Black Crusade

[Note: this page details an ongoing Black Crusade, events are being added as the campaign progresses. It is also wise to note that the other pages on this wiki detail the previous "peacetime" status quo of the sector, whereas this page details the most current events and situations, with many planets having changing sovereignty over the course of the war.]

A thousand years after the Sacking of Gassan Prime, the machinations of the Sorcerer Lord Ts'ophix come together as hordes of warbands pledge allegiance to his Black Crusade. Rather than simply maraud like the Chaos forces did during The Sacking, Ts'ophix intends this to be a sustained takeover, although each warlord has their own reasons for rallying to the cause.

Central to the events of the Crusade are a band of Chaos Space Marines, known unto many as the Crusader Companions. An unlikely crew of varied backgrounds, the Companions are to play a key part in the bloodshed to come...

Chapter One
"It is the 41st Millenium, and time is running out for the Arcadia Sector. A thousand years prior, an unimaginable horde of Chaos annihilated the Fortress-Monastery of the Rift Flame chapter of Astartes. Hundreds upon hundreds of warbands were united in the sacking, though each were seeking their own nefarious goals.

''In the years since then many attempts have been made by the Ruinous Powers to blot out Imperial presence, especially the capital planet Arcadia itself. However, even the many forces pledged to the infamous Drakul's Black League were not enough, and the war host was left broken.''

''That is, until now. Machinations many years in the making are in motion, and the foul minds of Chaos move to make the sector weak and ready for conquest. Even now the forces of the Dark Gods prepare for battle, for a Black Crusade.''

 It is the 41st Millenium, and in the grim darkness of the far future there is only war."'  

-Chapter One introductory text

Ts'ophix, having already forged an alliance with Skabyris, summons his trusted sorcerer Al'astix (also called "The Tainted", having being once possessed by The Watcher himself during the sacking) to his throne. Together with Tiamat of the Twelve, one of Skabyris' advisors and aides, Al'astrix is to act as envoy to a series of Chaos warlords, inviting them to take part in the Black Crusade.

To transport the messengers Ts'ophix has commissioned the fallen Rogue Trader Gale and his ship, The Nightdagger, to serve Al'astrix and Tiamat in their mission. Here they meet Gale, his heretek shipmate Morg, and their astropath Calex.

The Nightdagger first travels to Manovan, where the two Companions descend to the surface and enter a portal to the Pleasure Pit to entreat with its lord, the beautiful Daemon Prince Juliaen. Rejoicing in the deafening drones of his marine's music, Juliaen gladly pledges his warband to the cause, but with a condition. Before he will commit fully, he must celebrate with a great feast. Loath to celebrate alone, Juliaen demands the Companions summon his old love, the Greater Daemonette Silliax.

Thus the Companions set out for the correct materials for the summoning ritual, namely twelve pure souls. Juliaen sends one of his trusted sons Ariaen to assist, making the Companions three in number. Having failed to purchase child slaves at a slave market, they instead resort to kidnapping six Exodite eldar (but not without confrontation from their Craftworld cousins) and six Minisitorum priests (desecrating an entire shrine and wiping out an Imperial Guard platoon in the process).

After successfully summoning Silliax for Juliaen to dance a violent dance with, the three Crusader Companions press on. Next, the Nightdagger reaches the great fleet of Drakul's Black League. Welcomed into Drakul's throne ship, the Companions find the Black League recently swollen in number. Drakul explains this is thanks to his absorption of Persuel's Chosen (following Persuel's death at the hands of the vengeful Rift Flames) as well as the Black League taking in and assimilating the browbeaten Hrahras and his Hidden.

Having plotted another attempt at an Arcadia Sector takeover for years, Drakul adds his hefty might to the cause without hesitation. However, in order to restore his newly acquired men to full numbers he requires a large quantity of geneseed. Modak (of the duplicitous Hidden warband), recognises the Companions from The Sacking (where they saved him from a squad of Astartes). Drakul eagerly palms Modak off onto the Companions, cleaning his hands of one of Hrahras' most shady catspaws under the premise of using his know-how to plot a geneseed heist.

