Editing The 13th Black Crusade (section)

==Bad Times Everywhere Else==

While the Cadian Gate was the focal point of the Black Crusade, Chaos was also busy making things miserable for other places as well.

===The Battle of Medusa===

In order to keep the [[Iron Hands]] busy, Abaddon ordered several battlegroups to attack the Chapter homeworld of Medusa. All ten of the Chapter's [[Mobile_Hiveships#Land-Behemoth|Land Behemoth Fortress-Monasteries]] were deployed, and with the support of the heavily-mechanized planetary defense force, intercepted the ten-thousand tank strong Chaos invaders. In a running battle that played out over the course of five days, the Iron Hands Behemoths threw back their attackers, with their Ordinatus-grade weaponry destroying hundreds of tanks per volley.

Eventually, someone got the bright idea to [[Creed|not try and zerg rush the front of the Fortresses with big fuckoff guns]] and outflank the giant vehicles. With their mobile bases' vulnerable rear housing exposed, the Iron Hands desperately countrerstruck with [[Assault Squad]]s, taking serious casualties but blunting the traitor attack. The remaining forces were mopped up by Chapter Predators, and thus concluded the battle of Medusa.

===Chaos All Around The Gate===

The world of Belisar was paid an unwelcome visit by [[Lucius the Eternal]] and his [[Emperor's Children]] groupies, bringing untold amounts of slaughter, drugs, and sex crimes. Meanwhile, the [[Night Lords]] ran around terrifying everyone short of the dead and generally being Batman larpers without the aversion to guns. At Thracian Primaris Governor Thybault Helican XXIII fought against a rising tide of [[Furry|deviant cultists]], while the Arbites under his command struggled to maintain order with firearms and weapons.

In Segmentum Obscurus, [[Alpha Legion]] sleeper cells went active, and did their part in delaying the arrival of Loyalist Astartes reinforcements across the segmentum. This allowed more traitor Titans and elements of the Dark Hereticus to deploy on the field. It also allowed for hordes of cheap conscripts and Daemons to be deployed with relative safety.

===Keeping the Space Elves Busy===

Eldrad, knowing that the Eldar would be screwed if Chaos took greater control over the Galaxy, rallied his own Craftworld to participate in the Black Crusade. [[Ulthwe]]'s [[Storm Guardians]] were deployed in strength, with each task force given a Waystone that contained a fragment of Eldrad's psyche to safely guide them to the warzones where they could make a difference.

At Belial IV, a strike force led by the [[Phoenix Lord]]s would disrupt the raising of a dark cathedral by the [[Word Bearers]] to the Ruinous Powers. Meanwhile, the Harlequins told Ahriman to touch some fucking grass rather than trying to reach a bunch of dusty old books in the Great Library. Ahriman took this pretty personally and kept trying to break into it anyway.

===Dorn's Regal Daughter, Assaulted===

While the Imperium was busy with defending Cadia, a ragtag group of Chaos forces hatched a bold plan. The [[Phalanx]], Fortress-Monastery and home of the [[Imperial Fists]] Chapter, was in orbit of Terra. The plan was pretty simple: break into the Phalanx, murderfuck anything they saw, and use the BFG to finally destroy the Imperial Palace. Led by that sick fuck [[Shon'tu]] and the undivided [[Daemon Prince]] [[Be'lakor]], these unlikely allies wanted to upstage Abaddon's galactic bar brawl by conquering the venerable battle fortress. Iron Warriors and Daemons infiltrated the Phalanx through its warp drive, surprising the crew.

Even worse, the bulk of the Chapter was away on other missions, mostly because Abby's Crusade seriously threatened Cadia. The only thing standing between the invaders and defeat was thirty veterans of the First Company and 3rd Company. So about 130 men. [[Tor Garadon]] ordered them and whatever poor serfs that were onboard to defend the Phalanx. The Chapter had the home advantage of knowing which places were the best to defend, giving them so much overwatch fire that even the T'au would be proud.

However, Chaos corruption (helped along by [[Warpsmith]]s) soon turned the superstructure itself on the defenders. Whole decks were begining to do the unthinkable: change into [[Medrengard]]. The infestation spread rapidly, with scrap code eroding loyal machine spirits, and soon even the dorsal batteries would fall under Chaos control.

In order to prevent the Phalanx becoming a normie tier weapons platform, Garadon had to do the unthinkable -- [[What|blast entire parts of the fortress off with its own guns.]] He withdrew his forces to uninfected sections, and purged ten percent of the Phalanx's own superstructure. It was painful, but the sacrifice was worth it. Not only was the hold of the corrupt machine virus on the fortress broken, but the Phalanx would more importantly not be turned into a boring reflection of Medgrengard. He took the disruption this caused to order the Phalanx into the Warp -- wherever the fortress went, it would no longer be a threat to Terra. With that, Garadon remembered who forced him to ruin his pretty fort, and he was [[Rage|fuckin pissed]].

While the Iron Warriors were soon dealt with, and Shon'tu given a permanent [[Anal Circumference|Imperial Fisting]] care of [[Terminator Squad]] Furan, Garadon still had to contend with Be'lakor's daemons because he forgot Daemons become more powerful in the warp. The diminished Fists were driven back to the Chamber of Storms, and they prepared to make their final stand.

Sure of his inevitable success, Be'lakor sent his hordes against the Imperial Fists, and joined the fight himself to give the Imperial Fists a piece of him. Suddenly, the [[Legion of the Damned]] started to manifest in force to aid the Fists in their fight. The victory turned into a rout, and Garadon decided to take Be'lakor up on his offer of "a piece of him", and [[FATAL|yanked him into two parts.]]

As the Fists and Legion mopped up, Garadon took stock of his situation. Of the Astartes he started with, about half of the 3rd Company and 1st Company Veterans remained, and a tenth of the Phalanx's superstructure was simply gone, with the fortress itself severely damaged in countless other places. As for the Legion of the Damned itself, the spectral marines didn't dematerialize as was their usual habit, and instead stood at attention, as if waiting for something. Needless to say, aside from Garadon himself, everyone else gave the Legion a wide berth. Even if the Chaos forces had not accomplished their main goal, it accomplished something else entirely: kept the Imperium off balance, and weakened the Phalanx when they would inevitably be called to Cadia.

Sergeant Furan and '''Commodore Trevaux''' advised Garadon to make haste for Mars so they could get the thing repaired, but Garadon simply slapped a purity seal on the boo-boo and ordered them to deploy to Cadia immediately.