors and drones moving about the farm on various errands.  The forested valley where the farm lay was well sheltered from the rest of the province and a macro disruption pod they had set up would confuse any human scans of the area.  A large red barn stood off to the south where the Earth Caste had set up their repair bays.  The large shape of an Orca drop ship under repair sat beside it.  One of the turbine thrusters open like a soft-boiled egg with cables and wires hanging out of it like jungle vines.  A couple of workers wandered about atop it attending to various tasks.  She turned back to her repairs.

She had once served as a bodyguard to Anemos, the leader of the Cemephon Expansion.  In the few days before the expansion collapsed and the Dark Eldar forces swept across this world she had sought out her leader.  Chaos had reigned in the Tau headquarters and Ana’li recalled dashing through the empty halls looking for her master.  She remembered that she had paused at a window and saw the shapes of advancing imperial tanks and known that the Cemephon Crusade was over.  She ran to the chamber of the etherial and found it empty save for the body of her master.  Anemos lay in that dark and empty chamber in a pool of her own blood.  Ana’li knelt at her master’s side.  A foul poison still contorted Anemos’ face.  Veins stood out of her neck like grotesque worms eager to wriggle from her skin.  Ana’li cradeled her master’s head on her lap, tacky blood soaking her pant legs.  Anemos moved slowly now, blinking as though in slow motion.  A vast incision had been made in her belly and she had bled out onto the floor.  Ana’li remembered that she had wept for her fallen leader and cursed the humans that now bore down on this place.  She had been in such anguish that she almost had missed the quiet final words Anemos spoke.  Ana’li had lowered her head to Anemo’s lips to hear the breathy gasping words.  The fallen commander grasped Ana’li hand tightly, the slick blood making their hands slip.
“Continue” she said.  Ana’li’s eye’s grew wide.  “Take my mantle and continue”, Anemos’ eyes slowly closed her breath leaving.
Ana’li didn’t linger.  She gathered up the body of her master and carried it back to the upper concourse where the Sha’o kept their battle suits.  She gathered as many firewarriors to herself as she could along the way.  They donned the last of the available suits and fled before the advancing humans.  Ana’li donned her master’s XV22 suit and led the last of the firewarriors away.  They carried Anemo’s body with them.  Over the months that followed they moved from hideout to hideout, picking up stragglers from the Tau army as they went.  They had found this place four months ago.

Ana’li swallowed hard at the memory of the leader she had replaced.  She remembered Anemos’ last words, “Continue”.  She looked down at the suit spread out like a costume before her.  It had come to be her own now.  She glanced over at the alien sword that had been with the suit.  It glittered with a gold and green light.  It had been a gift from the Dark Eldar to Anemos before their betrayal.  Ana’li swallowed again.  She wondered what exactly she had been called on to continue.

Tau Victorious

The Third Cemephon War: Turn three narritive

Welch had failed once already in his attempt to capture the xenos controlled sector.  Possession of the manufactorum was vitally important as the xenos had repurposed it to provide their own forces with munitions.  Recapturing it would, of coarse, deny them that resource while supplying his own forces with much needed ammunition; however it was the location that was critical, control of this sector would provide a front from which further operations against important strongholds would be conducted against the enemy.  Dolgath realized a second frontal assault against the heavily fortified position would be fruitless, yet Welch was intent on taking it by brute force.  Dolgath had something more devious in mind…

“Your hammer failed!”  Welch exclaimed as he paced back and forth in front of the vast viewport through which the sphere of the planet glowed below like a precious jewel ripe for the taking. 

“Yes, the tides of battle can be unpredictable…”  Dolgath responded from his chair, lost in thought.  

“Is that all you can say?”  Welch spat.  

“Guile…” Dolgath said.

“Guile, what does that mean?”  Welch asked.

“The Tau are a guileless race, as far as I can tell.  They expect another frontal assault, so let’s give it to them.”

Welch pause in anticipation. 

“A night deployment, as if we plan to attack their fortifications at dawn, only we will not be attacking their fortifications at all, we will be attacking the utility and resource feeds to the manufactorum.  Without those feeds the facilities will be useless to them and they will take the pragmatic course and abandon them,” Dolgath concluded.  

