Arrakis Compliance

The Arrakis Compliance was a minor Imperial compliance campaign during the Great Crusade. The Red Eyes, led by Theoderaf, outnumbered the native forces, yet the enemy's guerrilla tactics and knowledge of the world drew the conflict out and forced Theoderaf to ask for help from a brother he barely knew.

The compliance would be one of the few times that Theoderaf and Azus would fight together, and be a victory that the Red Eyes would seek to gloss over.

## **History of Arrakis**

Arrakis was founded as a mining colony during the Dark Age of Technology, due to its large deposits of uranium and other nuclear materials. Over time it developed into a minor Forge World dedicated to building exterminatus weapons. When the Age of Strife began, the civil war that broke out on Arrakis as a result led to the detonation of a cache of exterminatus devices, irradiating the whole world and killing billions of people. The oceans became acidic and toxic, the land was barren and scorched. The survivors were left to scavenge the world, devolving into roving warbands searching for food, water and tech. Several years before the Imperium discovered Arrakis, a techno-barbarian warlord called Ingvac gained control of the largest warband, and used recently uncovered pseudo-knights to conquer the world.

## **The Red Eyes' Campaign**

The 5th Expeditionary Fleet, in their campaigning in Segmentum Ultima, stumbled across the dead world of Arrakis. The fleet nearly bypassed the world, with the radiation levels detected suggesting that whatever human civilisation had been there was now long since gone. As they passed by the world, though, they picked up signals coming from the world, with the tech priests of the fleet recognising it as a form of binary. The Emperor’s Oblivion sent a message to the world, announcing their arrival and telling the world that the Emperor had been searching for them. As they did this, the Decapitation Squads stealthily descended to the world to scout out and determine the exact nature of the humans who lived there.

What they reported back to Theoderaf was that there were large ruins of cities, utterly decimated and with no inhabitants living there. The Squads had noticed they were being tracked, but pretended not to notice to lure their watchers out. As the Squads were leaving the city and heading back to return to the fleet, they were ambushed by fast moving enemies. From the helmet camera footage and the accounts of the Astartes, it was clear that the foes were at least mechanical in nature, with several signs of bionic augments improving the foes’ mobility. One of the marines was immobilized and captured by the enemy, and they fled back into the ruins with their captive. Theoderaf decided that the scavengers’ camp must be located and destroyed.

Landing in the ruins of the city in force, Theoderaf led the First Company in a sweep of the city, with aerial support searching from the sky. The company came under harassment from the same scavengers, this time fleeing in the face of the overwhelming force. The scavengers’ camp was soon discovered, one of the still standing buildings, with no defences and little more than rags left behind. The body of the marine was found, stripped of his armour and equipment and dead from several gunshot wounds to the head. As Theoderaf left the city and prepared to leave the world behind, the reconnaisse squads reported that a larger force was approaching from the desert outside of the city. Theoderaf sent the Storm Eagles to harass the force, and marched out to meet them.

Theoderaf determined that the enemy in front of him was around 500 men strong, moving in a loose formation. From a distance, they seemed human in size, with quite a few vehicles amongst them, including crab-like tanks that scuttled across the sand. As the Red Eyes were not accompanied by their armoured elements, the Red Eyes would be forced to rely on their melta bombs to take them out. Out of range of the Red Eyes, the enemy stopped, and began kicking up a sand cloud. The irradiated sand blocked the vision of the scanners and visors, Seeking to not let them complete whatever they were doing, Theoderaf ordered a charge.

As the Red Eyes closed the distance, the enemy began pulling back, with the jump infantry of the Red Eyes failing to catch up. On top of this, the sand began jamming their bolters, making the light ranged options of the Red Eyes even more limited. Seeing that the enemy favoured mobility, Theoderaf voxed up to the fleet to deploy the jetbike and outrider squadrons, and continued to put pressure on the enemy.

As the Red Eyes entered the sand cloud, they lost sight of the enemy, and incoming fire began peppering all sides of the Imperial forces. Theoderaf and the Marks of Fate roared a battle cry and managed to stumble into some of the enemies. Whilst they were easily torn to pieces, the majority of the enemy remained out of reach, with one of the Marks of Fate being felled by a flurry of shots to the helmet. Theoderaf, acknowledging that there was nothing he could do, voxed the Storm Eagles to descend and attempt an evacuation. As the Storm Eagles descended and they were forced to dodge incoming fire, the fast attack elements descended and the enemy finally retreated.

The initial engagement set the tone for the whole campaign, as even though the Red Eyes were able to destroy any encampment the enemy made, the enemy would escape and inflict minor casualties as they did. Dubbed the Cyber Swarm of Arrakis, they were impossible to pin down for a decisive engagement, even with the fast attack elements of the 1st Chapter present. Wherever the Red Eyes lacked aerial forces, the Swarm would launch their own strange aircraft and wing-suited troops. Wherever the Red Eyes lacked heavy weapons, the war machines of the Swarm would descend, Dreadnought-sized Iron Golems and Sand Leviathans similar to small Knights. During this time, the Red Eyes discovered the name of the leader of the Swarm, a techno-barbarian warlord by the name of Ingvac. As the campaign dragged out, and Theoderaf grew angrier and angrier at the delays, the Red Eyes tried all kinds of tactics to destroy the campaign, but none were successful. By the end, around a thousand Astartes had been killed.

## **The Aid of Ghosts**

Finally, reaching the end of his patience, Theoderaf played his last card. Sending an astropathic message, he pulled his forces back and waited, bombarding the enemy from orbit when they were detected and using teleport strikes to attack and then withdraw quickly. Luckily, the receiver of the message was campaigning relatively close by, and a new fleet located in-system. The Ghost of the Sands was the expert of this style of warfare, and the Dune Serpents would be in their natural territory. Though Theoderaf had never been close to Azus, only having fought with him once, he welcomed his brother’s aid and bowed to his experience in this style of warfare. Azus immediately set about sending his legion to fan out and begin herding the Swarm towards a single location. The superior mobility of the Serpents forced the combat-averse Swarm to retreat further and further back, slowly surrounding the Swarm. Finally, Ingvac and the Swarm were trapped, and Theoderaf and the Red Eyes re-entered the fray. As the Dune Serpents began assaulting the front line of the Swarm, the Red Eyes teleported and drop pod assaulted the position, letting out all their pent up rage on the Swarm. The Swarm were no match in close combat, and quickly collapsed. Theoderaf tore through them to Ingvac’s location, cleaving through the leg of a Sand Leviathan with Psyche Cleaver and scattering the Swarm. He found Ingvac, who stood his ground and swung his power fist at Theoderaf. Theoderaf easily dodged it, ripped the arm with the power fist off and beat Ingvac to death with the power fist. The rest of the Swarm was destroyed in the slaughter, with none escaping and the Red Eyes accepting no prisoners.

## **Aftermath**

Theoderaf, in gratitude to the Dune Serpents, allowed them to resupply from the world, taking any of the Cyber Swarm’s resources before the Red Eyes classified the world as compliant. To the wider Imperium, it was yet another Imperial victory, with the Red Eyes and Dune Serpents working in tandem. However, the Red Eyes would seek to forget this campaign, as they viewed it as a failure for them. Theoderaf would never challenge Azus on his style of warfare or his conduct after this point, when others condemned it.