Chapter V: Retaliation of the Wolves
Southern Dependencies, Void Wolf Sector
Great Blood Wolf, Citadel War Barge
Malganus
The First Cohort’s Centurion waited patiently as mortal servants put on his power armor piece by piece. From his sabatons, they worked their way up to his helmet. He was in his personal armory – a comfort afforded every Centurion and high ranking officer in the Empress’s legions. He stood bit by bit clad in the power armor of the Twenty-third Legion. In the typical Death Wolf color scheme, most of the armor was as black as obsidian from sabatons to helmet and the visor was blood-red. While the gauntlets were black the arms were red and the pauldrons had the same blood-red color with a silver rim. One of the servants, a teenage alien girl, offered him his helmet, her large black eyes staring up at him with reverence. Like many picked to serve non-military duties on board an Ultra Marine ship she was orphaned. Luckily her life was given a new purpose. Her skin was white as pearls and from atop her head a head-tress of tendrils reached down to her shoulders. She was dressed in clothes of the finest materials.
He accepted it from her and placed it on his head where it was firmly attached to his gorget. His right pauldrons were adorned with a silver star and a bronze star to represent the rank of Augusticlavii – an honorary title awarded an Ultra Marine after eight-hundred years of service. Below the stars were two chevrons of gold to symbolize his rank of Centurion.
The servants kneeled around him.
“You are ready, lord,” the teenage girl said in a voice barely higher than a whisper. “We are honored to serve.”
“I am honored by your service,” said Malganus.
As he walked out of his armory the girl spoke behind him. “Is-is it true there’s Urks where we’re going?”
He turned around to look down on the frail teen. She looked down hesitantly and scratched her arm. Other servants looked shocked by her. He saw on her that she’d realized she had spoken out of turn. An Ultra Marine’s servants did not speak in such a manner.
A smirk spread over his lips and he said, “Indeed we are. We’ll arrive in the system soon.” She shifted her head to look up at him and he saw fear in her eyes. He understood it, for she had been found on a small colony ten years ago. She’d hid in a cellar as Urks slaughtered her neighbors and family. The horrors of the Urks would leave its mark on any mortal being. “We’re going to show them what happens when they attack Imperial worlds. Archon Neith leads us. I promise you that we will crush them and drive them from this entire.” Her eyes sparkled with confidence at his words and she bowed.
When he reached the bridge it was full of life, officers oversaw crewmen as they carried out their duties at hundreds of stations. In the back, raised up, was the command section where all decisions were made and sent forth from. A gathering of men and women hung around the rectangular holo-map table. Close to twenty of them were humans in officer’s fatigues of the Army and Marine Corps elements that traveled with the battlegroup Neith had chosen to take. The snobby Political Officer was easy to spot in his black tailcoat frock with his long grey boots and gloves. The Death Wolves were divided across seven other battlefields in the Southern Dependencies. The other men present were Death Wolves, all sharing the same ethnic Japanese features, the same charcoal black hair, sharp grey eyes, and pointed chin. Only two of them were out of their armor, Fleetmaster Anhur, and Foul-mouth Fabricius. One man that was noticeably missing was the Empress’s Champion.
At the head of the holo-map stood Neith in her glory. Her blood-red eyes were settled on the empty holo-map waiting for data to spring up the moment they exited Darkspace.
He looked at Scaurus that stood beside him. “Where is the Empress’s Champion?” He asked in a low voice.
His brother turned his head to him and said, “I know he held a sermon in the temple section an hour ago.”
“I thought he did that this morning.”
“And all through the day. It’s good for morale for Death Wolves and mortals alike. The people who get to stand in sermon under an Empress’s Champion are even less than the number of civilians that get to see an Ultra Marine.”
That was true enough he knew. There wasn’t that many men or women that the empress dubbed to be her champions on the field of battle. He had been as enchanted by them like everyone else at one time, but Archon Neith had explained to him the truth behind the Empress’s Champions and the magic had bee lost for him.
“Archon, we are exiting Darkspace,” the Adjutant said.
“Show me the enemy,” Neith said in a voice as low as a whisper.
On the holo-map, the planet Gaevalon appeared with crude, bulky starships positioned in orbit.