The Third War for Cemephon: Turn two mission narrative

The third war to take the embattled planet of Cemephon late in the 42nd Millenium began strong.  Shas-O Obolis was infused with a new zeal and had quickly taken control of vast swaths of territory.  The next pinch point of the war would be the securing of a manfactorum in the Gatatha Sector.  The facility could be repurposed to produce some of the basic equipment needed to continue the war effort.  Imperial forces, perceiving the jeopardy of allowing this factory to fall into enemy hands moved quickly to halt the Tau advance.  Obolis in turn saw this escalation and committed a significant portion of his Fire Warriors and resources to this engagement.  He hoped to overwhelm his enemy with a large weight of weapons before they could resupply.

Obolis was in the warm dark of his suit.  The image feeds that came from the advance Pathfinder teams showed a large number of Imperial tanks moving at speed toward his position.  He tapped a communication bar and opened a voice link to his ground forces.
“All ground forces move to engage at close range.  Crisis teams provide covering fire to support the advance.”  He paused thinking his strategy through.  “Fire Warriors, Pathfinders engage at close quarters.  Delay the advance and then fall back by numbers to the green line.  Broadside teams and Skyrays provide marker guided suppression.”

The Cemephon Expansion: Good hunting today

Obolis pushed open the large doors of the warehouse with the shoulder of his Crisis Suit.  The two doors swung open on old hinges with a raw whine.  Dust curled up from the floor and caught the green lights from the three suits now schilouetted in the doorway.  Their large frames took up most of the entryway.  Boxy and mechanical they towered sixteen feet tall, drones buzzed about them.  The suits immediately entered the darkened chamber.

Within his suit Obolis’ form seemed to float in a warm darkness.  Screens and view monitors floated in the darkness about him.  He checked the status of his other teams via a proximity map that appeared to float down at his right hip.  It was angled up toward his head.  One team was entering on the second floor of the warehouse.  They had jumped to the upper floors. He could hear them above.  Glass and masonry smashed apart as they entered.  A third team was still outside the building protecting the flank of the Tau’s approach.

The suits to Obolis’ left and right quickly fanned out, securing the large storage room, their targeting lights cutting green lines across the darkness.  A proximity light erupted on a display within his suit.  A report from a Pathfinder team bumped in front of his field of vision.  It showed several Imperial tanks crossing a bridge.  A report chirped a message to him, he recognised the voice as his old friend Matrun.

“Marines dismounting on the south side of your position.  They’re right outside the warehouse”. Obolis’s eyes grew wide.  He looked to the other side of the chamber and saw boarded up windows that would have looked out at the Del’Chan River.  A similar sized door as the one his team had entered sat in the center of the wall.   Obolis saw an opportunity; either the Marines were planning to assault the building and them within it or they were unaware of his presence.  Either way he saw a position of strength.  He quickly tapped commands into his communication consoles.  He directed two mechanized Fire Warrior teams to move from reserve to the roof of the building.  He commanded the crisis team that was still outside to come around the side of the building and flank the marines.  To the suits above him around him he spoke directly into his com.

“Heavily armed humans outside the south wall.  Fire for effect”.  At this command the suits reacted as though in a carefully prepared dance.  All three suits turned toward the south wall, their plasma guns spasming with a green light. And then a riot of color and heat erupted from their wide barreled weapons.  The fury of color issued against the south wall, the boarded windows and shuttered door.  Holes appeared in the dark wall and light issued fourth.  The marines outside had been on the verge of entering the building when the wall erupted.  Most of the marines were unfazed by the haze of plaster and wood chips blasting about them.  One or two received hits and staggered away from the wall.  The rest charged into the building, shouldering the doors open and other pulling themselves through the windows.

Obolis could hear and see plasma shots reigning down on the marines from his suits above.  He watched as a hail of plasma fire stabbed down at a marine and seemed to follow him as he entered the building.  The stabbing shots, like flaming sword, issued through the air and then exploded from the ceiling as the Crisis suit clearly tracked the movement of the targeted marine.  It eventually caught the human, slicing through his bulky armor.  The marine crashed down.  Obolis and his team dusted off and lifted into the air as swarms of marines entered the building. They continues firing while they settled on a catwalk above the marines.  Random shots came up at them and one of the shield drones exploded, overloaded from the fire, but Obolis’ team kept firing.  A door at the end of the catwalk opened and from it issued dozens of Fire Warriors.  Their transports had landed on the roof and they had quickly joined the fight.  They began firing as they came spreading out along the catwalk.  The reign of fire had become too much for the marines below.  Super heated shot issued at the marines from all directions.  Plasma shots bucked through the walls from the suits that had flanked the building.  Dozens of rifle shots poured from the catwalk above.  The beleaguered marines’ assault into the building had stopped in its tracks.   Most were dead and the last few were crouching behind scattered boxes and crates.  Obolis’ connected his suit’s targeting systems to the let marker lights coming from his Pathfinder teams and let them guide his shots.  The suit systematically targeted a marine with a green reticule, and shot him, targeted another, and shot him.  A third, the marine dropped with a crater in his head.