Back aboard the Nightdagger, the four Companions instruct Gale to set a course for their third and final treatise whilst Modak devises a plan. Arriving at a bizarre, perfectly flat and square daemon world, the three Companions seek out an audience with the enigmatic Xyphylylius. After meeting a robed envoy on the surface, the three enter through a pool-like portal into an inner sanctum apparently made of solid sky.

Surrounding the portal are many sorcerers, some human, some astartes, some merely balls of light, but all speak in unison. They introduce themselves as Gneb, diplomat of the Consortium of Xyphylylius, and explain they have been expecting the Companion's arrival. However, before the pleasantries can continue, a number of black clad berzerkers storm through the portal, lead by a hulking giant in terminator armour. Immediately they proclaim themselves to have come in the name of Ghorak (full epithet "Ghorak, Thy Flesh Consumed", the Daemon Prince leader of the cannibalistic Blooded Maw) to "leave no witch alive".

As the Companions assist Gneb in fighting off the menace, another follower of Khorne, clad in crimson, violently erupts from the pool, cutting down the warriors of the Blooded Maw with dual chainaxes. After eliminating the threat, the crimson warrior introduces himself as Crake, the last member of the Napalm Bloodkin, a warband which was wiped out and eaten by the Blooded Maw. Swearing vengeance on Ghorak, Crake pledges himself to the Crusade. Having watched the Companions defend Xyphylylius' realm, Gneb reassures them that the Consortium is fully behind the war effort.

Returning to the Nightdagger with Crake, the Crusader Companions are now a complete five. After a briefing from Modak, the team are ready to assault an Imperial tithe ship carrying an entire shipment of geneseed. Although the small and stealthy Nightdagger would usually be blown away by the tithe ship's escorts, it just so happens a force of Night Lords are also assaulting the fleet. Slipping into realspace during the fray, the Companions board the tithe ship in a boarding torpedo, systematically take out the defending stormtroopers, a couple of Night Lords, and a Rift Flames terminator before retrieving the geneseed and using the med-bay's teleporter to beam back to the Nightdagger, where they slip back into the warp and make their escape.

Delivering the geneseed to Drakul, the Companions complete their tasks as envoys, haven swollen in number from two to five. Drakul immediately gets to work on the arcane rites to produce new soldiers as the Crusaders return to Ts'ophix for further orders...

Chapter Two
"It is the 41st Millenium, and plans a thousand years in the making are coming to fruition. The dark forces gather to launch a Black Crusade to storm the Arcadia Sector and bathe it in terror and fear, overthrowing the servants of the corpse-god.

''After petitioning many other warmasters, the Sorcerer Ts'ophix has forged a great alliance amongst the followers of Chaos. His envoys, a motley band of five warriors, have sent word amongst the most dreaded masters of Chaos, and many have pledged their might to the Crusade.''

''Amongst them are the hedonistic High Children of Juliaen, the devout and fervent Spawn of Skabyris, the esoteric Consortium of Xyphylilius and the fated Brotherhood of the Scourging Eye. Even Drakul adds his might to the cause. Though his Black League still does not rival its former glory, it has swollen in numbers after acquiring Hrahras and his Hidden, and absorbing the now leaderless Per'suel's Chosen. Yet more warbands are pledging themselves even now as word reaches them of the bloodshed to come.''

''But the Ruinous Powers are cruel masters, and their blessings fickle. Will even this impressive might be enough to smash the stalwart defenders of the Imperium?''

 It is the 41st Millenium, and in the grim darkness of the far future there is only war."'  

-Chapter Two introductory text

Returning into realspace in orbit around The Watching Eye, the crew of the Nightdagger receive a transmission from Ts'ophix's carrier. Instead of the Sorcerer himself, his right hand man Skulswot addresses the Companions. He explains Ts'ophix and Juliaen's favoured son Daenael have awoken the tyranids from their nest, and gives the Crusaders a map overview of the Crusade Battle Plan, allowing them the liberty of choosing which front to join the assault in reward for their service.

Settling on joining Skabyris' Rotfleet in storming the forge world Hephaestus IV, the Companions rendezvous with the Spawn in orbit, meeting the likes of Agutha Hollowcorpse himself before proceeding into drop pods. Al'astrix pilots the pod directly into an Imperial Barracks, and the Companions and squad slaughter the entire regiment.

