Jornath: Gideon's Lament

+++ ANKOU +++

+0 Days 

Linces Hive

The Scent of the Woods is loamy and fungal.
A lone traveller looks from behind a veil of thickly hanging moss
an Elderly Man bleeds fire into a sacrificial bowl
A sea of stars falls to devour the heart of a faithful son


Epistolary Gideon slammed back to consciousness with a start, reeling within his restraint cradle at the vividness and import of his vision. He looked about the crimson bathed interior of the Overlord, slowly regaining his bearings in the material world, as he recovered from his sudden premonition.

"Brother Librarian are you well?" asked Brother Sergeant Tranent from across the cabin, his tectonic voice rendered sharp-edged by the electronic ministrations of his suit vox.

"Y..Yes, Sergeant, the veil between reality and the emperyan is thin around this world. No doubt thanks to the greenskin's witchcraft" Replied Gideon shaking away the last darkened tendrils of the warp's touch from his mind. He looked into the corner of his visor screen checking the strike force's overview telemetry. The echelon of emerald triangles representing the Dragoon's Overlord and Thunderhawk transports were just now breaching the far side of the debris field of the freshly slain Ork Kroozer blocking the space lanes above Linces' Starport. Gideon blink-clicked the vox rune representing the forces command frequency

"Lieutenant Thade, the warp is unquiet hereabouts, I suspect we will not have an uncontested landing." Gideon spoke into the vox link, and in short order the gruff reply of Lieutenant Thade came back, inhumanly deep, oddly so for a non-primaris Astartes.

"Understood Brother-Librarian, I will disperse the format..."

The Lieutenants words were cut off in a haze of static interference, and Gideon frowned within his helm but did not attempt to reestablish the link, as already the emerald triangles were beginning to move into more cautionary approach vectors, hugging the counter ordinance fire envelopes of the Imperial Navy and System Defense ships. Their operation was simple, land and establish contact with indigenous personnel on Ankou, and begin the bolstering of an Imperial defense which might withstand the approaching greenskin fleet.
No one had heard from Jornath's satellite in months, not since the wretched xenos magics had broken over its surface, there was no telling what fate the Ankouvians might have suffered. The whole of the situation made Gideon uncomfortable, it was not the purview of the Ork's to disrupt their targets with massed psychic attacks, or if reports from the Sons of Medusa were to be believed and it was largely impossible for any of gett of the Iron Hands to fabricate anything, vast hosts of the greenskin's reanimated fallen. Something altogether darker was afoot in this system, and he worried at the price the Imperium's defenders would pay to discover it.

Gideon was thrown from his ruminations by a chorus of static hazed vox blurts, and the sudden slamming of the Overlord to one side, which merely jostled the Astartes slightly within their restraint cradles, but which was extreme enough to render dozens of the House Trask Armsmen, also aboard the craft, unconscious from the g-forces involved. Gideon could already hear Sergeant Tranent asking the Overlord's pilots for a situation report,

"Anti Orbital Batteries Brother-Sergeant" came the terse reply from the cockpit. This news was not so much a shock as a disappointment, it indicated that at least some portion of the surface was under opposition control, which made the early stages of their operation that much more difficult. Resolved, Gideon reached out with his mind, grasping out past the steel and adamantium skin of the Overlord, through the tortured void between the descending assault craft to find the mind of Lieutenant Thade, vox traffic could become intermittent or garbled, especially in the midst of a void battle and he could take no chances. He sailed through the blackness of the stellar dark, dodging pillars of incandescent energy spearing up from Ankou's glittering surface, ducking under chunks of starships still ablaze with plasma fire, and through clouds of flash-frozen corpses, and then as gently as a butterfly drifting lazily through an open window, he found the sleek shape of Lieutenant Thade's Thunderhawk and settled gently into the folds of his mind, seeping in through the cracks on his subconscious to walk the pathways of his synaptic nerves.

"Brother Lieutenant. Shall I instigate Contingency Strategies?"

"Gideon, the vox is more than sufficient. You know my feelings about witchery."

"Yes, but still the question stands."

