The horned helmets of the Anointed looked daemonic under the glowing, red lights within the cramped hold of the Land Raider, and Kol Badar knew that he too looked like some malevolent daemon of the warp in his ornate battle-helm. Barbed tusks protruded like monstrous mandibles from his ancient helmet, which was crafted in the likeness of a snarling, bestial visage. The massive tank roared across the plains of the planet Tanakreg, hauling its deadly cargo ever closer to the central battle lines of the pathetic Imperials.
He was disappointed with the enemy, but then, he could not expect any more from them. The Imperium had grown weak.
The Host was borne from the Infidus Diabolus in scores of smaller vessels, angry hornets swarming from their nest towards their foe. They had landed on the planet surface as the harsh, orange sun was setting and stormed the first defensive line, taking it within an hour. The Anointed, borne within the belly of revered Land Raiders, had assaulted up the steep embankments to take the most heavily defended sections, slaughtering all in their path.
The enemy artillery was next to useless against the powerful tanks, and the remainder of the Host rampaged through the breaches carved by the Anointed and set up their own heavy weapon teams atop the earthworks, raining death upon the Imperials mustered beyond. They marched relentlessly through the trenches, killing and mutilating, and taking bunkers and strong points at will. Kol Badar had been disgusted to see hundreds of the Imperials flee before the Legion, seeking the false safety of the second defensive line. That second line had fallen almost as quickly as the first, once its emplaced guns had been silenced. The third line broke almost as swiftly.
There remained only the last line, the one closest to the city. The glow of the Imperial city could be seen over the horizon. This last defensive line was the shortest of the four, and had more emplacements than the first. Kol Badar hoped that it would prove somewhat more of a challenge.
So far there had been little satisfaction in these battles: they had been nothing short of massacres. The estimate was somewhere in the realm of fifteen thousand enemy troops slain, and around five hundred tanks, aircraft and support vehicles destroyed. The losses amongst the Word Bearers had been minimal.
The lascannon sponsons of the Land Raider screamed as they fired. The tank did not slow, and hit a slight rise at speed. There was a moment of weightlessness as the front of the tank became airborne before slamming back down to the ground. Dull explosions and detonations could be heard, the sound muffled by the roar of the engines and the screaming of the lascannons. The vehicle rocked as explosive shells struck its thick, armoured hide, and Kol Badar growled.
The Land Raider began ploughing up a steep incline, and Kol Badar knew that they were at the earthworks. High calibre rounds pinged off the exterior but the powerful machine had carried the Word Bearers across much deadlier battlefields on a thousand worlds, transporting them safely against far worse than these weakling Imperials could muster.
A glowing, yellow blister light began to flash, and Kol Badar pulled off the hissing coupling that held him to his seat and flexed his power talons.
'In the name of the true gods, Lorgar and the Dark Apostle,' he roared. 'Anointed! We kill once more!'
The elite cult warriors roared back, and the assault ramp of the Land Raider slammed down as the immense tank drew to a sudden halt near the top of the incline, steam hissing out into the cold of night.
After the muffled dullness within the belly of the Land Raider, the noise of the battlefield was deafening, as cannons boomed, boltguns thumped rhythmically and the screams of dying Imperials echoed across the salt plains.
Kol Badar led the Anointed onto the field of war, roaring like a primeval god. His archaic combi-bolter, its muzzle sculpted to resemble the fanged maw of some fell creature, coughed fiery death as he strode heavily forwards. His first shots ripped a grey uniformed soldier in half, and dozens more were torn apart by the gunfire of the Anointed.
The night was lit up as thousands of weapons fired, and Kol Badar could see the immense enemy bulwark stretching from horizon to horizon. Tens of thousands of uniformed PDF troopers stood along the defensive line, and hundreds of tanks and armoured units added cannon fire to the barrage.
He had chosen this place to attack the enemy for it was their most heavily defended point along the bulwark. A decisive strike that shattered their defences here would demoralise them completely.
Streaming las-fire lit up the night as the Imperials tried desperately to drop even a single one of the Anointed. The hulking Terminator-armoured figures strode to the top of the bulwark, walking straight through the frantic gunfire. Their own weapons ripped through the cowering ranks of the lightly armoured PDF troopers, the protection of their dug-in positions rendered useless.
A score of Land Raiders disgorged more of the Terminators at the top of the earthworks, and the butchery began in earnest. Kol Badar dropped down heavily over the lip of the corpse-strewn defensive position and raised his bolter to mow down a team of men working to reload an artillery piece. They were ripped to pieces, blood spraying.
Reaper autocannons roared along the line of the bulwark, the rapid firing, high-powered weapons tearing through the lines of reinforcements rushing to stem the breach in their lines. The high velocity rounds from the potent weapons tore up the defensive line and reached a battery of artillery pieces. The guns were instantly engulfed in a huge explosion as the armour piercing autocannon rounds ignited stacks of high-explosive shells. The fireball rose high in the sky, and further explosions answered it as other Anointed warriors struck further gun batteries.
'Warmonger, lead the Host forward,' growled Kol Badar, opening a comm-channel to the Dreadnought. 'Come join the slaughter, my brother.'
'Sir! we are being massacred! They won't die! Emperor save us, they just won't die!'
Captain Drokan of the 23rd Tanakreg PDF cursed and licked his dry lips as he ordered the comm-channel closed. What could he do? There must be a way to salvage something out of this disastrous engagement, but he was damned if he knew what it was. He turned to his adjutant, who looked absolutely terrified, his face pale and his eyes staring.
'Val! Anything from the colonel? From any of the damn officers?'
The pale-faced adjutant shook his head, and Drokan cursed once again.
There had been no warning of the attack. The Emperor alone knew what had happened to the listening posts that skirted the system: a sudden attack like this just should not have been possible!
But it was happening, and it was all too real. And somehow Drokan had found himself the most superior ranked officer, cut off from the upper echelons. Him, Anubias Drokan! Never a dedicated student of tactics or strategy, he had risen to the rank of captain more because of his family's status and his own skill with a sword than through any real competence. It was only the PDF, damn it! Father had wanted him to join the ranks to give him a bit of hardness about him, he had said. A few years of service: he had never expected to be on the front line of a full-scale planetary assault!
Think, man. Think! What should he do? He had four companies of the 23rd with him here (dying here, he thought), but what other regiments were close by? There was the 9th and the 11th, but his adjutant had been unable to contact them on the comms. He assumed they had already been engaged and destroyed by the enemy.
He had to get the other nearby regiments to pull away from the last line, pull back to Shinar. That's what his superiors would do, he thought. Shinar, the palace, the governor; they were what needed protecting. Feeling slightly buoyed, Drokan turned to his adjutant once more.