After the initial bloodshed, dropships both material and daemonic descend from the sky. A stormraven, recognisable as the Nightdagger's incumbent dropship, lands in the courtyard, piloted by Modak. The Companions are urgently recalled from the front lines for an audience with Ts'ophix.

The Sorcerer Lord explains that Xyphylylius has detected anomalous warp signatures in the vicinity of Hellion Prime, and that this could be linked to one of Drakul's fleets going off the radar and not arriving as scheduled. Entrusting this investigation to his valued envoys, he sends the Companions to Hellion Prime to meet with Gneb and uncover the source, with the exception of Ariaen who is temporarily posted back to lead his squad within the High Children.

The Companions arrive in orbit around the desert planet, welcoming Gneb aboard the Nightdagger before flying down to the surface. Modak sets the stormraven down and waits, ready for a hot exit. Gneb and Al'astrix try to pinpoint the source of the warp anomaly but en route to it they encounter a sandstorm and become lost for days, unable to vox back to Modak for pickup. After the storm clears they call in Modak for an air lift to the source, but as they do so they are set upon from below by a gargantuan Tomb Stalker. Crake takes massive injuries from the metal beast, but not without shredding into it significantly. Just before the Khornate marine meets his end, Modak arrives and blasts it with the dropship's lascannons, causing it to retreat beneath the sand.

Once again Modak sets down the stormraven, this time next to a peculiar metallic pyramid which the psykers identified as the source of the anomaly. Carefully entering the complex, the Companions follow a series of pathways, are set upon by Scarabs, and eventually make it to a central chamber, the source of the anomaly. Inside they find five Chaos space marines in red and cyan armour, discussing how to steal one of the devices in the chamber, supposedly on behalf on a sorcerer (from the tone, presumably a benefactor), all the while in hurried tones warning that some pursuers may arrive any time soon.

The Companions confront the marines, their leader steps forward to introduce himself as Brother-Captain Aion of the Sons of Change, a time-traveller, but he doesn't disclose any more information before tapping in a code to a wrist mounted device. Instantly, a warp storm envelops the marines and in a flash they are gone. As they vanish, Necron warriors emerge from the walls to attack the Companions.

Retreating back down the corridor they witness a similar warp storm and find five space marines in silver armour and loyalist heraldry. Demanding what the Companions were doing there, their leader also introduces himself as Brother-Captain Aion, saying they are hunting a group known as the Sons of Change. Before any exchange can happen, the Necrons violently enter the room, giving the outnumbered Companions a chance to escape. Outside they find Modak ready for a hot takeoff (as well as Gneb, who mysteriously teleported out at the first sign of danger, not out of cowardice but to make sure the report of the anomaly made it out).

As they leave Hellion Prime the Nightdagger receives two transmissions. The first is heavily encrypted, originating from somewhere on the surface, but after Morg eventually translates it into Low Gothic it reads:

"Sons of my [Enemy], Spawns of the Old Ones. You have made a powerful [Adversary] this day."

The second transmission is even more grave. A recorded vox-com from Skulswot, commanding the Companions to investigate the missing Black League fleet, which should have arrived from the Phantom Gulf four weeks ago.

The Companions venture to the Phantom Gulf and immediately enter the vast fleet, but every ship is broken and drifting with no signs of life, the only signals are the distress calls from each ship's black box. Each ship appears to have been violently engaged in both a void conflict, and then suffered boarding. Some areas even appear to have been blown out from the inside. The Nightdagger's systems detect the movement of another ship, and opens fire on an asteroid which the mystery vessel moved behind, but as the asteroid breaks apart, the ship has gone.

Modak, Crake and Al'astrix board the Stormraven and fly over to a ship with a great hole blasted into the side. Crake and Al'astrix perform an EVA manoeuvre and enter the ship at the top deck. As they proceed through the ship the signs of struggle are still apparent, bullet holes and blood cover the walls whilst corpses drift around in the zero-g, many of them missing their helmets with their throats or skulls torn apart. Crake however notices not all of the black-clad corpses are Drakul's men, instead some bear the mark of the Blooded Maw. Furious with rage he enters the next room, where the Blooded Maw's glyph is painted onto the wall above a stack of half-eaten Black League marines.

