The Brides of Khorne [40k]

Everything was coming apart. On all fronts the forward lines were breaking and being overrun. Apocalypse had been taunting the city of Koridan for almost eight months and now it was crashing upon them in a wave of destruction and massacre which stunk of cordite, filth and blood. When the 72nd Arvalone regiment first arrived to reinforce the planet just two weeks after the Ork invasion began, it seemed as if they would be able to fend off the greenskins with superior numbers and firepower. Now they found themselves penned in their own fortifications and winnowed away by ceaseless attrition to a mere shadow of their former strength. A frail levee of flesh, lasgun and Emperor-fearing will helpless to withstand a final surge of the green tide seething beyond the city’s walls.

A great roar surrounded the embattled city, resonating like a clap of thunder sustained indefinitely as the Orks advanced in massed assault. Heavy weapons and artillery mounted up on and beyond the walls opened up with a cacophony of their own in response. Autocannon fire ripped across the Ork front lines, painting the wall of green with red stains of exploded flesh and separated limbs. Shells whined overhead to explode amidst the advancing mass, sending up eruptions of blackend earth and broken bodies but the greenskins continued unabated. They fell by the dozens, by the hundreds as they advanced across the killing fields which had once been the 72nd’s frontline emplacements. Still more explosions punched holes in the Ork’s advance as bobytraps left behind in the trenches were tripped, felling greenskin along side human. Though already dark with spilled blood, the ground drank the fresh offering of death without prejudice.

Lieutenant Artur Bandor watched the bobytraps do their work with a grim smirk, ‘That’s right, you bastards, you’re going to pay for every inch.’ He spit and ducked back down into his trench as the Orks began to unload more steadily with their notoriously inaccurate though still acutely lethal small arms. Even of he’d known the men couched in the trench around him he’d not have been able to recognize them. Each was covered helmet to boot with dirt and dry blood, so much that even their regimental colors were as obscure as their individual identities. Even so, for every weary mask of soil and death there was a pair of eyes steeled with a look of grim determination. Bandor nodded quietly as he met each of those eyes in turn. He thanked the Emperor to be in the company of such fine soldiers but knew there would likely be but one reward for their stalwart resolve.

He licked his chapped lips and slapped a fresh clip into his bolt pistol before retrieving the gore-encrusted chainsword leaning against the firing step. The motorized blade began to rumble anxiously as he thumbed it to idle.

Bandor keyed his microbead, ‘All eastern sections, this is it.’ He began. ‘They’ll be in range any minute. Take up positions and lets make the Orks think the road to Koridan was paved straight through hell.’

The atmosphere inside the Field HQ was no less chaotic than on the frontlines. Another attack had been more than expected but the fact that the Orks were now surging in on all sides in unison had tacticians and adjutants running and and relaying orders at a dizzying pace in an attempt to rally the forces defending Koridan effectively. For all the gusto they were putting in, each man in the command center knew as surely as those on the lines that the city stood not a prayer of withstanding such a massed assault, they were simply too outnumbered.

Muted thumps began to jostle the interior of the command center as Ork artillery opened up and Colonel Turo Arcwald had to chuckle. There was little within the city walls worth bombarding as every able-bodied individual in the city was somewhere near the frontlines. At best the Orks might score a hit on the Arvalone’s own artillery pieces but it was more likely they’d simply be battering the very spoils they sought to claim into oblivion. There was a sort of poetic justice in the whole thing as it was the threat of the Ork’s artillery which caused the Arvalone to withold wiring the entirety of the city’s Munitorium supply caches with demolitions charges, for fear they might be set off prematurely. Now it seemed the greenskins might just do the job themselves although there would still be plenty of surprises awaiting them when they arrived to secure their prize.

Arcwald had just turned his attention back to the tactical map which dominated the center of the room when something far more potent than Orkish artillery sent a shockwave through the HQ, causing his half drank metal cup of recaff clattering to the floor.

‘What the throne was that?’ He looked up to a room of confused expressions as another impact rattled the brass gears of cogitator banks and upset another wayward kit cup. The Colonel moved over to the main auspex array, seeing his second in command already in heated discussion with its operator. Lieutenant Colonel Erlis Matzon looked up quickly at Arcwald’s approach, anticipating the question.

‘Whatever it is, its outside the walls, to the east.’ Matzon said, reaching over to indicate the dense blob of contacts which represented the eastern front of the Ork assault. As the shockwaves of the last impact faded and another kicked in the thick mass of contacts seemed to break up a bit. Arcwald tilted his head, studying the auspex curiously. Even Earthshaker rounds wouldn’t be making that kind of racket.