The Adjutant continued, “The Urk fleet numbers two-hundred vessels, who are currently engaged in battle.” It was only half the number of their battlegroup.
“With each other?” Neith asked for confirmation.
“Confirmed.”
“Why in hell would they do that?” An army Lieutenant General exclaimed gruffly.
“Their leader must be dead,” Malganus said.
His Archon’s pale frame shifted to look at him. “It seems the Daughters of Mara have made our task easier.” He nodded and she looked over the Urk fleet composition and sneered. “Their battleships are crippled by their own hand.”
All he could do was to shake his head at it. Out of a total of seventeen battleships, only six were operational – albeit damaged – and eleven was utterly crippled. How many other of their kin stood proud and crude before the Urks turned upon each other? Five of those yet functional was the size of a War Barge, but he knew that not even Urruk battleships were as powerful as that. The Empress had struck genius when she – oh so brilliantly – perfected the War Barge design in the first century of the Twenty-first Millennium. Back then the legions only had a single War Barge each. There were many reasons to think fondly of those days, but he didn’t. No Death Wolf did for they had started this age of war without an Archon to lead them. They didn’t find Neith until the third century. Malganus and his brothers had formed a strong brotherhood with the Imperial Blades since only their legions lacked an Archon, and sadly the Imperial Blades Archon had died long before the fleets first left the Sol System.
Leading their battlegroup forward was the two Citadel War Barges Great Blood Wolf and Wolf’s Vengeance and behind them came four Basilisk-class Battleships and Predator-class Battlecruisers that numbered fifty. Most of the remaining fleet was of Cruisers, Destroyers, Frigates, and Corvettes. There was also the Carriers, seventeen Alexander-class Carriers with their hangars full of fighters and bombers, both strategic and tactical.
“We are one-hundred twenty-thousand kilometers from the enemy fleet,” an officer announced.
Hmm, less then twelve minutes, he thought.
“I want a targeting solution on the Super MAC Cannons,” said Neith. “Take us a range of five-hundred kilometers and halt the fleet there.” That would place them at a range of five-minutes from the Urks.
“Our Super MAC Cannons will close that distance in no more than two minutes,” Anhur declared. “Ten minutes for Small MAC Cannons and four-minutes for the Large MAC Cannons.”
“It’ll be the same for the Urks,” Neith said, her eyes looked at the faces around the holo-map table. Several men nodded. “The true work will be done by our plasma cannons. They will only have a minor amount which gives us the advantage in firepower.”
“It’ll force them to charge into a closer range,” Malganus said. It would allow the Urk filth to use all of their MAC guns properly but it was the same for them.
She nodded slightly. “We’ll send forth the strike crafts then. The fighters will cover the bombers as they strike at the capital ships’ fresh wounds.”
“Skillful plan, my Lady,” Malganus told her sincerely. “The Urks never refuse an opportunity to get close up and personal – whether they’re in the void or on the ground.” He smiled smugly. They would fly straight to their death. Even if they wouldn’t press forth they would sit at a serious disadvantage in firepower. Though it had to be said that this was far less aggressive then he was used to seeing from her. It was unusual to see this from her.
“Have we been able to contact the planet?” Neith asked.
“I have available lines of communication to the governor and Keep Amor,” the Adjutant replied in her synthesized feminine voice.
Neith shifted her eyes to the Political Officer. “You will speak with the governor while I speak with whoever commands the keep.”
The man bobbed his wrinkled face down and then up. “Yes, my Lady Archon.” Neith gestured for a midshipman to show him to a communication’s console. “Give me a link with the keep.” She walked to a console and activated the holo-screen.
“Working. Done,” the Adjutant said.
The brown helmet, pauldrons, and green chest of a fully armored Daughter of Mara appeared. She instantly kneeled on the floor when she saw Neith stand before her.
“Oh, venerable Archon Neith. You honor me – us – you honor us with your presence,” she hurriedly spouted with both shock and reverence flowing through her words.
“I seek the commander of your keep,” Neith said flatly.
The Daughter of Mara inclined her head upward. “I command the-the command center of Ke-Keep Amor. I am Astropsycher Harford.”