Finally as they arrive in the bridge, the ship's captain lays dying in his terminator armour. Before he expires he simply points to a corner, where a single warrior of the Blooded Maw lays injured. Crake roars a challenge to him, and he accepts, rising himself up he readies a chainsword. The two clash violently, but eventually Crake cuts the enemy down, shredding his twin hearts with a single deft swing of a chainaxe.

The two retrieve the black box and return to the Stormraven. After they arrive back on the Nightdagger, Morg begins to decode the box's contents. As they begin to move out of the debris field they pick up the signal of the ship from earlier again, identifying it as an Eldar vessel. Before they can open fire it cloaks again. Wasting no time the crew contact Skulswot reporting their progress, and are summoned to a war council aboard Ts'ophix's ship. The black box's contents are decoded, revealing that the entire Blooded Maw fleet arrived and attacked the Black League, each marine chanting war-cries praising Khorne, their leader Ghorak, and furiously searching for something.

After the warp journey to an area inbetween Reginus VI and Tabula Prime, the Companions are ushered through onto the Brotherhood of the Scourging Eye's flagship, and into the central council chamber. Around the round table are sat delegates from the main Crusading warbands, including Ts'ophix, Skulswot, Daenael, Agutha Hollowcorpse, the Warpsmith Hastor and the Dark Apostle Lukov.

At the council it is revealed the Crusade is suffering even in its first stage. The Eldar have found common cause with the Imperium, and the Craftworld Tofwyn, as well as its Exodite wards from Tof'ura, have joined the battle of Hephaestus IV. Even worse, their Corsair allies have rallied around the returning Corsair Prince Aed Elisedd and have launched a counter-crusade into The Hyperian Trench to cut off supply lines. Meanwhile, the Black League have taken Stormgale after letting the Tyranids loose, but, due to the lack of reinforcements, are struggling to wipe the planet and the surrounding space clean of the Devourer. On top of this the Blooded Maw's whereabouts are unknown and yet still pose a massive threat.

The Companions and the council argue to and fro about the best plan of action, but each potential solution would leave the forces of Chaos spread too thin. After lengthy debates the taciturn Ts'ophix asks Al'astrix to repeat their warcry; "The Eye Watches". It is decided that the Companions (accompanied by the ever faithful Lukov) shall embark on a pilgrimage to seek counsel from The Watcher himself.

At Lukov's insistence they stopped by the jungle death world of Xacala Secundus so that the widespread cults on the planet have the chance to partake in the holy pilgrimage, as well as being "cheap bodies" against the dangers of the warp. Making landfall on the only safe landing plateau on the entire main continent, the Companions begin to enter the ocean of trees, teeming with life. Gale voxes the party to alert them that the Eldar vessel they detected before was also in system. After hacking their way through the dense growth, the Companions are set upon by a giant xenos serpent. Just before the beast is dispatched, Modak notices movement in the treeline. Al'astrix uses his precognition to receive visions of whatever is stalking him, and sees ships being crushed by metal skulls, rifles being broken and replaced by metallic replicas, and robed figures being shattered beneath a skeletal foot.

Realising that they must be being stalked, the Companions move on at speed. After a week of travelling, they set up a minor camp to recuperate. Al'astrix receives a vision of being watched, and a booming voice screaming "Ancients". Keeping watch, Tiamat notices some objects in the treeline move closer over the course of a few hours. Just when they appear to be on the threshold of reaching the camp, they drop out of the treeline dead. The party investigate the corpses, and find them to be Eldar rangers. Inspecting the wounds, Al'astrix recognises them as the work of a synaptic disruptor: the weaponry of a Necron Deathmark.

Hurriedly the party moves on, knowing they are within firing range of the ancient assassins, but are halted by a fearsome apex predator in the form of a Quad-jaguar. After slaying the beast the rest its pack moves in to attack, but they are immediately shot down and killed by synaptic rounds. Sprinting back into the undergrowth of the forest the Crusaders steel for battle. Only by virtue of Al'astrix's witch-sight do the Companions learn of the deathmarks' location. Systematically felling trees to bring down the cloaked snipers, the party begins to eliminate their hunters, but not without receiving serious wounds, with Crake even falling unconscious. Whittling down the six Necrons to the last, they prepare to eliminate the enemy squad when the remaining assassin drops his invisibility voluntarily.

