Beaten To Rebellion

Deotor and the Void Dragon cultists attacked at the end of Turn 4.

## It's A Trap

You are Octavia Tesla and you can’t believe where you are now, a fabricator general and ruling an entire system . If only you could see the face of your former superiors should they hear of this.

Your advisors were ecstatic upon hearing the news, but especially Talios who now looks forward to working with more resources than he already has . Although he does warn you will now be thrust into the spotlight meaning that you will have to be more careful and potentially elimnate many dissidents.

And now you ,Talios, Harrkem , Zerxes and 4 battalions of skittari have travelled to the Ramilis fortress , The FIst of Mars to meet with the leaders of Atlantis so they can swear allegiance to you in a grand ceremony .

While you wait for arrivals you survey the fleet you received .

Afterwards you meet with the rogue trader Pollus Faustus who appears weary after a long and odorous warp trip . You discuss many things with him and he appears to be a pleasant fellow and he is looking forward to dealing with you.

Your conversation is joined by General Marcus Spartas who is the leader of the Elysian Drop troops to find themselves here by accident . He seems annoyed by this derailment but is civil enough to you and he also tells you of the more recent happenings of the imperium .

Apparently Faust’s information is outdated by at least two centuries. Marcus informs you of the black crusade , led by Fulgrim and Lorgar attacking ultramar and besieging Macrrage itself. Seeking to finally destroy the brother they both hated . What happened next is unclear but it seems the attack failed and some reports indicate the Avenging son has been revived somehow though this is unconfirmed .

In other news somehow more dire news, hundreds of imperial planets have been going dark with no explanation at all . The only hints at what the menace behind this are panicked astropathic calls screaming of a “Great Devourer “ .

As you process these news your new subordinates arrive . Naar, Valid, Elizea and a magos you learn is named Arseuys. All pledge allegiance to you without issue . Valid and Elizea you can be sure of their loyalty but you are a bit suspicious of Naar and Arseuys is an unknown factor .

More worryingly however is the absence of Deotor whose presence is mandatory for the transfer of power.

Before you can think more of this , an urgent transmission from Armcus arrives. He tells you of a massive army of Skittari marching on Bermuda . Valid , Naar and Elizea receive similar news not long after. Distressingly these skittari seem more durable than usual and wield weapons unknown to the mechanicus.

A vox broadcast is then transmitted to you and the voice is all to familiar to you. Deotor thus spoke :

“Servants of the false omnissah , i speak to you as the herald of the true Machine God who will soon awaken from his slumber on Mars. Surrender now and be accepted into his fetid ranks and experience the true power of the metal. Or remain shackled and die as the worthless slaves you are .”

It seems that Deotor despite all that you expected from him beat you to rebillion and it seems he is more of a heretek than you are . No matter he is a threat to you now.

You and the magi present quickly regain your wits and start an impromtu war council to react to this .

## Battle Lines

You are Octavia Tesla and now you wait on the gates of Bermuda.

The war council was hastily organised but was still coherent enough to get a plan . Orbital bombardment of Havanah was commenced and succeeded in reducing it to scrap metal .and ruin, though some unusual structures proved sturdy enough to survive . His forces on the ground fared little better as any that weren’t concealed were decimated.

The entirety of air forces of Atlantis were launched for this war. Avengers and Thunderbolts were launched to harass enemy forces , perform reconnaissance and attempt to achieve orbital superiority while the few marauders on the planet were sent to obliterate enemy formations .

Unfortunately it seems Deotor had anticipated this and most of your air forces were blown out of the sky by his more advanced anti air defences and in some cases by some sort of invincible aircraft. It was a total massacre ; what few of your planes returned were heavily damaged effectively taking you out of the battle.

You curse at this defeat but keep calm. Reinforcments from the other cities should arrive as soon as the troop transports touch down , in the meantime at least your Ground forces seem to be doing much better than the ariel ones . Your Rough riders and Mechanised PDF have managed to to inflict devastating casualties on enemy forces and heavily slowed them down, giving you valuable time to fortify . As per your order they have scouted the necron ruins in the area and fortunately no enemy forces were found near it

Furthermore it seems the wildlife is aiding you as Thorner Dragons are observed in heavy concentrations attacking enemy forces bringing their devastating electrical powers to bear . They prove to be quite the nuisance elimnating entire enemy formations and bringing down many of those pesky phanom fighters.