The number of shots from the catwalk had slowed as the number of targets disappeared.  Quiet was broken occasionally by the odd shot from a Fire Warrior sniping at wounded marines.  Obolis scanned the room.  He saw the occasional movement but the Marine’s were done.  He saw that his Pathfinders had ruined the two transport tanks that had brought the marines forward.  Directed rocket fire had made short work of them.  He powered down his weapon and tapped his com link bar opening a channel to all units in the field.
“The warehouse has been secured.  All units return to orange line stations.  Good hunting today”.

The Dolgath Legacy: Part 22: I am open to your suggestions

Dolgath sat alone in his private audience chamber monitoring the feed from the command center on his desk’s holo-display.  He had a bad feeling about this mission from the very beginning.  It was rash and ill-considered of Nelthas to lead this mission personally, and yet, he understood her choice.  Under the circumstances, in his youth, he might have made a similar choice – who was he kidding, in fact he had done something very similar some sixty-seventy years ago… He was lucky to still be alive…

Dolgath very much understood her decision.  The Space Marines had been her force of choice and early on she had achieved great success with them, but the xenos had adapted.  Originally, the xenos expected a similar force to the Imperial Guard hammer he had used to crush the invaders on their first assault of New Boston.  On their second assault, the lightning tactics of the Space Marines disconcerted them, and Nelthas was able to mount a significant string of victories, yet the xenos adapted once again.  Nelthas’s tactics began to fail in the face of the enemy’s new strategies.  It was the chink that the Ordos droogs had been waiting for.

Dolgath had been unaware of Nelthas’ enemies.  All Inquisitors had them; of course, Dolgath had legions of them, as a matter of fact!  Yet Dolgath had assumed that Nelthas had her enemies well in hand – apparently not… Dolgath initially implicated Welch, but he quickly realized Welch was nothing more than the errand-boy he seemed.  If anything, Welch’s presence was more to monitor him.  Sadly, the machinations of the Ordo Xenos were quite outside his personal experience.

On a darker day, he might have suspected Treyquill, the Ordo Hereticus could never be trusted, yet Treyquill was gone – off clear across the galaxy chasing the specter of his old nemesis, Sylax.  The thought of that name sent sudden shivers down his spine… Sylax and Ozymandius…  He had sent them to their graves, and yet, somehow, he still did not sleep well at night.  He wished Treyquill the very best in his endeavors!    In fact, Dolgath had danced across the line between the various Ordos factions of Maleus, Hereticus and Xenos many times in his career, and he had made untold enemies in his wake; any of which might be singling out Nelthas as a target simply for her association to himself.  The thought of it filled him with rage…

The holo-display flickered with a sudden chaotic blurt of activity…  The Grey Knights had made contact and engaged.  Stupid fools, Dolgath thought, their mission was one of rescue, not revenge… The footage was pixilated and highly fragmentary; the Ordo Maleus restriction filters were preventing a clear, real-time picture of the events.   Helmet-cam images flickered rapidly between combatants, finally settling on a steady backfield view.  It focused clearly on several locations, before… The last images transmitted were of intensely bright orbital strikes falling on the scene.

All communications ceased after that.   Dolgath left his audience chamber and stormed up to the command center.  As he entered the command center he witnessed complete uncontrolled chaos.  He saw Welch standing at the command nexus attempting to shout out commands, but no one was listening.  Dolgath stood at the center of it all for a moment gathering it in… Information was streaming in unfiltered… Servitors moved about without porous… junior officers shouted out irrelevant commands… Senior officers had nothing to give command for… As his master had taught him long ago, Dolgath drew it all to himself and focused it, concentrating the chaos into a moment of clarity…

“Stop!”  He shouted.  The reverberations of his voice echoed throughout the chamber.

Quickly silence prevailed.

“What is called for here is a hammer, a hammer even larger than the one I brought to New Boston in the first place,” Dolgath said aloud.

Only silence greeted him in return.

At last a singular voice spoke: “I am open to your suggestions…” said Inquisitor Welch.