A cloaked figure, the Necron announces himself as Lehnotep, Court Assassin of the Skynekh dynasty. Knowing he is outnumbered. he gloats to the Companions that their Black Crusade is doomed, and that the Skynekh dynasty will stop their "forebears achieving their machinations from beyond the grave", and then utilises a teleportation orb to escape. As he phases out of reality, Al'astrix lets off a full bolter burst, striking the fleeing assassin before he escapes.

Finally safe, the Companions arrive at the cult's village, and meet with the High Priest, Qual. Lukov and Qual perform dark rituals to the gods to ensure their safe passage into the Eye, and the Companions leave the settlement at the head of a horde of a thousand pilgrims.

After a few weeks transit from Xacala they are rejoined by Ariaen, fresh from his victories leading forces on Reginus VI (where they dealt severe blows to the Order of the Black Lotus). At the threshold of entering The Watching Eye, Lukov warns the Companions that in order to avoid the maleficent effects of travel in the deep Warp they should appease the Dark Gods. Each Companion took a handful of cultists as offerings, dispatching each in a manner pleasing to their respective devotion.

Eventually they enter the Warp storm, the endless unreality spanning out before them. Giant eyes watch the ship whilst skull-like planets groan in agony. A peach-like planetoid orbits close to the Nightdagger and begins to spasm, depositing a stream of off-blue ooze onto the surface of the ship. The ooze begins to coalesce into blob-like legged beings which swarm the hull. As the fighters cannot be scrambled (as they cannot safely exit the Gellar field of the ship), the Companions split up and take out the infestation on foot, performing EVA and mag-locking onto the hull.

Fighting through hordes of the shape-shifting beings, the Companions start to whittle down the number in a surreal battle, fueled by the unreality of their surroundings. Eventually the blob-things on the side of the ship near Al'Astrix and Ariaen begin to merge into a living drilling rig. The pair attempt to destroy the beast but fail to stop it implanting one of the beings into the living quarters before it withers away into the Warp.

Returning into the ship the two Companions stalk the thing through the living quarters, following the trail of ooze and destruction, briefing hearing screaming over the vox in a language they cannot hear as they pass through. Eventually they follow the trail into the maintenance elevator, where the bottom has been melted through. They try to use their mag-locks to descend but cannot get a grip on the sides and fall down all the way to the waste processing decks. Wading through sewage they receive a vox form Morg, warning them the warp anomaly appears to be heading to the Gellar field generator.

As the two take another elevator up to the generator they begin to experience oddities. A buzzing, vibrating headache starts in Al'Astrix's head, whilst Ariaen begins to perceive every single sound, smell and sight to excruciating detail. They reach the doors to the Gellar field room, and prepare for tactical entry as the screams start and stop in their vox channels. Storming through the door they stop as the room they enter is not the generator room, but the hangar. The hangar is pitched black, yet they can see all the cultists from Xacala floating in the air, as if there was zero-g. Each one is planking, bolt straight with expressionless faces, and although there are no lights in the room each one is illuminated as if by a floodlight from below.

Turning back to exit the room the Companions find the door gone, and have to exit through the opposite side. Walking out into an unfamiliar corridor the two step into a puddle, but fall into it knee deep as though it were a pool. Stepping out they reach a door that resembles the door to the bridge. They vox Gale who asks what is going on, and they decide to enter. When they do they see Gale facing away from them, who then draws his sword and disembowels himself. Al'Astrix rushes over to inspect the corpse, but every time he turns the body over to face him he finds the body is facing away.

Ariaen looks around and notices Morg cut open and nailed to the main screen, his limbs and mechadendrites spread out to form the star of chaos. Panicking, Al'Astrix takes off his helm to view the situation with his third eye, but instead they both hear the screams from earlier, as well as footsteps. As the clapping sounds of the footfalls get closer, the screams heighten in intensity, the servitors bound into some of the consoles raising their heads and joining the wail. On top of this, their afflictions reach an apex, with Ariaen being able to sense everything in preternatural levels of detail, whilst Al'Astrix's buzzing headache becomes almost crippling.