Malganus smirked. Clearly, this psychic Daughter of Mara was young – likely no more than a few decades out from Earth or any other of the worlds with cloning facilities. She had definitely never met another Archon before. That much was amusingly clear. As was Neith’s annoyance.
“Are you the highest-ranking officer, girl?”
“I…no. I-I could connect you to her? Sh-she’s fighting wi-with most o-o-of the Company in the fort,” she managed to stutter out through her external speakers. He bet she was happy she wore her helmet with the visor on right about now.
“Do so.”
“Poor cousin,” Scaurus mumbled in amusement.
The screen went black and soon a voice came through. “Captain Warhowl, I hear you.”
“This is Archon Neith of the Death Wolves Legion.”
There was an audible gasp. “My lady! Empress be praise, I am relieved that you’re here.”
“You command the Daughters of Mara on Gaevalon?”
“I do, my lady. I command the stronghold and the Company that garrison it.”
“What is your situation on the ground Captain Warhowl?”
“In the last week, the Urks have focused most of their forces on the capital and its hinterlands. My sisters and what remains of the Imperial military fights hard for every room and every street.”
“We’ve detected that the Urruk fleet has been fighting itself.” As the holo-map showed that had stopped and they were maneuvering to head for their battlegroup.
“That started a few days ago.” Her voice was full of pride when she declared, “We killed the Warboss commanding this invasion and many of his commander since. A fight for power followed.”
“Hmm. Good work Captain Warhowl,” Neith said approvingly. “How many sisters remain?”
“Seventy-five. I’ve lost twenty-five of them to the foul Urks.”
“And the Imperial military?”
“When the Urk fleet arrived planetside the generals gathered most of the military around the capital and what remnants of the divisions and air force remain is holding out.”
“I expect it will not take not for me to crush the enemy fleet. We will speak again then.”
“Yes, Archon.”
Neith returned to the holo-map. They had almost reached the range she had commanded and as they did she looked at Fleetmaster Anhur.
“Fire at will, fleetmaster.”
“Yes, my lady.” He gave the order to an ensign that sent it out to the communications section of the bridge.
Their Carriers hung back with a screen of Frigates and Destroyers. Also hanging back was several flotillas of ships kept as a strategic reserve.
The fleet slowed. Then the capital ships that were equipped with Super MAC Cannons opened fire and a fierce barrage laid by thousands of plasma cannons followed suit. The bolts were the first to strike at the Urks hulls. They let their battleships lead and their battered hulls stood firm for now. The capital ships made no attempts to avoid the shells from the Super MACs from the two Citadel War Barges and four Battleships and fifty Battlecruisers. The standard Predator was armed with two Super MAC Cannons and the Basilisk Battleships were armed with six. A Citadel War Barge, technically a battlecruiser, was armed with ten. They had the speed and maneuverability of a battlecruiser and the firepower of a battleship dreadnought.
The targets of most of the giant shells launched at high velocity targeted the capital ships. Six cruisers targeted were obliterated on impact and two battleships were impacted by a succession of shells against their damaged hulls and cracked. Meanwhile, the hail of green plasma rained upon their Lycinium plated hull. Thrice Urk launched shells strike the Great Blood Wolf’s hull. Their screen of Frigates, Destroyers, and Cruisers dodged incoming
Then the second volley was launched and it was joined by Large MAC Cannons. The holo-map then revealed that the Urks had launched thousands of strike crafts that was quickly speeding towards them.
“Launch our fighter squadrons,” Neith ordered then.
No more then three minutes later their fighter squadrons came out to greet the crude Urk crafts. Then the Smaller MAC Cannons joined the fray on both sides. When a support ship was too damaged Neith ordered them back and directed a specific vessel to assume their formation. For now, no ships from the reserve was needed. Unfortunately, there were still losses, a few Destroyers, a Cruiser, and two Frigates were either destroyed or crippled, and two battlecruisers withdrew to avoid crippling damage. The Urks were only two-hundred and fifty kilometers from them and their casualties were four-time higher than theirs.
“Halt all vessels,” Neith commanded. The order was given and all engaged Imperial ships stopped. “Send forward Commodore Vaesar’s group.”
