Editing The 13th Black Crusade (section)

==Hope Comes on Wings of Fire and Fury==

===The Emperor's Bride===

[[File:Fall_of_Cadia_-_Celestine.JPG|thumb|The Living Saint]]

She arrived like a comet, wreathed in holy fire as she made her descent. As she neared, and the defenders got a better look at her, her name began to be spoken, from Battle Sister to Shock Trooper. It spread like wildfire, uttered in reverence and elation by the faithful.

For [[Saint Celestine]] had finally come.

She didn't even slow down once down on the muster fields, as her fiery wake swept traitors off their feet. Her silvered sword was a blur, and each stroke banished daemons back to the Warp.

Her arrival re-invigorated the defenders, and strength returned to tired limbs as much as hope flared in their hearts. The Emperor was still with them! Why else would He send his [[Living Saint]] to guide them in this darkest of hours? Even Creed forgot the looming threat of the Blackstone Fortress to join his men in battle. Only the Astartes were unaffected, as the Imperial Creed wasn't their faith, but even so Celestine's arrival was still welcomed.

The traitor Baneblade was buried against the surge of defenders, and cultists scattered from this renewed fury. Only the Black Legion was able to meet the charge with their own blasphemous resolve, and so the attacked soon stalled.

But Celestine did not come alone. The landing craft of five companies worth of Battle Sisters from the Order of the Martyred Lady, escorted down by [[Imperial Fists]] [[Stormtalon]]s, arrived on the muster field and disgorged their cargo of chanting Sororitas. They had been lost in the Warp for around fourteen hundred years before Celestine had found them, and now was their chance to make up for that lost time with interest.

The reinforcements tipped the odds in the defenders' favor once more, and the traitors were pushed back. Saint Celestine sought Urkanthos out personally, and while she was no match against the Daemon Prince on her own, her faith had resurrected the [[Geminae_Superia|twin canonesses that]] he had slain just shortly before. And so the trio's battle with their unholy foe began in earnest.

Outside the eastern walls, Baroness Vardus of House Raven was out of options. The Titans of Legio Vulcanuum continued their inexorable march towards Kasr Kraf, and there was nothing she could do to stop them. Detonating her plasma core and going out in a blaze of glory sounded like a sound tactical move at this point, but before she could act on these thoughts, the bright yellow [[Stormhawk]]s and Thunderhawks of the Imperial Fists swooped in. The entirety of the ''Vessel of Damnation's'' right side disappeared under intense turbolaser fire, and as the aircraft finished their attack run, the baroness put aside thoughts of glorious suicide away. For now.

Far above the melee at the muster fields of Kasr Kraf, the Chaos ships in orbit were about to get their own rude awakening.

===An Imperial Fisting, Done Dry===

[[File:BFGA2_The_Phalanx_Arrives.JPG|thumb|Heeeeeeeere's Dorn's Boys]]

Abaddon had planned many things, but he certainly [[Not As Planned|did not foresee the Phalanx suddenly thundering into the midst of the gathered might of his fleet]]. The venerable battle-fortress' guns roared to life, while its ancient shield generators held firm despite soaking multiple broadsides from the ships around it.

[[Tor Garadon]] had witnessed wonders and horrors in the last few hours to last a lifetime, from the arrival of the Legion of the Damnned, followed by the Living Saint Celestine guiding a time-lost Sororitas transport to the Phalanx's care. There were so many questions he didn't have any immediate answers to, but the sight of the gathered might of the Black Legion was something he was very familiar with.

The battle fortress was alone amongst a multitude of foes, but it didn't matter; something needed to ''die'', and the Phalanx would be the one to do it.

The ''Will of Eternity'' was the greatest threat, so the Phalanx turned toward the Blackstone Fortress' direction. As its flank batteries hammered the Traitor ships trying to surround it, Garadon held the powerful bow guns of the fortress ready -- because of all the damage it had experienced prior to arriving at Cadia, it had to make that first planet-cracking volley count.