Meanwhile you are here coordinating the fortification and defence of the city. Every able bodied human was either given a weapon or made to work on barricading the place. You hope to repeat the same strategy with Orica. Not to mention you break out all the weapons in your vaults from RAD and plasma weapons to even the few precious Volkitee armaments. You have instructed the other cities to do the same , and you hope they will listen . If all goes wrong however you have an escape method and nuclear weapons ready to prevent Bermuda from falling to enemy hands should the worse come to the pass

As your forces finish fortifying the Phlygians , Skittari and light infantry you sent to hold off the enemy return. They report they managed to hold their own and retreat in good order but weren’t able to inflict much damage .

They also bring a surprise. Apparently they were aided by a cabal of extremely powerful psykers who had saved multiple regiments at critical hours . The leader of the Cabal has arrived and he introduces himself as Marwyn. Though Talios is weary of him, you are not about to waste free help at this critical hour.

## An Unlikely Ally

You order your orbital assets to continue bombardment on any and all enemy facilities detected . Bombardment was a success and most of Deotor’s infrastructure (that you know off ) has been reduced to rubble and ash, this includes most of his airfields.

Infrastructure wasn’t the only thing target as you made sure to target any major ground forces as well which went amazingly well as enemy forces tended to cluster together in tight matching formation making them tempting targets and allowed to butcher scores of them.

To further cement this reversal was the Elysian drop troops deciding to join the fight. Though they have managed to sow confusion behind enemy lines it seems that Atlantis’s ecology proved quite unforgiving to these soldiers preventing them from being effective as they usually would be.

Unfortunately however reinforcements are slow to arrive as the troop transports are facing a new massive Ariel creature while forces from other cities face difficulties with the marine life.

Your submarines have attempted to supplement the bombings from orbit but weren’t able to inflict much damage. Fortunately the dragon cultists were also unable to damage the subs

You send orders for the remaining viable aircraft to once again take flight to further disorient the enemy . This time , knowing what to expect , your surviving Air Force has taken revenge for the previous massacre ; they have caused mayhem and carnage on Deotor’s ground troops and have even managed (with some help from Thorner Dragons ) to bring down some of the sinister phantom planes.

Despite all this you know this conflict will not end until that insane heretic Deotor is a rotting corpse , maybe you could have it stuffed and mounted in your office. But for now he and the main army groups with him have proven elusive, whenever sensors came close to locking on to his life signals they would be jammed somehow preventing him from being targeted leaving him free to head directly to Bermuda.

You have requested Marywn and his coven attempt to divine Deotor’s plans or at least his current location. This proved to be much more difficult for them than expected. Something seems to be shrouding him from them

Unfortunately it seems that you didn’t need divination as your scouts report massive scores of Deotor’s forces nearing Bermuda at a rapid rate. To slow him down as your forces prepare, Marywn and his acolytes attempt to rile up the Atlantean Wildlife to harass the dragon cultists. This time they were successful, significantly slowing their advance.

Before you can send out your forces however , Deotor and his dragon forces appear suddenly near your gates in a flash of baleful green energy, no doubt yet another trick he reverse engineered .

You stand now at the gates of your capital city as heretic forces close in . You appear before your troops in your new upgraded form inspiring awe in them . Giving a grand speech inspiring the men to hold their ground and tell them of how even with their supposed technological superiority the enemy has crumbled many times before the warriors of the omnissiah. You have little talent for theatrics but the men seem content.

Their morale is tested when the first of Deotor’s forces arrive. Rather than the silent silver soliders you were expecting you are greeted with a sight that arouses fear in your mechanical heart. Millions upon millions of humans , all implanted with what appears to be mind control devices.

Totally aware as their bodies move against their will charge their fellow humans they scream and screech at their fate and beg for release. However they are unarmed and uncoordinated and prove easy prey to the cold and uncaring skitarii hosts on whom such psychological tactics do not have any effect and they put these poor souls out of their misery . However your normal human forces appear to be shaken but they hold.