Finally into the room emerges the source of the screams: a 12-foot tall emaciated and milk-pale daemon with hollow eyes and a wide maw filled with nuclear fire and silhouettes of immolating crewmen. The two face down the beast, chopping an arm off before firing off a killing salvo. In its death-throes its maw opens wider and wider, and as Ariaen brings down his sword in execution the bridge is annihilated by the nuclear blast.

As the light dies down, Al'Astrix finds himself in a desert. Below him is orange sand, and above are the familiar stars of the Arcadia Sector. Floating in front of him is a being of ever-changing hue and form, limbs and shapes and fire-flesh orbiting a single giant eye: The Watcher himself. The Watcher greets Al'Astrix with a monologue (the wording of which can be found in the Act 2 trailer above), and in Al'Astrix's mind three portents from the Watcher appear:

WHEN THE MAW CLOSES

THE ANCIENTS RISE

AND I SHALL WALK THE VOIDS AGAIN

-

FEAR NOT THE UNBLOODED ANGELS

THOUGH THEY WALK NOT AMONGST YOU

THEIR FOE IS YOURS

-

GHORAK'S HOUNDS UTTER HIS WORDS

SILENCE HIS SONS

AND HIS JAWS WILL FALL SILENT

Light envelopes him again, and he finds himself next to Ariaen, about to breach the Gellar field generator room. Both of them remember the previous hour in full, including the mysterious hangar and the monsters on the bridge, as well as Al'Astrix's vision, but their afflictions are now gone.

Entering the generator room, they find it working normally with not a single problem. They return to the bridge where the rest of the Companions are waiting, along with Lukov and the bridge crew. As they explained what had happened to them, Modak exclaims about the screams he heard over the intercom which panicked him into firing his meltagun wildly in his chambers. Gale then asks about a pyramidal trinket on Al'Astrix's belt, which Al'Astrix had not noticed before.

The strange, verdigris triangular-based pyramid had eyes carved onto each side, along with daemonic runes and numbers. After a while decoding it, the crew discover the runs to be four sets of realspace coordinates. Ruminating on The Watcher's omens, they decide this must be the locations of Ghorak's Champions, and that in order to cripple the Blooded Maw they must take out each of these commanders.

Returning to realspace, they are hailed by Daenael who gloats over the first total victory of the Crusade, the capture of Reginus VI under his command. He then queries what answers their pilgrimage has brought, and haughtily congratulates them on their quest. He gifts Ariaen a Blast Master as a reward for his service during the siege of Reginus VI.

Just then Ts'ophix's battleship arrives in system. Another war council is held to exchange information. As he hears about the Watcher's portents, Ts'ophix remarks that he has seen Al'astrix's pyramid trinket in his dreams. For the mission ahead he grants Al'astrix command of his old squad, whilst Daenael does the same for Ariaen. Agutha Hollowcorpse extends the same courtesy to Tiamat as well. Immediately the Nightdagger sets off to the nearest coordinate, an area near Tabula Prime.

Chapter Three
''"It is the 41st Millenium, and darkness has come to the Arcadia Sector. Ts'ophix's Black Crusade rolls onwards, bringing death to the servants of the false Corpse-God. His allies are many: The Black League, the High Children of Juliaen, the Spawn of Skabyris, the Consortium of Xyphylilius.  But his enemies are growing. Both the Rift Flames and the Feles Iratus commit their chapter strengths to Arcadia, and the Arcadian 101st bravely defend their sector. The Eldar have found common cause with the Imperium, both Exodite and Craftworlder taking arms against the dread Crusade. The legendary Prince Aed Elisedd has returned from his exile to lead Tofwyn's corsair allies on a counter-Crusade into the Hyperian trench. Even their Dark brethren emerge from Commoragh to reave the Crusade's fleets.  And yet the most fearsome enemy is that of Chaos. Ghorak and his Blooded Maw have returned to the Arcadia Sector, forging a path of destruction and leaving a trail of blood in their wake. Though their motivation remains a complete mystery, their path of destruction could cripple the Crusade. However, after a pilgrimage to entreat with the Watcher himself, the Crusader Companions set out to bring down Ghorak's warband by slaying his favoured hounds and precious commanders. It is the 41st Millenium, and in the grim darkness of the far future there is only war."''

