The fall

[Alexos]

Hello, fellow marines. This will be a thread where I (hopefully) write a story that is good enough to become a Novel for BL. It will be on the Fall of Tyran. I really like the dynamic combat against the Tyranids, and want to make a few (hint, not a few) books on them. This is a very Long-Term goal. I want to make an Omnibus on the three main Hive fleets, the first one being a collection called Behemoth, featuring the Fall of Tyran, the fall of Thandros, and the Battle for Maccrage.

 

I have set very simple goals, the first one is to complete the first chapter by the end of the first week of school. I want to complete the next two chapters over the course of the nine-week Quarters at my school, I think this will allow enough time to be able to really develop and refine each chapter to make the most of it.

 

I had written the whole first chapter, but I have heard on other sites that there wasn't enough detail, so I am re-writing it, and have the first part of the first chapter done.

 

C&C is appreciated. Try and scruitinise everything when you read this over, I want this to shine when I submit it.

 

The world J73-O3 was a barren, dead shell of its former self. Auspex scans had shown an endless sea of unbroken rock stretched from horizon to horizon. All other scans, from psychic gauges to thermal depth-finders, had shown the same. The world was barren, a completely useless husk that didn’t even harbor the basest minerals. That didn’t mean that the Mechanicus was taking the chance of a surprise attack. A single Adeptus Mechanicus cruiser moved forward, leveling all gun batteries at the space directly around itself, standing sentinel over the dead planet below. The cruiser Righteous Destiny, being a Mechanicus Ship, was one of the most heavily armed and armored ships in the Segmentum; boasting enough armor to take a volley from the forward lance-batteries of an Oberon-Class battleship, and armed with enough weaponry to cripple the offending ship with relative ease.

 

Making sure that no psychic manifestations, thruster signatures, and heat changes of over 80 degrees centigrade were in the area, the Righteous proceeded with preparations to launch a wing of Marauder Destroyers. Hundreds of servitors flooded the flight decks, each one an almost grotesque mesh of mechanical limbs and human brains, and proceeded to refuel and pressurize each ship with pressure-hoses and thermal sealants. Each Marauder was heavily modified from the original versions; each and every one had their standard, sub-atmospheric engines replaced with system drives which resembled that of the ship’s mighty plasma stacks, giving all the craft Extra-atmospheric flight capabilities.

 

A full wing was 80 flyers, which was divided into Eight Squadrons of Ten armed fighters. In general, every plane had a standard set of markings and iconography to show over its standard matt-red paint job which fighter belonged in which squadron, what forgeworld it was manufactured on, and the call sign of the plane itself, and its serial code. That in no way meant that the crew kept to those guidelines; each pilot had added some form of pin-up, shark’s teeth, and fiery wings to each flyer, most ostentatiously decorated was the fifth plane in third squadron, bearing a 5-meter tall pin-up across the wing where it joins with the fuselage, the title “death from the skies” on the right wing, and an image of a winged Daemon on each side of the cockpit.

 

As the orders for launch procedure was given, crew members scurried across the flight deck. Each plane had a crew numbering five people. There was the pilot which took the plane out and followed the designated flight path, the aft-gunner would keep the plane‘s rear protected in a dogfight, the navigator detected differing wind currents and updrafts and warns the pilot accordingly, the bomber co-ordinates with the pilot when dropping bombs, and a Techpriest to oversee repairs and targeting information.

 

Ladders and hydraulic lifts were used to ferry the crew aboard, as each plane was docked in a support nestles, making sure that the aircraft’s finer instruments and less durable workings were safe from harm if the Righteous was to take a hit. These nestles also acted as a catapult, launching the planes into the void and maximizing the time the flyers could be away from fuelling stations.

 

 

Servitors trundled from the flight deck, the doors sealing airtight behind them in preparation of the Explosive decompression generated by the ship’s launch bays opening. The combination of all atmosphere emptying into the void in 3 seconds, and the nestle’s flinging the planes out at over six thousand Psi, made sure that the flyers were well away from their mother ship when they activated their drive-trains.

 

Entry into this planet’s atmosphere went very well, as there was hardly an atmosphere left. Thermal build-up was practically non-existent, no cross-winds that could be felt by these metal behemoths was absent, and the only thing the Navigators had to worry about was Gravity.

 

Once the full wing had entered the atmosphere, each squadron took a compass-point, and proceeded with an Ultra-pattern sweep of the Mechanicus drop-site, flying low at 5,000 feet up they each hardly went over 600 km per standard Terran hour. This allowed the planes to relay enough information on the actual appearance of the landing zone for the Righteous to create a Hololithic map that was an accurate 1:5,000 scale.

 

After an optimal landing zone was selected, five Imperial shark-class transport ships were released from the cruiser’s belly, drive-trains roaring as they descended into the planet’s atmosphere. Every ship had giant murals of the Machine-god attached to their hulls; alongside kilometer-wide void-proofed parchments covered in Binary prayers and religious paraphernalia. The Sharks contained a Demi-legion of Tech-guard, over ten thousand modified humans with weapons systems, auspexes, and a small power generator in place of minor organ systems, in all.

 

I will try and post daily, but may only be able to get in once every two days, due to real life butting in.