Siege of Terra (Hektor Heresy)

This article is about a battle in the /tg/ Heresy project, a fan re-working of the Warhammer 40k universe.

The Siege of Terra
Date	M31
Scale	Planetary
Theatre	Holy Terra
Status	Pyrrhic Imperial Victory
Belligerents
Forces of Chaos	Imperium of Man
Commanders and Leaders
Hektor Cincinnatus Johannes Vrach The Voidwatcher	Emperor of Mankind Darius Cyaxares Kleisthenes
Strength
Heralds of Hektor Life Bringers Black Augurs	Adeptus Custodes Sand Keepers Scions of Europa
Losses
-	-
Outcome
Hektor Cincinnatus slain Emperor of Mankind mortally wounded Hektor's rebellion crushed

The Siege of Terra was the final battle of the Hektor Heresy. A titanic clash between the forces loyal to the Emperor of Mankind and the foul Traitors who swore allegiance to the Ruinous Powers, this titanic battle decided not only the fate of humanity, but also that of the Galaxy as a whole.

The Battle of Terra

Sand Keepers vs. Green Men

The Battle for Sud Merica, colloquially known as The Uprooting, was the battle christening of Galen's gene-modified Green Men. Although it resulted in a loss for the traitors, it established the vicious plantmen as a dangerous foe to the Imperium and provided them with a lot of valuable combat experience that they managed to turn into many a decisive victory later on.

To be fair, victory was not their goal in the first place. Their main objective was to keep the main forces of the Sand Keepers distracted from the onslaught on the Imperial Palace. The secondary objective, which was, perhaps, even more important to the Green Men, was to reintroduce life to the polluted wastelands of Sud Merica by turning them into a Sea of Corruption. And so, their first move after landing on Terra was to send out their Thunderhawks loaded with scores of spore bombs. Relentless carpet bombings turned whole hive cities into toxic ruins in the span of hours. Worse still, thickets of poisonous fungi soon started sprouting from the bombing sites and growing with uncanny speed. Hadil Nictore, the commander of Sand Keeper forces, frowned as he watched the videotapes of these developments. He understood full well that the battle would be as good as lost if he allowed these blasphemous forests to grow to their full size, for his forces could not fight well beneath their noxious boughs. Unfortunately, he had no means of destroying them in time at his disposal; or, to be precise, he had one which he was prohibited from using. It was with a heavy heart that he made the decision of violating the decision of the Council of Nikaea and ordered his Legion's former Librarians to don their psychic hoods once again and do anything necessary to prevent Galen's diabolical plans from achieving fruition.

Although the Librarians understood clearly that they would probably be executed after the victory for breaking the Emperor's edict, they obeyed their commander's orders and began a sorcerous ritual. After chanting for hours and burning no less than a ton of incense, they unleashed the awesome might of their magic on Galen's Sea of Corruption. Colossal roaring sandstorms in the shape of aquillas came down on the fungal copses, choking the poisonous fungi under great dunes of scorching sand. Pressing this advantage, Sand Keepers immediately started advancing on the enemy lines, with the Immortals leading the charge. Infuriated by this turn of events, Galen ordered Alraun to counter enemy sorcery with that of their own. The Librarian complied by summoning a great barrier of prickly bush in the way of the enemy's advance. While the Sand Keepers were burning the unexpected obstacle with their flamers, the heavy weapon teams of the Green Men concentrated their fire on them.

Though they were eventually relieved by assault squads that came to their rescue, the vanguard of the Sand Keepers sustained great losses while trapped in the thorny bush. Anticipating a decisive victory, Bercilak ordered a full-on charge at the enemy positions. The outcome was looking bleak for the Loyalist forces when the Librarians came to their rescue again. Using the rubble left after Galen's spore bombings, they created several massive golems the size of Imperial Knights, each one controlled by a Librarian's unshakable willpower. Like buildings given life, they attacked the Traitor formations from the flanks, crushing their heavy support and bringing chaos to their ranks. It is said that more than a half of Sand Keepers' Librarians died on that day from straining themselves too much, but their sacrifice was not in vain, for it helped to redeem the usage of psychic powers after the Heresy.