 

 

 

 

The Dolgath Legacy: Part 21: Tears to her hidden eyes…

Nelthas had never actually lead a major battle force into the field before – she had, of course, been involved in many small skirmishes over the years, and had recently overseen the strategies and logistics of planetary-scale battle operations – but she had never actually been in the think of it…

Welch had agreed to lend her elements of his Ordo Malleus detachment to help recover the remnants of the Adeptus Astartes forces trapped in Sector Twelve.  Nelthas suspected Dolgath’s hand in that.  For all his seeming aloofness, Ian brooded over her like an old grail-hawk.  He reminded Nelthas much of her Uncle Petros in that way – the thought of him brought unbidden tears to her hidden eyes…

As she stormed toward the launch bays, infuriated by loosing command of the campaign and intent on vindicating herself in the most dramatic fashion possible, the magnitude of what she was about to do began to sink in.  For her, war had always been something seen from a holopic.  War was that messy, amorphous business conducted by crude and brutal men.  To her, at best, war was a transitory step on the path to a goal; never before had war been a slavering beast intent on ripping the flesh from her bones.

The Grey Knight thunderhawk crouched conspicuously on the floor of the launch bay, like some antisocial raptor – no other craft were anywhere close to it.  Its broad wings were spread wide and burdened with loads of lethal ordinance.  As she approached the open hatch of the craft’s assault bay, she felt like she was stepping into the maw of doom…

The faces of the ranked units of Grey Knights standing in the hold of the thunderhawk were hidden behind their helmets, never-the-less, Nelthas expected that underneath their faces were just as hard and inscrutable as the adamantine visages.  She once again gave thanks to that ancient Adeptus Mechanicus tech priest, Id, who crated her suit, only the pre-programmed expressions of her psychomorphic mask allowed her to maintain any sort of expression of decorum – otherwise, she thought, the poor marines would be staring down on a tiny frightened child.  As it was, the image that they saw was a tall, slender figure in severe black leather accented with rubies the color of fresh blood.  Her mask was ivory, the pouting lips the same blood red as the rubies.

The sudden descent from the drop bay sent her stomach up into her throat and sent an almost orgasmic thrill through every vein.  Nelthas wondered if the Astartes felt that thrill; she guessed not, as they all stood perfectly still and silent, like ancient statues.  The entire rescue force was assembled on the thunderhawk’s assault deck and it looked to her to be inadequate for the task, and yet, she was aware that these were the most elite warriors the Imperium had to offer.  If she could not accomplish this task, she only had herself to blame…  The thunderhawk touched down with such deceleration force, only her suit’s sophisticated augmentics kept her from sprawling face-first onto the deck.  The Grey Knights were unfazed by the deceleration of the sudden touchdown.  As the assault ramp slammed down, they quickly deployed out in perfect combat readiness.

It was planetary pre-dawn, dark and chilly, but her suit’s sensor suite fed multi-spectral data into her imager to compensate for the darkness and, of course, accommodated for the temperature.  She sometimes wished she could actually feel the conditions on site, experience the real world environment, but the thought quickly faded as the marines were on the move and she rushed forward to keep up with them.

She designated operational command of the detachment to the Grey Knights leader, Questor Gelth.  She did not know him, or even comprehend the significance of his rank, she trusted the Grey Knight commander knew the mission and would conduct operations appropriately.  As they deployed, she began to wonder about the wisdom of that choice.  The majority of the detachment boarded razorback transports and sped off in a cloud of red dust, leaving Nelthas standing next to a hulking solitary figure in baroque, rusty-red artificer armor.  A Techmarine.

He was helmetless.  Half his face was obscured by a mass of augmentics – his right eye was supplanted by an intimidating, glowing telescopic enhancement that whirred and clicked as it focused.  Yet the half-smile that showed through from the human half of his face was warming.

“Inquisitor,” he half-bowed.  “I am, Reginalt, Techmarine of the 4^th Company of Grey Knights.  I admire your epidermis: highly functional and yet aesthetically pleasing.”

Nelthas stared at him unsure how to respond.

“I note the style of Master Artificer Id Ingnalius,” he elaborated.

“Really!” Nelthas said in amazement.  “You can see that?”

“Oh, yes, from the overall flow of the design, as well as the tiny details.”  He reached out a massive armored hand and delicately touched the armored support structure of her midriff.  “I noticed the fractal pattern and the perfection of the curve.  He tutored many of the techmarines currently serving the Adeptus Astartes, including myself.”

Nelthas was stunned and struggled for words.  “Ingnalius is a vassal of my family.  He is old, but he serves still…”

Half of Reginald’s face beamed with a smile.  “That is well, Inquisitor, that is very well!”