This was obviously a shock tactics, sending dread inspiring but ultimately cheap cannon fodder to lower the enemy’s resolve . You have to admit it’s a sound albeit disgusting tactics.

After this it isn’t long before Deotor himself appears at the head of a truly massive force of elite cultists . His sound is broadcast all throughout the battlefield as he once again rattles on how resistance to the “true” omnissah is useless and he even “generously” offers you one last chance of surrendering. He is interrupted by an all too familiar scream ; The Oricas arrive . The xenos seem to be affected by Marwyn’s actions as a massive hoard attacks Deotor’s rear and manages to flank him from the right.

Their alphas’ psychic abilities prove quite effective against Deotor’s abominations and the Titans seem quite adept at smashing through their formations

You are amazed at the sight of your two enemies on this planet destroying each other. It seems that the omnissah truly is on your side today. Then you can’t help but notice these Oricas are much more well equipped and organised than last time and will become even more so as you see them loot enemy corpses.

Nevertheless capitalising on the chance you send your Skittari, mechanised, rough rider and armoured regiments to charge into the fray and fully encircle Deotor in a death grip. You are careful to have them maneuver in such a way that they avoid being near the Oricas as to not risk having them fight you as well.

The Charge while not successful as you hoped it would is still enough to entrap the dragon cultists allowing you and the Oricas to whittle them down.

You watch the glorious melee and how the heretics are cut down and brutalised like the curs they are . You then notice a familiar “face” among the Orica ; the horde leader from the previous battle . Scars from his injuries glow in an unusual platinum warpfire and it seems to have gotten much larger than last time. And much more dangerous as well .

The leader as if guided somehow cuts his way to Deotor whom he obliterates in a devastating show of psychic pyrokinesis . Deotor’s pitful screams echo as the silver metal coating him melts right off him before his flesh and bones are burned to a crisp leaving only a pile of ashes.

After the relatively anticlimactic of Deotor his force’s cohesion breaks down completely as his body unleashes a green wave that seems to disable his forces or drive them into a frenzy . As the last screaming cultist is crushed by a titan , a gaping silence reigns on the field as the victorious sides look at each other in anticipation.

The Orica leader somehow knows where you are and stares right at you and you stare right back. After a full minute that seemed like an hour , the creature does a mock bow and the Oricas rapidly retreat back from whence they had come. You consider attacking them but decide it won’t be effective.

Deotor is slain and the battle is won .

## Aftermath

The battle is over and now it’s time to count the cost. Your ground forces came out of this much better than you expected in stark contrast to your air forces , though the same could not be said about the Elysians.

Casualties are a certainty of war but at least they weren’t devastating. On the plus side you are now finally free to take your rightful place as Fabricator General . With this rebellion as a pretext you order many potential traitors to be arrested and either executed or interrogated .

The fact that these suspects more often than not tended to be those who previously voiced suspicion and/or disdain about your methods or were the most staunchly conservative in the hierarchy was a simple coincidence . You can’t help but inwardly feel amused at the irony of you playing the dutiful imperial preventing potential uprisings .

In addition you have sent salvage teams to retrieve any intact technologies and wrecks left by the defeated forces of the dragon cultists. Ostensibly for proper disposal but in reality you are not about to waste such valuable resources. Well Selica always wanted to experiment on necron technology .

The teams are greatly successful in this endeavour and managed to recover much of the technology in good shape for research and reverse engineering.

Even more astonishing is the tale of Cermese "Viper" Vandopher and that of the psyker Misra who together not only managed to survive the Atlantean Wilderness and the dragon forces for days but also captured and returned with an intact phantom plane . Already they are hailed as heroes (and the few who were outraged by them using xeno tech were quickly silenced one way or another).

In the midst of all this , news arrive from the other cities. It seems that after Deotor’s death , his forces fell in complete disarray and were easily slaughtered in most cases . However it seems that the battle in Johnam had become so desperate that Valid had start outright equipping his forces with Tau Plasma rifles although he keeps the pretence that they are Dark Age technology.

The Nix islands fared better and Therea fared much better, their harsh environments making their battles much more lopsided against their enemies.

As all these reports and more reach you, you feel stressed by the workload yet rejuvenated by your success; you can feel it with every fiber of your being.

A new age begins.