Taskforce Onyx History Act Three

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+++CLEARANCE: Cobalt+++

+++DATE: Error: [Warp Transit]+++

+++RED NN. 468673-5+++

+++BY: Lord Inquisitor Sangfroid, Baine Amihan+++

+++SUBJECT: Renegade Warband, Astartes, Threat Uncertain+++

<ACCESS GRANTED>

"*Extracts taken from the diaries of Lord Commander Daniel: 'Triumphs and Failures in the unveiled Ghoul Stars.'*"
—We're away from interpreting official records now. Very odious writings, heavily abridged: Comment, Arachus.

## Massillium Xenocides

### **Location**

Massillium, Ultima Segmentum Galactic North, ‘The Ghoul Stars’.

### **Result**

Extinction of Xenos opposition

"*A second chance is an indulgence of those in power, from Gods within their fiefdoms. There are no Gods here, only the echoes of their voices, there are no second chances. Just the inevitable descent.*"
—Ascribed to Remembrancer Genevisuse Pye
# Act 3 (937-955.M30)

## Arrival

"***Systems restored**
**Attempting to retrieve recordings**
**System error**
**Systems restored**
**Recording active**
Praetor Xenaphi: ‘and keep our signature low.’
High Admiral Crult: ‘Ariand, do you know where we are yet?’
Master of the compass: ‘Yes, but it's arbitrary. We're off course to our destination, astronomically significant, we’ll need to renter the warp Lord.’
High Admiral Crult: ‘Pox ridden Bastard.’
Praetor Xenaphi: **Unclear, unknown language** ‘Give us a destination for the rest of the fleet. In the Empyrean or in realspace, they must be somewhere.*"
—Auspex Fragment, Anabasis Bridge.
For 89 years, from the perspective of realspace, the Expedition had been lost to the warp and drifted. When they did finally arrive they were scattered across space and time; The first ships arriving years before the rest. Xenaphi and the Anabasis was one of these first vessels to arrive, and quickly set about to stabilise the situation. Initially using their Astropaths to identify wayward vessels scattered to other systems and swiftly regroup.

## Dominion Beta Xenocide (943.M30-947.M30)

Their fleet had emerged into the heart of an entire Dominion, comprised of four Sub Dominions of similar size and power as the three they had already vanquished. Initially the Expedition had no indication that the rest of the fleet would ever join them, they feared the worst; That tragedy had struck them again but now many thousands of their number were lost to the cruel nature of the warp. Xenaphi decided that they would conduct the campaign in that mindset, his forces were scattered across an entirely alien Dominion, and only numbered a few thousand Astartes at their core. They conducted hundreds of raiding operations, immediately, and managed to catch the Kythros Dominions by surprise. The Xenos again seemed to be unprepared for this invasion, losing some resources at anchorage but were quick to respond as war fleets arrived. The Taskforce took to the frontier space between star systems, embracing a guerilla campaign. While the Kythros Dominion could travel instantaneously between their star systems, it seemed to be most irregular, restricted to temporary formations of warp corridors. While the Expedition eventually identified that it was related to the Voi’Fa Vies’Tang there was no additional strategy to be made from this; Their hit and run approach was already the ideal counter. The Kythros Dominions for their part had difficulty tracking the Expedition's warp jumps, sometimes they responded quickly, sometimes they did not. By trial and error the Expedition was able to repeatedly strike at vulnerable star systems and destabilise the Sub-Dominion. As the years dragged on the Expeditions forces continued to arrive and in greater and greater numbers until finally the full force was present and ready to commit the xenocide proper. The Sub-Dominions were divided up and engaged simultaneously by numerous autonomous groups, a strategy that would eventually become the Tasforce’s favourite.

## Dominion Gamma & Delta Xenocide 949.M30 - 953.M30

With the past Xenocide completed the Taskforce at last had breathing room. To their rear, between them and Sardularis, was the likely capital Dominion of the Kythros and was still unassailable through the warp. Their scouting parties, now stronger than ever, had identified the next targets. Not just one further Dominion waited for them, there were two. Colony creation and fortified backlines were already underway to both secure against an attack from the Capital but if either Dominion also attacked them they would not endure. Thus the Taskforce would attempt to attack them simultaneously. They were considerably smaller targets than the last, but it would delay the conquests.