Any other vessel would have been reduced to scrap by the sheer amount of fire it had received, but the Phalanx was made of sterner stuff, and even without an escort fleet it was still more than a match against the rabble that was facing it. But it could not hold on forever, as the heavy hitters of Abaddon's fleet left their moorings around Cadia and headed in its direction. Garadon didn't care though -- if this was to be the Phalanx's last battle, so be it, but not before the Blackstone Fortress was destroyed.

Unknown to all, Sven Bloodhowl and the remnants of his volunteer strike force still fought on in the depths of the Blackstone Fortress. They were pinned down, just short of a vital interchange that powered a section of the ''Will of Eternity'''s shields. The arrival of the Phalanx, viewed through one viewport, reinvigorated the raiders, and as the [[Legion of the Damned]] began to manifest all around them, Sven led the last of his Firehowlers to glory.

An explosion flared on one of the Blackstone's flanks, and along the whole lower port quadrant of the ''Will of Eternity'' the shields sputtered and died. That was the chance that Garadon and Trevaux were hoping for, and as one the main batteries of the Phalanx focused-fired on that area with the fury worthy of Dorn himself.

Traitor ships desperately battered themselves against the ''Phalanx'' 's onrushing mass, and while this silenced some of the battle fortress' guns, the rest still pounded on the Blackstone's now-cracked hide. In the strategium, hull breach klaxons and damage reports kept on being heard, but Garadon paid it no heed. The ''Will of Eternity'' was going to '''die''', no ifs or buts about it.

After what seemed to be countless salvos, something within the Blackstone Fortress just... shattered. Massive fissures appeared on its surface, and lurid purple light bled through the cracks. As the Phalanx limped away as fast as its engines could muster, a silent scream echoed across every living being in the Cadian Gate as the Blackstone Fortress broke up in a blinding flare of warp energy. By the time the glare faded away, a full third of the Black Fleet was gone, snatched back by the tides of the Warp, while more had burned out and crashed on Cadia's south pole.

As for the fortress itself, its ruined husk remained in orbit, a brand new and lifeless moon overlooking its former quarry.

===A Reprieve, Not a Victory===

The remaining Nobles of House Raven combined their fire with that of the [[Imperial Fists]] [[Thunderhawk]]s, and soon enough the traitor Titan ''Vessel Damnation'' was reduced to fused and melted slag. At the same time, with the forces of the Cadian 8th and Sororitas of the Martyred Lady in the lead, the traitor filth was finally driven from Kasr Kraf's muster field. When Sergeant Kell replanted the company colors of the regiment back on the Kriegan Gates, Urkanthos himself had fallen, slain at the hands of Celestine and the reborn Canoness Eleanor and Genevieve, and the daemon prince's unholy corpse thrown off the walls.

With the death of the Blackstone Fortress, the spirit of many of the traitors broke, and soon the invaders fled south, hounded by the Ironwolves and the Knights of House Raven. Those who could not flee threw down their arms and begged for mercy, but the defenders would give none, and met their end via sanctified promethium. Countless died in the assault, but despite the victory of the Phalanx, Abaddon's forces still held air superiority. The air space above Cadia Secundus swarmed with drop-ships, who eagerly picked up survivors in preparation for another attack.

Creed himself knew the truth of the matter. This wasn't a victory. They had survived, but he wasn't sure if Cadia's luck could hold for much longer.

Indeed, far above the atmosphere, in the bridge of the ''Vengeful Spirit'' itself, Abaddon mulled this new setback in front of his nervous lieutenants. Cadia was still intact and still defiant, but the Blackstone was now in ruins, its three massive pieces spread across the planet's orbit for kilometers. And while Prozus Ghael, the commander of the ''Will of Eternity'', had somehow survived, he currently wished he didn't. Now he languished in agony under the ministrations of Abaddon's torturers, who would make sure that he would live for a ''long'' time before death was allowed to claim him.

Urkanthos' failure cast a tense shadow over the gathering, and the Despoiler was definitely in a foul mood. No, he would not let another of his lackeys possibly screw things up, oh no, now it was time for Abaddon to handle matters '''personally'''. No more messing around. Win or lose, the commander of the Black Legion would see things through himself.

