The Imperium began its descent in blazing fashion to destabilize and instill fear.
The Thranxans did not welcome the Imperial invaders, they fought them. Layered bands of void shields shimmered across the firmament, translucent veils of energy that turned the air into a shimmering wall of refusal.
Inside the command deck of the Vengeful Spirit, the hum of tactical cogitators filled the silence. Strategic displays flickered with red runes as orbital strikes splashed harmlessly against the Thranx defenses.
"Orbital saturation has reached the threshold, my Lord," a bridge officer reported, his voice tight.
"Their shields are at variance…"
"Every salvo we fire seems to allow them to calibrate for the least amount of power needed for defence."
Horus Lupercal stood at the edge of the strategic dais, his armor reflecting the flickering data-streams. He did not look frustrated. He looked like a hunter studying a clever trap.
"Then we take the fight to the ground," Horus said, his voice a calm thunder.
"If the heavens will not yield, we strike the earth that anchors them. Signal the Legions, we make planet fall."
The order rippled through the fleet. In the hangars, the roar of gunships and the clatter of ceramite became a symphony of war.
Stormbirds and Thunderhawks launched from their bays in staggered waves. The Luna Wolves led as the tip of the spear, with the heavy transports of the Imperial Army following in their wake.
The Thranx responded with machine-like speed. Energy lances punched through the cloud layer, white-hot beams of light punctured through Imperial ships like a knife through butter.
"Breaking cloud cover! Incoming heavy fire!" a pilot's voice crackled over the vox.
"Transports Vigilant and Iron Oarsman are hit! They're spiraling!"
"Ignore the losses!" a Luna Wolves Sergeant roared over the squad-link.
"Trust in your heat shields! Eyes on the drop zone!"
Then came the pods.
Drop pods punched through the atmosphere, they didn't bother with maneuvers or evasion. They simply accelerated, their hulls glowing white-hot until they slammed into the surface of Thranx Prime with a BOOM, carrying the force of a falling star.
The landing zones were nightmare corridors of death. The Thranx had shaped the terrain into perfect kill-zones in long, open lanes flanked by elevated firing nests.
The moment the pod doors blew clear, they were received by a wall of energy weapons and hot sluggs. The Thranxans had planned for a ground assault as well
"Out! Move!" Sergeant Torgaddon barked, his bolter already barking death as he stepped onto the scorched earth.
The Thranx infantry were waiting for them, like machines they didn't shout war cries. They stood in silence, their own power armor whirring as they leveled heavy rifles with uncanny precision. They fired in perfect unison, a wall of fire that met the Astartes head-on.
"What are these people!" a Legionary shouted, ducking behind the wreckage of a pod as bolter rounds sparked off his shoulder guard.
"Their armor is holding! They're tracking our movements faster than a mortal should!"
"Then hit them harder!" Torgaddon replied, leaning out to snap-fire a three-round burst into a Thranx soldier's visor.
"Luna Wolves! Close the gap!"
The Luna Wolves surged forward, fighting with the feral grace of their namesake as they pounced. They moved into the gaps of the Thranx firing solutions, forcing the enemy to split their fire.
Behind them, the VII Legion made their landing. They were the immovable mountain that sat at the top. Where the Luna Wolves disrupted, the VII Legion held.
"Shields up! Advance by squads!" Captain Sigismund ordered, his voice cold and rhythmic.
The VII moved in locked formations, their bolters firing in disciplined volleys. They didn't look for cover they became the cover. Every step was measured, every shot placed to create a grinding pressure that the Thranx line could not ignore.
"Enemy response is optimal, Captain," a legionnaire reported.
"They're shifting resources to meet us before we even finish the maneuver."
Horus watched the battle from his tactical feed. He saw the way the Thranx moved, it was uncanny to perfection. Units that should have broken instead slid into new positions.
Heavy weapons teams moved to new nests without a single command being shouted over the vox.
"This isn't discipline," Horus muttered to his inner circle.
"This is synchronized cognition. They are thinking as one."
"A neural Implant?" Abaddon asked, his face grim.
"More than that, there is no latency in movement patterns" Horus replied.
"They are maintaining an equilibrium, they do not possess the vitality to stand against us fully. We must break that balance."
Heavier Imperial Army transports slammed down, displacing mass were tracked assault tanks. The engines roared as the armored behemoths pushed into the kill corridors.
The Thranx anti-armor teams reacted instantly. They didn't fire at the tanks thickest plates they fired at the treads, the turret rings, and the sensor arrays. They were dismantling the Imperial Army bit by bit.
"They're picking us apart!" a tank commander screamed over the vox as his vehicle groaned under a coordinated volley.
"Requesting immediate support! We're stalled in the corridor!"
"XVIII, move in!" the order came.
The Legionaries of the XVIII broke through the smoke. They moved into the tightest, most lethal zones with voltic chargers and melta-guns.
"Bring the heat!" a XVIII legion sergeant yelled.
"Scorch them from the dark! Leave only ash!"
Promethium washed over the Thranx barricades. The screaming heat forced the silent soldiers out of their defensive nodes, turning the kill-zones into a chaotic swirl of flame and shadow.
For the first time, the Thranx coordination stuttered.
Aurelian Gaius Trajan stood atop a jagged ridge, overlooking the carnage. To his mind, the war was a system of energy and micro-delays.
He saw the way the Thranx units adjusted. He saw the tiny lag in their movements when a command node was destroyed, and how quickly it was bypassed by another.
"It should not be this stable," Aurelian said quietly.
"The Legions are winning the ground, Aurelian," Namian noted.
"No," Aurelian countered.
"We are gaining the advantage, but that is only how it would seem." He paused for a second
"Luprecal should see it too, we are being drawn in. This level of coordination should not be coming from field officers."
He looked past the smoke, his gaze seemingly piercing the ground itself.
"The patterns are consistent with abominable intelligence," Aurelian said.
"We have fought them many times, Namien. Is the pattern not clear to you? The controlling system needs to be removed."
Down in the mud and fire, the battle continued. Bolter rounds met plasteel. Chainswords met power-armored joints. The Luna Wolves roared, the VII ground forward, and the XVIII burned.
Aurelian and the ten thousand stood upon the Bucephalus and watched.
They knew they would soon be needed. Meanwhile something else ravaged the mind of Aurelian.
The original stories tend to show all the most devastating or technological battles, but why had this one been dismissed. Had there been a change…
A thought came to him, one common to this situation…