The Legend Begins...

[Brother Landrain]

The Imperial Guardsmen, huddled in the trenches surrounding the Outpost as night fell on the desert mining planet of Atacama Major. For almost a thousand years the planet was quiet and safe from the constant wars ravaging the Galaxy. Not abundant in resources and extremely dry and hot, the planets mines produced enough metals and resources to sustain and support only a small population of 50,000 Imperial Citizens. The planet was protected by an Imperial Regiment comprised mostly of natives and citizens of Tallarn decent. While not a massive force, they were well equipped and armed. A Thousand years of peace allowed them to stockpile and preserve the best equipment. And for a thousand years peace ruled on Atacama…

 

Then the geological events began. At first they were just minor earthquakes scattered across the vast deserts, then they started to become major events. The Imperial towns and outposts were well built and were able to withstand even the most violent rumblings of the planets. After one such event, a huge gapping cavern had opened up outside of one of the major town. The cavern went deep into the ground, an expedition was sent into the cavern to see if anything interesting was uncovered. The expedition quickly lost contact with the surface as they moved deeper into the cavern system, and it never returned.

 

Not long afterwards the first the first sighting and accidents began.

 

At first the Imperial Governor and his administration dismissed the sighting, Strange looking monsters were seen lurking by the exposed caverns. Large hulking men over seven feet tall with hunched backs were supposedly seen in the foothills around the settlements. All of the sighting usually were accompanied by accidents. The accidents and sighting were, according to the local authorities, a combination, of long working days, not enough sleep, and too much alcohol. As drinking was easily the number one form of entertainment on the planet.

 

And then the attacks began…

 

From out of the hills and caverns a green tide of Orks descended upon the Imperial settlements. The Orks were very poorly and crudely equipped. Seemingly with none of the standard Orky tech, so common to their War bands. The Imperial astropaths scoured the heavens, no Hulks or Ork Craft were seen above the planet. It was as if the ground opened up and released a massive tide of Orks upon the planet.

 

 

The Imperial Guard easily was able to defeat the first few waves of Orks with their superior firepower and weaponry. But slowly and surely the Green Tide kept coming, seemingly with more and more Orks each time. With no means of reinforcement close by, and in a war of attrition with an overwhelming force. The tide of the war slowly turned against the Imperial Guard. The Governor frantically sent communiqués to the Sector Governor asking for help and reinforcements. No response was ever received.

 

The war and planet seemed all but lost to the Green Tide.

 

All of the Imperial Guard Tanks and Vehicles had been long destroyed. There was no more air support or even any civilian flying craft left to try to escape the death trap that Atacama Major had become. The last of the citizens were huddled deep in the bunker beneath the outpost, Only 300 women and children. The outpost walls and trenches were manned by the last 200 Imperial guardsmen left, with but a couple dozen Veterans and all of the male citizens impressed into duty by the Commissar. This outpost would be the Last Stand of Atacama Major.

 

The Imperial Guard Captain walked the parapet atop the Bastion at the center of the outpost. From here he could just see the glow from the campfires of the Orks just beyond the ridgeline. The night sky surrounding the outpost was awash in the glow from the Ork encampments. Scouts estimated that there were over 10,000 Orks just beyond the hills awaiting daybreak to attack the outpost. The Captain looked down at his command, never did he think it would end this way. Atacama Major was such a nice assignment after fighting for the last 10 years nonstop across the sector. He thought that he had finally found a place to retire with his family. “Retirement”, he laughed, “What was I thinking.” His family huddled deep within the bunker. Safe for now. He worried for their fate, but knew that at least if it came down to the end, they would not suffer. The Commissar had told him that if the outpost fell, he had a Viral Bomb that he would use to prevent the women and children from suffering unspeakable atrocities at the hands of the Orks.

 

As he stood there looking out at the desert, a commotion arose from the walls below. An Imperial Guardsman was shouting and pointing up at the sky. Soon the entire outpost was looking towards the sky. That is when they saw it. A shooting Star seemingly headed directly for the outpost. “Could this be?”, thought the Captain, “are we to be saved? Finally, after so much death and destruction.”

 

The shooting star, suddenly stopped and seemed to position itself directly over the outpost. Frantically communications techs tried to contact the object in the skies, was it a ship? Could it be an Imperial Craft that had come to save them all? No reply was received. The radios remained silent…

 

 

 

Several hours passed, No sign of Drop Pods descending, of Landing Craft headed to the surface, no sign of anything from the object high above the outpost. The sudden excitement and hope of the Imperial Guardsmen below slowly subsided and turned again to despair. With no communication led many to believe that the object was perhaps a Xenos craft that had come here to watch as the Orks massacred the final Imperial citizens on Atacama Major. The Tau had been sighted in the sector years before, but never on the planet or in the system.

 

Just a few hours before Dawn, the object in the sky seemed to glow brighter. Soon it was outshining all of the other stars visible in the sky, and almost as bright as the planets moon, when suddenly bright white and blue lances of light leapt from the object descending towards the Ork encampments over the ridge. Could this really be their salvation? The red glow of the Ork encampment fires was soon outshone by bright blue-white bursts of light, but no explosions ensued, it was not a bombardment after all.

 

Suddenly, the hills around the outpost shook with the screams and shouts of the Orks, the sound of their weapons echoed and rolled across the desert. Explosions were seen over the ridgeline, sporadically a rokkit would fly into the air and crash harmlessly in the no mans land between the ridgeline and the outpost. But the sound of Imperial weapons fire was not heard. It seemed as if the Orks were shouting and shooting amongst themselves, No sounds came across the desert that sounded like any Imperial weapons, or even any Eldar or Tau weapon fire.

 

The Battle raged for over an hour all around the Outpost. As dawn rapidly approached slowly quiet began to overpower the fierceness of the Ork Fighting, until Suddenly the desert was still and quiet, Fires raged unchecked over the ridgeline in the Ork encampments. Then a Bright Blue-White glow began to appear, at the Ork encampments, and suddenly Lances of light leapt from the surface back to the object in the sky.

 

The communications officer suddenly heard a frantic burst of radio traffic on one of the lesser used frequencies, it seemed to come from a hilltop overlooking the plain that the outpost resided on. The transmission was definitely not Imperial in origin.

 

Suddenly another Bright glow began from the object in the sky, this one was not WHite but Green, and a Lance of pure energy shot down from the sky and the hilltop were the transmissions were originating, was vaporized in a bright glow. The transmissions ceased immediately.

 

The object in the sky soon began to glow again, and in a bright flash of Blue light, it was gone…

 

 

The next morning, the Ork Attack did not come. Scouts were sent out to discover what the strange events of last night had accomplished. The Ork encampments were completely destroyed, not a single Ork was left alive. Most of the bodies had been torn asunder, sliced to pieces. There was no sign of any combatants except the Orks themselves. The only sign left behind in each encampment of the mystery combatants were several round areas of sand that were melted smooth to look like glass, and seem to be the result of some form of teleportation beam.

 

The only other evidence of the existence of the mystery combatants was a banner pole planted through the body of the largest Ork Nob in each encampment. The banner had an unknown Heraldry on it. A Black Heart with wings, with a Bright Red Broken Sword piercing it vertically. The saviors of Atacama Major left as mysteriously as they arrived, No one knows who they are, but their Legend begins ...

[Cairbre]

Interesting. Looking forward next part. :)

[WatchCaptainAzrael]

... Proceed. :cuss

[DAG42]

Good start. Want to hear more of your DA spinoffs.