‘Orbital?’ Arcwald asked, a barely repressed glimer of hope to his tone at the prospect reinforcements had finally arrived. Matzon shook his head, not in contradiction but in disbelief.

‘I can’t see what else would be causing it, sir.’ The two shared a few moments of stunned silence until the auspex operator cut in.

‘Colonel! I’m picking up ships in low orbit, Imperial!”

‘Are you sure?’ Arcwald looked down at the screen as if to confirm for himself, though in truth he could tell little beyond basic impressions from the machine’s many cryptic readouts.

‘Well, they definitely look Imperial, sir.’ The operator reported with a hint of apprehension. The Colonel looked up to the comunications officer.

‘Are you getting anything on the vox? Ship identification cyphers? Anything that’ll tell us what those ships are and whose side they’re on?’ The coms officer nodded distractedly, pausing flailing fingers to adjust thick-lensed glasses on the bridge of his nose. Streams of encryption runes flickered past across them as he worked the levers of his cogitator feverishly. The bustle of the HQ had ceased now, with the attention of all within hinged upon this new development. Slowly, a grin of triumph eased its way across the com officer’s lips.

‘The lead vessel is reading as the Cathedral class Battle Barge Blutrache. It’s the Sororitas, the Order of the Fervent Heart!’

Drown by a chorus of cheers and elation, someone in the command center cried out in horror.

Bandor’s ears popped as the shockwave from another ripple of massive explosions washed over the trench. The tremors were so great he’d bitten down on his tongue when the initial salvo hit and the metallic tang of blood now filled his mouth. Next to him one of the other troopers in the trench was looking up over the parapet and shouting excitedly. The Lieutenant leaned up to take a look, and his jaw dropped.

The Ork advance, now scattered and in disarray, was back lit by a seething inferno. Something roared past overhead and Bandor looked up to see a triad of large aircraft swoop over the walls of Koridan. Bright, bloody red, they stood out starkly against the black sky above and firelight glinted upon the bronzed crests on their flanks. Thunderhawks, but whose? Another string of explosions sounded off from further away and he could see from the tint of the sky to the north and south that whoever they belonged to was thoroughly carpeting all fronts of the Ork attack with munitions.

The Lieutenant looked to his vox man, but the trooper simply shrugged impotently. Signals were a mess with all the ordnance going off. Whoever the newcomers were, at least they seemed to be on the same side. Bandor looked back out over no-man’s land. The Orks were running scared in every direction, some still trying to press forward towards the city. Spats of las fire from the trenches were cutting down the few which got close enough and there now seemed to be weapons fire coming from behind the Ork lines as well.

‘So… what now, sir?’ A trooper on the firing step next to him asked. In truth, Bandor had no idea.

A pair of attendants from the medicae had gotten the priest propped up against a wall but the old man was utterly hysterial. He’d apparently lost consciousness for a moment after screaming but quickly came to and resumed his fit. Sedatives seemed to have no effect and it was all the medicae could do to keep him held still. A few of the troopers posted in the bunker stepped in to try and help while everyone else simply looked on aghast.

Arcwald and Matzon exchanged confused looks as another Ecclesiarchy priest ducked into the Field HQ. The newcomer moved quickly to his fellow and began inciting litanies of blessing and protection upon him, forced to shout over the weeping cries of the frenzied man.

‘Sir!’ I’m showing multiple new ground contacts, all fronts.’ The auspex operator called out. ‘The Fervent Heart is beginning a ground assault, they’ve got the Orks on the run!’

It took a moment for the Colonel to notice the chanting of prayers had ceased, and the newly-arrived priest had crossed to where he and Matzon stood,

‘You… what is that you say?’ The priest asked. He was a man somewhere in his mid forties and his face suddenly appeared pale and fretful at something. Arcwald looked at him warily, fearing another abrupt outburst of hysteria.

‘There are Adepta Sororitas, come to ward off the Ork attack.’ He spoke slowly, watching the priest’s fraught expression. ‘The Order of the Fervent Heart.’ At that the priest gasped and staggered back, narrowly bracing himself upon a cogitator bank. Matzon stepped up to help steady him. Colonel Arcwald shook his head, confused. Why were these priests so fearful? ‘Father, what is going on?’

The priest was obviously shaken, though retained his composure far better than his fellow. He simply smiled ruefully and looked up to Colonel Arcwald.

‘The Fervent Heart has not existed since its name was embossed upon and Inquisitorial writ of Excommunication…’ He spoke somberly and it was Arcwald’s turn to gasp. For those words the entire bunker fell silent, including the sobbing priest. ‘Their homeworld was purged and their name struck from the archives of the Ordos. The were pursued, to the very brinks of chaos, but never successfully brought to task for their heresy.’