### Dominion Gamma

The Xenocide committed against Dominion Gamma was considered the 'Redemption of Haniel'. Lord Commander Haniel had led the 1st Legion thus far, despite his failure against the Aeldari he remained a highly experienced Lord Commander and one valued highly enough to lead nearly half the expedition in this endeavour. In the typical fashion of the 1st legion he led the combined force in a series of campaigns that saw complete destruction and scouring of the xenos. The severity of the xenos destruction forced them to enact a scorched earth policy that saw them withdraw entirely to more easy fortified reserves.

#### Skirmish against the Perpetrularis

Numerous Dominion blockades hampered the desired swift conquest, the Taskforce attachment under command of the Lord Commander Haniel attempted to rally into distant void space to secure a flank and pincer the Dominion. As they gathered in the void space they detected faint anomalies of relativistic energies just before a leviathan void ship arrived. This monstrosity, later named a mothership, dwarfed any of the assembled vessels and disgorged hundreds of dropships that made a direct line to board the Imperial vessels. The mothership also fired these same dropships at hypervelocity towards them. These unknown xenos relied upon no advanced technology, just vast size and numbers to absorb and trivialise the Imperial's own firepower. For a time the Lord Commander held off the idea of retreat, determined to crush this new threat. But the casualties began to mount. Ships were left to list as huge rents and holes were torn through them, the smaller escorts outright destroyed. The survivors faced down borders, automatons that swarmed the crew with a slow determined pace, simply beating them to death and ripping the machineworks apart with their powered frames and short range fusion beams; Summoning more to them with constructed gates that folded space. Haniel did call the retreat, but their losses were severe and the mothership was not significantly damaged.

#### Limping on

Having suffered catastrophic losses the taskforce returned to the Dominion with a cautious pace and at a disadvantage. The sledgehammer was forced to refine and slowly it achieved its mission.

### Dominion Delta

The other division of the taskforce would be led by Praetor Clearchus, this campaign would be considered his own redemption, though it would be supervised by Vikolaus. The ultramarine saw the duty done with little flair or nuance, but with great efficiency.

## Colonisation

As Dominion Alpha had become Sardularis, Dominion Beta would become Massillium. Xenaphi wished to oversee their colonisation personally, with his own company present to continue eradication of persistent Astakara populations. Fear that the Dominion would strike into this territory cast a shadow over their efforts and Xenaphi orchestrated judicious fortification of ground and naval assets; Nearly all of it was designed to be concealable or equipped with rudimentary cloaking technology. Ideally Dominion forces would pass through but every world would be well equipped to deeply wound their invaders. Xenaphi ordered that powerful weapons be secreted amongst the bunkers, units of the Ordo Dominius employed sleeper units of their powerful Thallax warriors and servitor armies. The populations would for the immediate future control their expansion to small nomadic settlements that could be withdrawn at a moment's notice.

## Campaign against the Perpetrularis (953.M30 - 955.M30)

With control of the Sub Dominions in their grasp the question of their next objective hung in the balance. The scouts were once again out into the far reaches of space to survey the surrounding stars. Other sub dominions of the Kythros likely existed and would be destroyed if found. In the meantime the question of the Xenos threat, named the Perpetrularis, had to be addressed. They were a threat extremis, indeed they could be a threat beyond the Expedition entirely but many of the seasoned commanders argued for an immediate Xenocide to be readied against them. Having seen how Lord Commander Haniel had fared against them, Xenaphi was against such an expedition. Indeed the aforementioned Uncrowned Prince, despite having his pride severely wounded, denounced any such action as fool hardy; From his charges, especially the 1st Legion, he was denounced as a coward for this. Xenaphi assembled the council to vote and was widely outnumbered against caution. Risking his own respected command the Praetor did not overrule the collected decision and began preparations. It was hoped that the substantial fleet, and in particular the Anabasis, would make the difference. The Expedition's navy adapted their existing doctrine in anticipation for battle, integrating an emphasis on countermeasures and decoys against the heavy fire. The greatest change however was widespread adoption of Disruption Macrocannons; Where it was hoped that their enemy could be disabled if not outright destroyed.