The Commodore’s one-hundred and twenty ships would soon advance to flank the Urks and fire upon them from the rear. That left a single flotilla in the strategic reserve, forty ships in total. Malganus had no doubt about victory, for the enemy was down to two battleships.
“Two-hundred kilometers,” the Adjutant altered them.
Only now did the Political Officer return from his conversation with the governor.
“Anything of note?” Neith inquired of him. She didn’t take her eyes off the developments on the holo-map.
The man shrugged. “Not really. He’s not a thankful feller. Pissed we didn’t arrive just moments after the Urruks did.”
Malganus groaned. So he was one of those civvies. Great, just great. The dogfighting went very well, the Imperials skill and excellent crafts performed perfectly and was slowly picking off the Urks. Of course, the Corvettes and Frigates gunners shot down their fair share as well.
“Send out the bomber squadrons and make sure the fighter squadrons keep them protected,” Neith said.
“Aye, Archon,” Anhur replied, giving commands to an officer that sent them on to their respective sections on the bridge.
The Carriers commanded their squadrons to relocate to protect the bombers as they left the hangar bays. The fighters carved paths through the Urk fighters and quickly closed the distance between the approaching hostiles and themselves. The holo-map registered hits to the cracked hulls of the closest battleships, three full squadrons of bombers unleashed their loads inside and the ship’s front was torn apart in soundless detonations that shredded bulkheads and armor and vaporized flesh.
The ship shook as its own armor plate buckled in some places under the enemy’s relentless fury. Malganus always enjoyed the sight of Neith holding command in battle. The speed of which she calculated every decision in her head before she spoke, how she worked out so many outcomes in her head in a second. He knew commanding this battlegroup was nothing to her. She was used to commanding fleets that numbered in the thousands. Once even over ten-thousand. In that campaign, she had commanded their Legionary Fleet, three Imperial Fleets, and a portion of the Imperial Blades and Onyx Crusaders Legionary Fleets. It was a pleasing sight to see that less then half the enemy ships remained functional and the last battleship was no longer firing and only moved by the momentum it had before its engines died.
“Give me a map of the planet beside that of the void engagement,” Neith told the AI. The Adjutant complied. Neith highlighted several locations planetside. She kept her eyes on both maps as she continued. She quickly delivered orders to the human commanders. Several divisions would be dropped in strategic locations around the region with the capital. Two regiments of marines, an armored battalion, and several Walkers would drop around the governor’s palace in a valley. The attention of the First Cohort of Death Wolves would be focused on the massed enemy presence around the capital – with support from two full divisions and armor and Walker support. That pleased Malganus and he knew it pleased his brothers as well. They would drop and crush the Urks.
Neith looked at the officers around the table and settled her blood-red eyes on Malganus. He stood perfectly still and at attention.
“Centurion Malganus. Organize with the other ships for the landing operation.”
He folded his fist over his chest and bowed his head. “It will be done, my Archon.”
“You are dismissed,” she said, and the officers all saluted and filed away from the holo-map.
Malganus did not move immediately. He saw on the map that the Commodore had successfully reached the Urks rear and was tearing them apart. Neith slowly raised her head from the battle map.
“Yes, Malganus? You wish to ask something?”
“I, yes. Are you dropping with us?”
Her lips curved into a vicious smirk. “I will.” Those words and that look filled him with a yearning for battle.
As he left she turned toward the Political Officer.
Malganus grabbed his bolter rifle from the armory and joined many of his brothers that were gathering in the ship’s drop pod launch bays. On both War Barges, the brothers of the First Cohort would gather to deploy by dropships and drop pods. He would descend by drop pod himself. He looked at the assembling men, chatting, checking their equipment a second time, and eagerly wait to slay Urks. Human operators carried out checks to ensure that every drop pod was functional to carry their occupant planetside. Captain Scaurus made a bet with the Captain of the Twenty-Eighth Company to see which of them slew one-hundred Urks first.
