Hive Fleet Orthrus

### **Notable Foes**

Ultramarines, Iron Warriors, Xerxekh Dynasty, Zerexal (Forge World), Rampart Boars

### **Known Infestations**

Cemolodon, the Dareel Asteroid Cluster, Ghrido IV

### **Identification Marks**

Dorsal spines are often reversed from their typical configuration on the back

**Hive Fleet Orthrus** is a medium-sized Tyranid Hive Fleet which has arrived in the galaxy shortly after the start of the Second Tyrannic War in the eastern portion of the Imperium Nihilus. Little is known of the true origins of the Hive Fleet but it is presumed that they do not form as a splinter fleet of any of the major hive fleets being faced by the Imperium. The fleet has a distinct preference for hunting down areas of technological importance to their enemies such as forge worlds.

## History

It is difficult to say where Hive Fleet Orthrus came from or how they may have developed. What is known is that their main fleet arrived in three waves above, below and galactic true east of the Hive World Cemolodon's greater system, and swiftly chewed through the system's guard regiments and other defenses. Ultimately, a large force of Skitarii units in the service of Magos Biologis Xendrid Marne was able to evacuate much of the world's population with the help of Astra Militarum reinforcement ships, in order that Marne could study the Hive Fleet's behavior without military intervention. Interestingly, he discovered a number of strange characteristics about this fleet over other Tyranids.

He noticed that while the fleet was new to the galaxy, a Genestealer Cult appeared to be relatively well established and had not only ascended but gathered ships and fled the planet. It is known to be the case that pure strain Genestealers is repeatedly noted as displaying an instinct to leave a world that the fleet will devour. However, almost never does this extend to the previous hybrid generations. It was also the case that they did not devour the entirety of the planet and instead primarily devoured its life forms and razed its surface, but left small animals and moss-like plants untouched. it was as if it were taking only enough to grow itself a set proportion above what it invaded the planet with and to travel to another and left the planet to grow life anew. The Hive Fleet was not devouring raw materials like the carbon of the crust to convert into biomass, it found it more efficient to let the world's organisms convert its materials into organic compounds and process those more complex materials.

Tyranid Hive Fleets devour planets, hunting mankind and gathering the resources of its worlds. Orthrus was not hunter-gathering, it was farming, on a planetary scale, knowing that with man gone a new species would spring anew to tap the planet's material, and they could harvest them a second time all the same without leaving the galaxy until its resources dried up. This would mean the Hive would be less immediately dangerous to largely underground societies like underhives and heavily mined planetary cores, but it would also mean that Orthrus would move somewhat quicker than other Hive Fleets, albeit spread thinner than say Kraken or Gorgon.

Cemolodon and other systems near it like the Ghrido system were evacuated and remain uninhabited since the arrival of the fleet in an area called the "Gate of Orthrus" a series of systems which Orthrus is, has or is anticipated to feed on. A ring of planets around this Gate of Orthrus have been destroyed by the Inquisition via Exterminatus upon the counsel of the Adeptus Mechanicus in order to slow the fleet's spread.

## Variants and Biomorphs

Hive Fleet Orthrus has a high propensity for the use of aerial attacks from large numbers of small enemies. For this reason, gargoyles armed with fleshborers are the primary unit of the fleet. The fleet also uses heavy close combat units for larger vehicle threats and infrastructure destruction, with a highly acidic blooded variant of the tusked Stone-Crusher Carnifex being it's primary Carnifex unit armed with wrecker claws.