He held up a hand and three massive servitors marched forward out the thunderhawk’s bay.  Each had one arm replaced by a massive plasma weapon that steamed with cooling vapors.  “These servitors are at your service.  I will be engaged with targeting for the orbital relay.”

Nelthas glanced at the trail of dust left by the departing Grey Knight.  “I guess we should hurry so we are not late to the battle.”

Reginalt grinned and nodded in agreement.

The Dolgath Legacy: Part 19: Cut-off in sector twelve

The command center of the Mars class battle cruiser, The Subjugator, was controlled chaos.  Servitors and ratings scurried about briskly intent on their individual tasks. Junior officers and adjutants strutted to-and-fro relaying tactical data. Line officers lorded over their stations issuing orders critical to their functions, and at the center of it all was the glowing sphere of the command nexus where the senior officers contemplated the vast, swirling central holographic display.  Three stood out from that group, two massive Adeptus Astartes commanders, one in gleaming white and gold and the other in green and brass.  Between them stood a towering yet fragile figure that seemed to sway in the winds of battle like a young willow tree.  From his unobtrusive vantage in a shadowed alcove on the seventh tier, Ian Dolgath sat reading from an ancient book.  From there he could observe the activity of most of the command center while staying within earshot of the critical developments around the nexus.  It was all quite exciting for most, yet war held little allure for him.  To Ian Dolgath, the objective was the only thing that mattered.

The book he was reading strangely paralleled his feelings at that moment.  It was a highly proscribed volume named, The Third Chronicles, attributed to a forgotten remembrancer who recorded his experiences with The Thousand Sons chapter of space marines before and during the Horus Heresy.  Most of the work was clogged with irrelevant minutia, yet hidden within it were some true gems: direct quotes from the Primarch Magnus The Red.  Dolgath found Magnus a fascinating figure; by all accounts a heretical daemon worshipper, yet strangely Magnus avowed his loyalty to the Emperor right up to the end.  His quotes were invariably filled with profound insights into the fundamental nature of war, cutting through all the accolades of victory and glory and illuminating the brutal truth of it.

Magnus spoke of how the tides of war moved in predictable ways; if you were experienced enough to have learned them.  Despite his feigned disinterest, Dolgath did not fail to notice the distinctive tide of defeat as it washed through the command center.  The change of mood was palpable, but the results of the battle were clearly written on the faces of the two Space Marine commanders as they marched heavily out of the chamber.  This defeat was just the latest in a string of victories for the xenos.  The reigniting of the Octaloron campaign began as a few minor skirmishes that quickly blazed-up into a full-blown insurgency.  The xenos had adapted to the successful tactics Nelthas had deployed previously, and were now dominating every engagement.

The battle was over, never-the-less; the command center remained a beehive of activity as retreat operations where implemented and strategic assessments were conducted.   Nelthas remained, a dark, brooding, immobile figure staring silently and inscrutably at the tactical display.  She had not yet learned to accept defeat well, despite loosing the last four of her battles.  Although he dreaded it, Dolgath knew he would need to intervene at some point and take her to her quarters for sustenance and rest.  Unfortunately, as he stood, the foppish messenger-boy, Inquisitor Welch, chose that moment to enter the command center.  He marched forward with a squad of Ordo Malleus storm troopers in dress uniform and reached the nexus before Dolgath could navigate the lift.  By the time he exited the lift and hurried toward the nexus he could hear Welch speaking to Nelthas.

“By order of Segmentum Ordos command, you are here-by relieved” Welch began to say.

“Silence!”  Dolgath roared from the back of the chamber.

Welch spun around at his words, and the storm troopers turned their heads back in almost comical unison.  Dolgath pointed at him.

“Come with me, we need to have some words in private” Dolgath growled.

“Let him speak” Nelthas said as she glided rapidly forward.

Welch rotated his head back and stared like a penitent caught in a searchlight.  He glanced back and forth at the towering form of Nelthas and the smoldering glare of Dolgath wondering which intimidated him more.

“Speak!” Nelthas spat.

“By order of Segmentum Ordos command, I have been ordered to take command of this campaign” he sputtered.

Dolgath almost began to laugh, but when he saw Nelthas rear back like a serpent ready to strike, he held his words.

“A general retreat has been ordered” Welch said.  “All deployed units must retreat to sector five for evacuation.”

“I still have units cut-off in sector twelve” Nelthas said emphatically.

“My orders are clear, if they are not at sector five at the appointed hour, they will be left behind,” Welch said with growing confidence.

“Unacceptable!”  Nelthas raged.  “They are Adeptus Astartes, I will not leave them,” Nelthas exclaimed as she turned and glided away out of the chamber.