"Such impudence...Take the Starport, I will silence the Guns, Baron Grundel, and the Armsmen will secure the Governor's Palace... Now... get the hell; out of my skull."

A vicious three-way firefight blazed across the Transhive approaches to the Lord Magyar Honorific Starport, the Armsmen under Sir Kalen had just achieved the first barricade from the hands of the mind tainted Ankouvians, whole hosts of crazed civilians had flooded the streets since their contested landing a half-hour before, screeching themselves hoarse in a bastardized imitation of lingua-technis, the Cult Mechanicus' binaric shorthand, and firing all manner of las weaponry and autoguns. No matter how many fell to the disciplined volleys of the Trask Armsmen and the mighty boltguns of the Astartes themselves, the tide of madmen simply pressed on regardless. Before too long, the undisciplined mobs had given way to organized resistance, Phalanxes of partially augmented nobles wielding humming power blades, supported by well-drilled tech adept levies, all chanting the work line cants of the Mechanicus in a steady monotonous chorus, as they lured Armsmen into prepared kill zones of pre sighted heavy weapons or fell upon the Strike force's supporting Armigers with melta charges and industrial drillers. The whole thing reminded Gideon far too much of the filth covered throngs of Chaos devoted lunatics that now plagued every corner of the blessed Imperium, though the fetid stench of the warp was not present. When the Orks arrived it was almost a relief...almost, in a fashion typical to the wretched beasts they had announced their arrival by bringing down the facade of a habitation block with an immense explosion, which had fortunately neutralized the squadron of Ankouvian tanks parked in the vicinity of the building. 

Brother Ancient Reinhart had made short work of the greenskin sappers that emerged with his Onslaught cannon, but as the saying goes "There are always more Orks".  Reinhart was even now advancing in support of Sir Kalen's troops, using the massive bulk of his Redemptor chassis to shield the more fragile human soldiers from the storm of las and slug fire blizzarding around the area. 

Gideon advanced alongside the intercessors of Sergeant Tranent, summoning up walls of kine force to block the deadliest of the incoming fire, poping the fat rockets shrieking in from the Ork throngs occupying the parapets and communications towers to the northwest of the Starport's gatehouse. He stepped over the scrap metal barricade and joined Sir Kalen and Sergeant Tranent behind the hulking form of Brother Reinhart.  The Trask Armsmen were in a sorry state, only about four dozen were still alive at all, and many were nursing bloody wounds, one of the strike force's three armigers had been lost to Ankouvian ambushers, and all of their armored vehicles had been destroyed. He knew that his small strike force could not continue this tenor of fighting for much longer, he didn't need to be a psyker for that level of insight. 

"Damnable hard fight sah." breathed Sir Kalen, who attempted to salute smartly, but who was forced to flinch back down behind the leg of Brother Reinhart by a particularly close grouping of shots. Gideon nodded "Indeed Sir, you and your men have done the name of Trask good honor this day. My Dragoons shall claim the battlements in short order, you should bring your armsmen in behind our avenue of advance and use the shelter of the starport to reorganize your formation." 

"By your Order Lord Librarian." Sir Kalen replied, even as Gideon moved next to Brother Reinhart, and slapped an armored gauntlet upon the Dreadnaughts flank. 

"Brother Ancient, shall we punish the aliens for their arrogance?" Gideon asked the leviathan of ceramite.

"Yes Little Brother. We shall find the beasts herdmaster and finish this." barked the harsh voice barking forth from the Dreadnaughts vox grille. Gideon flexed his shoulders and let the power of the warp flow into his fingers with crackling energy. Behind him, Sergeant Tranents Intercessors were forming into a fighting wedge, and Sir Kalen's armsmen began laying down sheets of disciplined las fire. 

"DRAGOONS OF THE EMPEROR!  INTO THEM!" Gideon bellowed through his helms speaker and began to charge.  

Gideon parried the brutish cleaver of one ork, before ramming his blade into the stomach of the beast next to it, tearing the blade free and spinning to face yet another greenskin as a heavy ax blow landed upon his pauldron, he sent a bolt of searing warpfire into the alien's brain for its trouble. The stink of cooking meat and the fungal reek of orkblood pervaded his senses as beyond the scrum of Astartes and Ork bodies the Armigers of house Trask crashed into the swirling melee like the furious judgment of the Emperor made manifest. The chainblades of the knight aspirants sweeping bright gory arcs through the air. 