-Chapter Three introductory text

Arriving in orbit around Reginus VI the Companions find themselves on the fringes of a void battle between the Crusaders and the Blooded Maw. After being hailed by a friendly ship, they opt to make landfall instead and avoid being blasted apart by Ghorak's ships. Al'astrix casts his precognition to attempt to find Ghorak's general on the surface and is overcome by a vision of a blood soaked battlefield. Using landmarks in the image as a guide the Companions locate the area in the Stormraven.

Before them is a plain of mud and blood, where Imperials still fight the Khornate invaders. As the Imperials (both Guardsman and Sister of Battle) fall their corpses are dragged by the berzerkers towards a fortress due north about 100 km away from the landing site, whilst a bastion lies roughly 50 km north west. The fort stood protected by five defilers providing anti air fire, whilst a soulgrinder patrolled the outskirts. A great flaming icon of Khorne sat above the fortress' main hall.

In preparation for the siege the Companions call down their squads, as well as 300 of the cultists. In a series of attacks the Crusader force storms the trenches laying between them and the bastion, both Ariaen and Tiamat taking the structure whilst Al'astrix marches across the no-man's land to the west, behind the meat shield of 100 cultists, of which none survive the onslaught.

The Companions manage to rendezvous in the trench-moat surrounding the fort, resisting a surprise attack from Blooded Maw marines. They breach the threshold and go over the top, charging into battle with the defilers. Tiamat and Al'astrix and their squads take down two, whilst Ariaen slays the soulgrinder using his swordsmanship and deceptive tactics.

Eventually they manage to enter the fort, breaching the gates into the courtyard where they are met with a horde of berzerkers. The Crusaders cut them all down, each berzerker entering a fit of hungry rage seeing each other die, with some even uncontrollably feasting on their fallen brethren. Afterwards the Companions enter the main hall of the fort, where they are greeted by monolithic piles of the Imperials' corpses, each pile acting as a feast for a feral marine of the Blooded Maw. Atop the greatest pile sits a champion with many rows of teeth and an icon of Khorne atop his helm.

As the Companions challenge him to battle he roars a warcry, announcing that "you shall die by the jaws of Midras!". Before the Crusaders ready their weapons, Midras beckons forth something behind him, and from behind the pile of corpses behind him emerges a Heldrake.

Dramatis Personae
THE CRUSADER COMPANIONS Al'Astrix the Tainted - Sorceror, Brotherhood of the Scourging Eye Tiamat of the Twelve - Chosen, Spawn of Skabyris Ariaen - Champion, High Children of Juliaen Modak - Forsaken, The Hidden Crake - Champion, Napalm Bloodkin BROTHERHOOD OF THE SCOURGING EYE Ts'ophix - Sorcerer Lord Skulswot - Honour Guard SPAWN OF SKABYRIS Skabyris - Greater Daemon of Nurgle Agutha Hollowcorpse - Chaos Lord CREW OF THE NIGHTDAGGER Calex - Astropath Morg - Heretek Gale - Captain The rest are nameless slaves THE HIGH CHILDREN OF JULIAEN Juliaen - Daemon Prince of Slaanesh Daenael - Chaos Lord, Highest Son of Juliaen DRAKUL'S BLACK LEAGUE Drakul - Chaos Lord Hrahras the Hider - Chaos Lord, The Hidden Hastor - Warpsmith Lukov - Dark Apostle THE BLOODED MAW Ghorak - Daemon Prince of Khorne THE CONSORTIUM OF XYPHYLYLIUS Xyphylylius - Greater Daemon of Tzeentch Gneb - Sorceror, Envoy of the Consortium SONS OF CHANGE/KNIGHTS OUROBOROS Brother-Captain Aion TEMPLE OF THE COILING SNAKES Qual - High Priest SKYNEKH DYNASTY Szakenegar the Slothful - Phaeron Lhenotep - Court Assassin