“Inquisitor!” Welch took a few steps in earnest to follow her, but she quickly vanished.  He turned back to find the dark eyes of Dolgath glaring at him.

“If she is lost, it is you who shall pay”  Dolgath pointed a grim finger at Welch before turning away.

The Cemephon Expansion: One lost soul in particular

A silvery moon sat low in the sky.  It’s milk white orb sat close to distant dry hills that were bathed in the gold blue of the approaching dawn.  The towering form of a Tau Crisis suit stood amongst the tall dry yellow grass of the summer.  The white of the massive, but graceful, suit picked up the cobalt color of the dawn. A green robotic eye watched the dawn. It hadn’t been like the last time the Tau landed on Cemephon.  Obolois recalled the Honchop Horns bellowing as the massive invasion fleet had descended toward the ruins of New Boston.  He recalled the massive bombardment of the city from orbit.  Back then, almost a year ago now, the strike from space, followed by the massive landing was just as much of a message to the humans as an opening salvo to a war.  The message had been clear~ do not stand against this power.

Behind Obolis’ suit an army was gathering.  The last of several large drop ships slowly and quietly lifted from the field like balloons drifting away to the sky.  They left behind several thousand Fire Warriors, their transports and mountains of supplies for a long conflict.  He recalled that during the original invasion the conflict had not been as brilliant or as deadly or even a prestigious as the arrival.  The humans had had forced the Cemephon invasion into a waiting game, then into a war of attrition, and then into retreat.  Not this time Obolis thought to himself.  This time, Obolis swore, he would do it his way.  He had been overruled time and time again during the opening battle and then the wider campaign.  Now there was nobody to overrule him.

They were not lingering here.  Obolis turned toward the army behind him, fired his jet pack and dusted off the ground.  The fire warriors were quickly loading their supplies into hundreds of Devilfish transports.  As they became ready the transports, each with an escort of Crisis Suits and an assortment of skimmers, took off and departed for their various destinations.  He watched as his hunter teams took to the sky.  Dozens of teams moving off in the dawn light.  And as they became more distant they seemed to become as swarms of insects, some larger than others, all heading toward their various targets. This time the landing had been at night.  Under the cover of a comit’s radiation wake his army descended to the fields of Tralthus.  It was a much smaller army now, all that remained of the original Cemephon warfleet.  There were probably more veterans of the Cemephon Sphere in the pits of the Dark Eldar City than in this battle group.  But those that stood by him were veterans indeed.  They had fought on this ground though dozens and dozens of engagements.

Obolis’ suit coasted toward a hovering Pathfinder Devilfish.  As he approached a pair of heavy skimmers lifted from the ground scattering dust and battering the long grasses.  He joined the rest of the crisis suits in his team, three pair and him.  They formed up behind him and were joined by two pair of light scout skimmers.  The cadre of flyers all departed and moved toward the east.  Obolis cast a glance back toward the drop zone.  It was emptying now.  Few Tau were even on the ground.  A brace of transports circled the lonely drop zone.  There had been reports of Tau resistance on this world since he had left months ago.  In secret he sought to link up with those abandoned souls and strengthen their resistance.  To the humans it would appear that a guerilla war had just turned hot.  They would have no way of knowing that a new invasion was underway until half the world had slipped from their grip.

There was one lost soul in particular that he meant to find…

The Cemephon Expansion Part 18: We will kill his memory

Obolis observed his three fingered hand.  It was ashen blue with deeper blue age lines through the stubbly knuckles.  The backdrop to his hand was the yellow gold stone under autumn light.  The occasional crimson or amber three fingered leaf scatted by on the last of the warm summer gusts.  He wore counting beads around his wrist and was clothed in a cream colored robe with an orange sash.  He sat on one of several low benches that surrounded this small courtyard.  They curved around it’s circular edges.  The paving stones had been lain in a concentric circular pattern.  In the center they made the circular shape of the Tau home world.  He cast his eye from the edge across the courtyard looking toward the familiar glyph. A large Appra tree spread its long broad arms above the meditation place and its gold and crimson leaves created a dappled light in the afternoon.  About him were low buildings, cream color, with gentle curved half moon windows.  The sounds of a dull bell could be heard some distance off.  Obolis recognised it as the call to the third cycle meditation.

He had remembered the impacts that had brought down his suit.  They had shattered his hand and crushed his frontal vertebrae.  He remembered his broken fingers and exposed bone.  He had dragged himself from the mangle that was his ruined suit and with one good hand had hauled himself to shelter.  He was amazed at how his hand now bore no sign of the ruin that it had been.  He watched the dappled light move across his hand.