"Brother Librarian, xenos motorized troops and ground forces have overwhelmed the brothers near to the gatehouse!" Sergeant Tranent voxed between the sound of rapid bolter fire and explosions. Gideon hammered his fist into the nearest greenskin's face, pulling away with the alien's visage caked in blood and began to issue redeployment orders to his forces before a deep machine voice cut across the vox. 

"The gate shall not fall Gideon. I shall hold the right." boomed Brother Reinhart, already the ripping echo of his Onslaught cannon reverberated across the warrens of the Spaceport. 

"No Ancient! The place crawls with orks you need support!" Gideon protested. 

"Silence Boy! I've been culling these foul bastards since you were a novitiate. Rally the force. Secure the Objective. FOR THE EMPEROR!" snarled Reinhart across a private vox link. 

Reinhart's ammunition counter had long since been depleted, but it was no matter, the mighty weapon could slay efficiently as a cudgel just as well. The burning remnants of a half dozen xenos walkers surrounded him, lighting the eaves of the gatehouse with flickering orange light, as dozens of feral aliens clung to his armor, tearing chunks of his blessed plate away even as he slew them with sweeps of his meat clogged cannon or crushed them with his close combat arm. 

He saw Gideon and Sergeant Tranent battling through the tide of greenskins beneath the shadow of the armigers, and through the haze of heat lances, and the smoke of bolter fire, he saw the form of the alien war leader, bellowing to his lieutenants in the savage bleating cadence of the Orks. He had fought this particular breed of alien enough to know that as soon as the creature's command structure was crippled they would surely break under any significant amount of pressure and with the determination only an Astartes would muster in such odds he bellowed his fury and made for the creature. 

Gideon grappled an Ork to the ground by the crude metal jaw sutured to its nerveless flesh and hammered its brains apart on the plastcrete surface of the starports pavement. He returned to his feet just in time to see Sergeant Tranent hack the weapon arm from a greenskin moments away from delivering a grievous downward blow to his head. It was in this frantic moment to moment brawl that he saw the lumbering smoke wreathed form of Reinhart, his form thick with alien warriors clinging to its surface as he plowed into the heart of the ork line, and like a sledgehammer blow the import of his vision in orbit came to him in horrifying certain clarity, and he screamed into the strike force vox network for the ancient warrior to cease his reckless charge. 

Reinhart, blink-closed yet another emergency notification as it appeared across his cognitive link, the whirring of crude xenos saw blades severed the hydraulic feed to his cannon arm rendering the limb little better than a boom of useless metal. Still, he pressed onward, smashing the foe with feet of iron. He was mere meters from the warboss now, and he snarled a challenge through his vox grille even as the orks clinging to his chassis pried the lid of his sarcophagus open. 

"COME AND DIE WRETCHED FILTH! he spat, and for the first time since the Fall of Vellincrest to the Daemon Hosts of the Many Crested King, Hector Reinhart, revered brother-ancient of the Imperial Dragoons, a veteran of 98 campaigns in the Emperors Name and Lance-bearer to Chapter Master Fendrigalo DeMonde at the Chapters rediscovery by the Indomitus Crusade saw his enemy with his own eyes, and moments later slew that enemy, himself and fifty other xenos as his chassis' reactor went critical under his own direction. 

Burning tears of rage streamed down Gideon's face, as he stood over the burning remnants of Reinhart's dreadnaught body. The survivors of Trenants squad and the Armsmen filtered across the killing ground, delivering death blows to Orks not yet fully persuaded to remain dead. A chapter hero had fallen, and in his sacrifice, he had bought the lives of his battle-brothers, he had bought the security of the spaceport and as a result, likely earned Jornath and her citizens much need time to prepare themselves. It was irrelevant to Gideon. He only cared for vengeance bought with the blood of the greenskins now, and he would not stop until Ankou had drowned in an ocean of Orkish gore.

-Your Favorite Madman-