Powerless to turn the tide of battle, Bercilak ordered retreat. It was only due to his tactical brilliance that the Green Men managed to escape Holy Terra with relatively minor losses and a great deal of combat experience. Unfortunately, their actions have left a deep scar on the face of Sud Merica: it is said that the lower levels of its great hives are still overgrown with noxious fungal jungles prowled by nightmarish creatures.

The Fall of Batavium

Even though Hektor had planned for the Black Augurs to assist him in the siege of the Imperial Palace, the Voidwatcher made sure that the involvement of his forces was minimal. Extremely unwilling to risk his life for another's cause, he preferred to sit the battle out in the rear ranks and watch his brothers slaughter each other with a grin of amusement on his lips. That is not to say that the Fourteenth Legion remained passive for the duration of the battle: nearly every Vate had his own goals on Terra, which they departed to pursue with their Primarch's tacit approval. Some went to loot artefacts of power, some set forth to raid the planet's ancient libraries, and Ilmari Wieland headed to the great Hive of Batavium with the intention of slaughtering its every citizen in a bloody hecatomb. Like many others, the Hive was left with only the most basic defences in the wake of the assault on the Imperial Palace, which made it an easy prey for the Hammerfist Coven. As soon as Batavium's last defenders were vanquished, Wieland and his followers ventured into the Hive's deepest recesses, placed numerous chemical bombs and detonated them from a distance. Like a deadly tide, toxic mists started rising up from Batavium's lower levels, forcing all of its inhabitants to seek shelter in its central spire, the only place towering above the toxic clouds. It was this spire that was set to become their common grave. Seated in his throne room in a great zeppelin circling around the Hive, the Hammerfist started preparing the ritual that would summon two greater Daemons into this world.

Wieland's malefaction did not go unnoticed. The blight that came to Batavium was soon detected by one of the satellites belonging to the Scions of Europa that were orbiting Terra to monitor the activities of the Traitors. Although the end goal of the rogue Vate was unclear to the Legion's leadership, it was certain that it didn't bode well for the Imperium. To prevent his plans from achieving fruition, a Chapter under the leadership of Praetor Aristomachus was dispatched to Batavium. The Scions of Europa were outfitted with the best chemical protection their Legion's armoury could spare and a large amount of transports. Their objective was to evacuate the trapped citizens of the Hive before Wieland's diabolical ritual was completed. Deeply annoyed by this unexpected interference, the Hammerfist had to pause his great ceremony to deal with the intruders. Summoning the powers of the Warp to his aid, he breathed life into the weapons of the slain defenders of Batavium, forcing them to taste blood once again. The sons of Kleisthenes were puzzled when they were suddenly assaulted by ranks upon ranks of swords and pikes fighting on their own, as if held by invisible, incorporeal hands. While the Scions of Europa were trying to figure out how to kill something that has no body, Wieland was finishing up his ritual. Great spouts of jet-black smoke appeared from his zeppelin's nozzles and formed a giant storm cloud shaped like a grinning skull over the central spire. At the Hammerfist's command, a severe storm of lightning came down on the spire from this cloud, for several minutes turning it into one colossal electric oven. When it was over, the great structure was melting like a candle and everyone trapped inside it had turned into a charred corpse.

Just as the Vate had planned, this hecatomb allowed him to summon not one, but two abominations from the Warp, a Bloodthirster and a Lord of Change. As soon as they appeared, Wieland put a binding spell on them and trapped them in the weapons that he had prepared for this occasion: his own bare fists. Long before the ritual, he had tattooed his hands with profane pentagrams that now kept the Daemons firmly imprisoned inside them. However, there was a heavy price to pay for his triumph: the Daemons trapped inside his fists caused him constant searing pain that would quickly drive a lesser man insane. Even though Wieland possessed enough willpower to endure this unending torment, it greatly soured his already unpleasant personality, turning him into an easily irritable madman prone to destructive bouts of rage.