His strategy had failed.  The widening front of the Cemephon war had not been contained.  His personal assault on the newly arrived behemoth tank of the Imperial Guard had resulted in the death of most of his Fire Warriors.  He and three others had dropped from the back of a strafing drop ship into the combat zone and almost immediately had come under fire.  He recalled that as he had spiraled down from the open hatch of the drop ship, the large forms of his brothers and sisters behind him, their retros firing, his suit had begun registering impacts.  He could see the form of the massive Baneblade below him and he raced toward it.  It formed the central part of the Imperial lines.  Its massive cannons blazed away unevenly like the cannons of a woodside ship, vast gouts of smoke and fire. Thud, thud thud.  He watched in horror as the main gun fired toward the Tau line that could be seen in the distance.  The massive shell sucked the air away at the point of impact before an mammoth explosion obliterated a dozen fire warriors and a Broadside suit.  His attention was forced back to his drop zone as his personal drone was overloaded and exploded from fire.  A red frame appeared around his targeting reticule and he started firing his fusion guns at the Baneblade.  Macuil, his team partner, opened up also.  The super heated blasts seemed to be absorbed by the tank with little effect.  He noted a dozen proximity warnings as the ground reared up toward him.  He ducked toward a derelict building as the slow moving guns to the tank trued toward his teams.  His partner steered toward the roof of the building and crouched with the impact.  Macuil, on the roof already, had started heading toward the edge of the roof, the charge lights of his fusion guns solid.  Obolis followed his partner.

When he reached the edge of the building he saw that the tank had stopped moving.  It had become a bunker, fire issued from dozens of weapons on its vast iron hull.  It obliterated everything around it.  Obolis was surprised to see several human soldiers cut down in the fire fury that had erupted from the machine.  Most of the fire was being directed at the distant Tau line~ most.  He noted his second crisis team had hit the ground in the street below them.  He grimaced as he noted their lack of cover.  He knew their lone shield drone wouldn’t last long.  He watched in horror as the team of two were cut down.  A machine gun blasted through the first large form of the crisis suit.  An impact quickly dispached their shield drone in a shatter of sparks and white metal.  Further heavy rounds then rippled through the first suit like a storm through the autumn leaves.   Metal, cable, and then flesh were scattered.

The quick demise of the first suit gave the second suit just enough time to fire.  He recognised the warrior, Gallty, he thought her name was.  She was a Firewarror from one of the outer ring worlds.  Her fusion shot went wild.  He cursed because he knew she would not get another.  Her suit was hit by a lazer cannon round which obliterated it’s entire right side.  He saw the her burned body, a blackened stub where her right arm should have been, fall from the gaping hole in the crisis suit.  Her manged and torso fell forward like an overcooked banana curling out of its blackened skin.  She slumped forward hanging at at her waste, which was still lodged in the ruined suit.  She hung for a second before the actuators and servos of the suit failed and the armor collapsed forward obscuring, and probably crushing her body.

Obolis remembered his rage as he lifted his twin fusions guns, his foot gripping on the raised edge of the building roof. He and Macuil opened up on the tank.  Their precise fire hit the tank blasting apart armored plating.   Now, they being the only threat all, the fire from the tank was re targeted toward the roof they were on.  The wall and structure below them started to erupt, torn apart by shells.  As the side of the building came apart and his footing gave way he activated his jets to stay aloft.  A brace of shells hit him.  The first hit his suit and did most of the damage, a shot of pain raced through his arm.  The following shots were scattered across his sensor intakes.  His data feeds and actuators malfunctioned and his thrusters automatically failed.  Red warning signs flashed in-front of his eyes and he tried to reengage the thrusters.  It was too late, the suit fell from the edge of the building in a cascade of rubble and debris.  Its internal systems struggled to stay functioning as it fell the three stories and hit the pavement far below.  The actuators, which normally would have worked to have the suit mimic his movements, acted as a cushion when the suit hit the pavement.  In retrospect it was probably a good thing.  Macuil was hit by a lazcannon shot and killed instantly with an abruptly curtailed scream.

Obolis remembered the slow fading of his suits systems.  He watched in pain as the tracked tank before him moved on down the street.  The booted feet of Imperial infantry passed close by his felled suit.  He watched them on a static laced viewer.  They must have taken one look at the remains of his suit and dismissed him.