===Arrivals at the Eleventh Hour===

[[File:BFGA2_Cawl_Arrives.JPG|thumb|The Archmagos arrives]]

The dawn of the next day was greeted by the smell of ignited promethium, as countless funeral pyres burned in Kasr Kraf's muster fields. They burned for two days, fed by whatever fuel that could be spared for the task, a final mercy to the martyred dead, so that Chaos corruption would not disturb their rest.

It came at Saint Celestine's insistence, and even Creed couldn't gainsay her request, though not out of piety or respect. The task would keep the minds of his soldiers occupied, buttress their flagging morale, and keep them from quickly realizing just how precarious their situation really was. But Creed knew, even long before the corpse of the slain daemon prince was thrown off the ramparts. The previous day's show of defiance was the fortress' last, and when the hordes of the Despoiler came again, the defense would have to be done somewhere else.

Creed let Celestine continue her ministrations, and continued to ponder strategic withdrawals. The arrival of the ''Phalanx'', damaged as it was, provided possibilities. What if it could take the bulk of the Cadian forces on-planet elsewhere, to continue the fight perhaps at Agripinaa or Belis Corona?

As unbelievable as it may seem, reinforcements still managed to reach Cadia this late in the siege, mostly due to the disruption that the ''Phalanx'' and its destruction of the Blackstone Fortress had provided. First were the [[Crimson Fists]] 5th Company under Brother-Captain '''Luis Tracinto''' along with the remnants of the Cadian 14th, who had been driven off Kasr Partox. A dozen [[Imperial Navy Cruiser|cruisers]] limped in from Solar Mariatus, their holds filled with the tanks of '''Armored 51st Regiment''' as well as the Knights of '''House Taranis'''.

The latter's flight to safety was especially intriguing, as the spoke of slate-grey ships bearing faded symbols of the [[Space Wolves]] appearing out of nowhere to intercept their pursuers. When asked if these were reinforcements from the Fang, Orven Highfell could give no answer.

However, the last of these unexpected arrivals would be the most welcome. It was a Mechanicus [[Explorator Fleet]], arrived from the dry and backwater Eriad System. Creed hoped that it could breath life back to the planet's shattered defenses, but it soon became apparent that the newcomers had experienced their own trials. While the ships of the fleet itself were untouched, the ranks of its [[Skitarii]] as well as its artificers and battle-masons had been thinned considerably by prior violence at that arid world.

But that wasn't the worst of it, oh no. Its leader, the Archmagos [[Belisarius Cawl]], had some '''terrible''' news to share to the Cadian war council.

===An Awful, Terrible Truth===

[[File:BFGA2_Cawl_Briefs_Council.JPG|thumb|Cawl puts it bluntly]]

Cawl briefed the gathered War Council of his discoveries at Eriad IV, and while it was nigh-incomprehensible at times due to the lexicon the Arch[[magos]] used, the meaning it held was still abundantly clear to those gathered there. For time immemorial, structures similar to the [[Cadian Pylons]] had been buttressing reality together like stitches on a tapestry, keeping the Warp at bay... And like the sneaky bastard that he was, Abaddon had been quietly destroying these structures throughout the galaxy, usually timing it during one of his Black Crusades. And with each Pylon field obliterated, reality slowly unraveled as well.

Cawl's ramblings sounded like a crackpot theory for some, but at the same time the evidence bore itself out. It brought a new but very disturbing perspective on the "failure" of Abaddon's previous Black Crusades, and the rising tide of darkness and prevalence of Warp Storms in the galaxy since the Despoiler had first set off from the Eye. These costly campaigns throughout the millennia had all been smoke and mirrors, obfuscating what Abaddon's forces had really been doing. It was something only an immortal, who could afford to wait thousands of years for a resolution, could have come up with.

There was no way of knowing how many Pylon fields remained in the galaxy, or just how close the galaxy was to finally fraying, but one thing was clear: Cadia could no longer be abandoned. The Despoiler '''had''' to be stopped here. The question now would be ''how'' to do this impossible task.