The Adjutant told him that the Urk fleet was broken Neith had sent a part of the fleet to handle the fleeing ships that remain while the Great Blood Wolf and Wolf’s Vengeance were heading toward Gaevalon at full sublight with their support screen. Ten minutes passed. Then he saw a figure enter the cavernous chamber that was the drop pod launch bay. He was a human man, garbed in a layered pearl-white robe and a medallion hung around his neck. It looked to be made out of gold and depicted a fist with angelic wings behind it. His name was Arcturus Saar Mengest and he was the Empress’s Champion that had chosen to join the Twenty-third Legion. Death Wolves turned to him, many of his brothers took a knee – armor clanking as they did – and they removed their helmets. An Empress’s Champion did indeed deserve a wealth of respect for they were believed to have been blessed by the Empress’s miraculous might. The ‘why’ was clear when you looked at him for from his back sprouted a pair of bright-white angel wings. They were folded behind him as he moved among the Death Wolves, putting a hand on some of their foreheads and held a sudden last-minute prayer. Once, he had been as awed and encouraged and his emotions stirred just like everyone else’s. That was until Neith hold him the secret of the Empress’s Champions. There had been no miracle that grew those wings even though everyone – the Champions themselves included – thought so. It was what they were all taught. When they were chosen scientists apparently made some changes in their genes. He didn’t understand the science behind it but that didn’t keep him from feeling depressed when he had that information in his head.
Lately, he had managed to appreciate the moral boost Saar Mengest’s mere presence had on the faithful, be they human, alien, or Ultra Marine.
The Adjutant made an announcement over the speakers. “Two minutes until deployment, two minutes until deployment.”
“Alright. Get to your pods,” Malganus said in a raised voice.
He made his way to the closest pod and stepped in, letting a crewman close the hatch behind him. The pod was just big enough for him to fit in his full armor. The revelation had not hurt his faith in the Empress’s divinity and grace. Was not her comprehension of science divine? With the power of her mind, she created the Archons, designed several of the warships utilized by the Imperial Navy, and the cloning facilities that bred the Ultra Marines – the greatest soldiers in the known galaxy. Certain in the two-thirds they had brought into the fold by force of arms and by the oratory talents of diplomats. Who but a god could do those things? The answer was obvious to him. None. Who but a god could lead Earth for a millennium and a half to make preparations for a divine quest to unify the galaxy and bring it back to the light of civilization? The civilization that had fallen in the dawn of the nineteenth millennium and had been replaced by darkness. With the Empress helming the ship of state they had brought almost two-million worlds into the Imperium.
The clanking of metal reverberated throughout the large chamber as two-thousand Death Wolves entered their drop pods. As they departed the other three-thousand onboard would descend via dropships and large landing transports and the same transpired on the other Citadel War Barge. As fun as spilling Urruk blood as it had been too many decades of fighting Urks in the Southern Dependencies. He always wished to switch places with the Imperial Knights. Archon Poseidon’s legion had spent – what, over forty years on Chemmosis. By all reports Chemmosis’s fauna spewed out poisonous fumes that would kill a human in moments alone and not even an Ultra Marine could survive long without medical evac. It was a world of eternal darkness and shadow with mires, bogs, and swamps of corrosive water that would eat through even power armor with ease. He was so sick of Urruks that he almost wanted to trade places with them. Almost.
“Drop in five, four, three, two, one.”
The drop pods were deployed as the Great Blood Wolf was in the atmosphere, traveling down toward their target at high velocity. It would not take long until they strike the ground in the capital city of Haevshal. If he remembered it was named after Harry Haevers, who’d been the first president of Gaevalon in the dawn of the tenth millennium as the Second Empire of Mankind was crumbling. It had been replaced by the Commerce Alliance of Planets. After eight millennia it was replaced by the Third Empire of Mankind – which only lasted thirty years. As he understood it, all three Empires of Mankind died because of their hostility toward non-humans. On many tens of thousands of worlds in the Imperium aliens happily went to work in factories to produce everything from munitions to screws to keep the hungry meat grinder of war advancing. Hell, it was aliens that had alien engineers that had forged one Neith’s sisters’ armor and the Oannonians intelligence made them brilliant in whatever field they worked.