He looked up from his pondering and before him stood a tall Tau wearing a simple orange and white tabard.  It was Milsin, an Etherial Caste member.  His long dark hair was a long brade and his claiming eyes cast themselves over Obolis.
“What are you looking for?” Asked the Ethereal.  “Is there something that you seek from your hands?”.
Obolis rested his hand on the bench “I was amazed at the healing power of the Earth Caste.  My  hand shows no scar from the battle two months ago.”
“Doesn’t it?”
“none.”
“None that can be seen.  You seem to look for it anyway.”  Obolis nodded.  The Ethereal caste was always looking for meaning in simple things.  Looking for something under the surface.  Perhaps that was why this Ethereal, Milsin was the leader of this place.  He was always seeking healing beyond physical healing.  “You’re still thinking about the defeat at Cemephon.”
“Well wouldn’t you?” hurt could be heard in his voice.
“yes” Milsin nodded. “The loss of that world, and the horror that followed, is something that pains my soul too.  Your soul however should not be blamed for this.”  He paused as though looking inward. “We Ethereal should take the blame if any.  After all it was our Ari Ashi who lead your invasion of that world to ruin, not you.”  There was a quiet pause between them with the rattle of the dry leaves on the stone.
“I should have resisted.”
“you tried.” silence again “…and that is why you’re here.  You questioned Ari’s traitorous allegiance and still tried to win the war for our empire.  Perhaps your fault was not seeing that the more you fought the more your doomed expedition was to suffer.  There really was no way your campaign on Cemephon could have won with such a cancer at its heart.”
“But a corrupted Ethereal.  How could it be so?”
“How indeed?” Milsin nodded.  “Corrupted. And so much was lost.  So many warriors killed.  And Anemos, one of our most brightest and faithful leaders, dead.”
“Nobody ever saw her killed” Obolis looked up at the Ethereal with a harsh look in his eye.  Milsin raised his eyebrows and formed a slight frown, one of the few ways Tau had to show concern.
“Here we are again.”  he said.
“What?”
“Anemos.”
“What?” The Fire Warrior’s face in a snarl.
“Do you think she is still alive?” said the leader, seeing something of hope in the Fire Warrior.
“Probably not” his look was forlorn.
“You miss her leadership”.  Obolis didn’t reply.  The Ethereal sat down on the bench quietly as the silence and open ended question filled the space.  He breathed out in a long slow breath.

Another sweep of wind blew through the courtyard scattering orange fragments.
“You have been here for months Obolis.  It is time to return to the field”  The Ethereal said.  “I have been tasked to guide you now.  But there is something that has not been resolved here and I have been unable to get to the bottom of it.  We can not begin again until it is resolved.  I would have thought it was the betrayal of Ari Ashi, the Traitor Ethereal.  But no.  I sense that even during the campaign you were trying to out maneuver him.  You had moved past his influence then.  What holds you back now is Anemos’ absence”.
Obolis shifted uncomfortably in his seat.
“It is though she were your true leader” The Ethereal said.
“She was”.  Though what Obolis said was a virtual blasphemy the Ethereal simply sighed.
“I must conclude” Milin spoke “that you do not wish to disgrace yourself by claiming that Anemos was the true leader.  Had she been, the defeat on Cemephon would have been hers rather than Ari Ashi’s.  I must conclude that your attachment to her was beyond that of an officer to his general”.
Obolis said nothing.  His mind was confused beyond words.  He had counseled Anemos to rebel against the traitor Ethereal.  But she had stayed true as her duty obliged her to.  And now he felt regret at her absence and his inability to influence her when he had the chance.  He blamed himself for her loss.
“You must move beyond this defeat Obolis”
“I just can’t” he pushed the words out.  The Ethereal nodded slowly.
“We’ll do it together.  We’ll move past this together.”
“What do you mean?”  The Fire Warrior turned to his new guide.
“You will summon the remnant of the Cemephon Expanson.  They are camped beyond the Maltran Plain.  They are ready for war again.  You will return to Cemephon, wipe out the Imperials that now threaten the world again and you will find the body of Anemos.  You will bury her in the ground”.
“What if she is alive?”
“She is not.  And you will discover that and put her memory to rest.”
“What of the Fire Warriors?  They still worship Ari Ashi despite the defeat?”
“I know it.  We will embrace the icon of the fallen Ethereal and make it our own.  We will kill is memory in our victory.  We will own his tattoos and make them proud again.  Are you willing Obolis?”
The Fire Warrior paused.  A gust pushed through the square and the two leaders locked eyes.
“I am.”