His pod dug itself partially into the concrete street and within a few seconds the hatch swiftly opened and he stepped out, bolter ready and he aimed for a group of Urks that was assembled ten meters from him. The six of them stood in what appeared to have been a brutal battle with bodies of army troopers, civilians, and Urks. Many of them were torn apart, guts, blood, and body parts scattered about the area. The six Urks had been caught off-guard by the drop pod and it allowed him to shot three of them before they could react. The fourth and fifth he killed while they began to charge him with their guns raise and roaring. The sixth fired a single bolt that hit the side of Malganus’s arm – tearing a mark in the metal without detonating its charge. Malganus killed the Urk with his next bolt. On that very street, nine other pods had struck and their occupants left the metal coffins with their arms at the ready.
The squad quickly assembled around him as he saw drop pods on their final approach through the clouded sky, seconds away from impact in Haevshal. It would not be long now until the dropships descended through the clouds too. Merely a kilometer away he saw the high walls, empty and void of hails of bullets. The outer walls of the fort must have fallen.
“We’re making for the fort,” he told the squad. He intended to pick up forces as he made his way there to meet up with Captain Warhowl and strengthen the fort and most of all the keep’s defenses. Above all, he had to secure the keep.
“Aye, sir,” the squad’s sergeant confirmed.
Much of the city was a burning ruin and corpses of defenders, Urruks scum, and unfortunate civilians laid everywhere. No matter where he looked he saw corpses. The many remaining defenders were no doubt reinvigorated by the sight of Ultra Marine drop pods. He quickly rallied two companies around him. They advanced through the streets and mowed down any Urruk in their path, killing hundreds of them on their march toward the fort. Small groups and even lone Urruks charged their advancing lines through the rubble-covered streets. The short – by Ultra Marine standards – green-skinned, broad shoulders menace were close to suicidal in their desire to fight. Not a one got close enough for a chainsaw bayonet to do its gruesome work. He and his brothers preferred bloody close combat, not unlike their Minotaur’s Sons cousins, but unlike them, they could determine when their preference could be sated and when it could not.
They entered the fort via the hole that had been made in the wall. The hole and courtyard within were full of corpses, mostly or Urruks. But also humans and he even saw a few Daughters of Mara, though they were less than a dozen. The inner wall had also been breached, but there were so many corpses there now that it would make any hostile charge difficult due to the mass of bodies to walk over. Atop the inner wall were a good number of machinegun turrets that had line of sight on the breach and the courtyard before it. He directed squads to clear the ruined buildings in the courtyard to ensure that no Urruks hid there. He raised a hand as he walked towards the breach and his assembled men assumed defensive positions to secure the outer wall. Several armored figures appeared out of the breach and walked to meet him. His brown and green armored cousins halted before him and the one in the center raised a fist to her chestplate and bowed her head. He did the same.
His helmet identified her as Captain Rei Warhowl. “Captain, I am pleased to meet you.”
“Not as much as I am, as well as my sisters,” she answered pleasantly, relieved. “It was beginning to look rather pale as more and more filth swarmed to the city.”
“You don’t need to worry any longer,” he told her, a smile beneath his helmet. “Great Archon Neith will soon descend herself.”
“When we detected ships in the system I thought it’d be no more than a Battlegroup.” She chuckled. “Not the Great Wolf herself. It’s a great honor that an Archon leads our rescue personally.”
“You’ll be able to tell her that soon enough I’m sure. How are your defenses holding?”
She laughed. “The Urruks has been in chaos since your fleet broke theirs, Centurion Malganus. We haven’t had a single assault since you starting dropping. I imagine they’re a tad too busy for that.”
“That’s for certain, Captain.” He remembered reports that Amor was constructed in the last few years. “Congratulation on your promotion to lady of a keep.”
“It was a great honor – one I never expected my great Lord Ares to ever appoint me to,” she said sincerely. “It was a conflicting feeling, that I was a poor choice and the impossibility that was the notion that he could have made a mistake.”
“I know the feeling,” he said honestly.
“Sir,” a lieutenant said on over comms.
“I read, lieutenant. Report.”
“Outer wall secured.”
“Very good.” He closed the channel and spoke through his external speakers. “The outer wall is secured. Can you push your company forward to strengthen them?” As a Centurion, he ranked well above a Captain, but he didn’t rank above the commander of a Legion stronghold.
“Of course,” she affirmed.446Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ03LXm3RSIB