### Opening Battles

The terms of engagement had not improved much, the mothership was still a gargantuan target and the combination of relativistic projectiles and swarm boarding tactics still lead to heavy Imperial casualties. Though now the xenos ships were often left listing in the void. The Anabasis was indeed able to savage the thick armour of their Motherships, who would summon macroscale portals to withdraw into.

### The Long Journey

The Perpetrularis were not an isolated threat, they were unending. The scouts found their motherships tailing their expeditions, the Taskforce itself was assailed at every exit of the warp, and with each mothership routed at cost another followed. The thought that the unending attacks must surely eventually end, or that homeworlds would be met drove them on. In the meantime their casualties mounted.

### The Foundry Battle

Success was found by a daring team of Voidsmen-at-arms that secured entry to one of the transport's portals, and found themselves aboard the proximate mothership. It was already theorised that the motherships could be coming from a single place of origin. The Expedition planned to deliver a strikeforce led by the Anabasis through the Perpetrularis' macro portal, and achieved it. The 1st battle of the Foundry is recognised by the Taskforce's internal records as the single greatest achievement of a single crew.

As they exited the portal the Anabasis was still faced with a wounded but deadly mothership, but achieved the first kill of these ships in the opening minutes in collaboration with their destroyer squad. Two further motherships awaited to intercept them and beyond them was a vessel that made the motherships appear as mere transports of it. The vessel swallowed asteroids as a whaleshark passing through krill and was harvesting a star system of its debris field. This vessel was named the Foundry, and it birthed Motherships and transports alike.

The Anabasis would not survive an outright battle but committed to a passing raid, they crippled one approaching mothership and blew past the other guarded by the first's wreckage. As they reached the foundry they blew a hole in its armour and deployed their Chapter, Xenaphi and Vikolaus recklessly joining them in this initial assault. Their fleet would pass by and slingshot around the star, giving them a few days aboard the vessel and time to repair.

Within the vessel the chapter and a contingent of the Imperial Army fought a battle for survival as endless tides of automatons swarmed them. Still they fought through and were able to access the xenos equivalent of noosphere technology and map the vessel. A theoretical sabotage and destruction of the vessel could be achieved but not with their current force and explosive charges. They detonated their charges and sabotaged one of the engines before returning to their exit site to meet the returning Anabasis. A tenth of the surviving force was stranded, including Vikolaus, as the Anabasis and its surviving destroyer escort took to the warp.

The 2nd battle of the Foundry was far more mundane, nearly a week later the Expedition arrived to end the Foundry, facing a fleet of motherships down. Despite having suffered heavy casualties in their expedition thus far they were determined and experienced, but most of all they had the advantage of the asteroid field that the Xenos harvested, to cover their advance. Multiple chapters boarded the Foundry and delivered unique charges created by the Akotaine to render the ship destroyed in every possible definition. Vikolaus and a handful of survivors were extracted and the remaining Motherships were destroyed.

A map had been extracted from the foundry that showed a total of twenty six Foundry vessels existed in an array around a home system. They were merely a security system to slow down invaders, self-sustaining and completely automated. The Expedition's triumph was to break through a mere fraction of this unknown alien's security. Questions of how advanced and powerful such a race was would soon be answered, though the question of what dangers such a security screen had felt warranted against would never be answered.

### The Perpetrularis

There were no relativistic signals to foreshadow their arrival, space simply folded on itself and from it arrived a small fleet of warships. Their vessels were small, and radically different from the brutalist structures of the automatons, bearing curved shapes. Tendril-like apertures pulled the vessels across the void by unfathomable means and vivid holographic mimics hid the cloaking vessels as they approached combat range. Beams of supercharged particles and gravitation wave attacks devastated the Imperial vessels who desperately fought back against the fast moving vessels. Ships fell quickly and the Expedition was vastly outclassed; They retreated to the warp immediately.

The campaign against the Perpetrularis saw greater casualties to the Taskforce that the previous two xenocides combined, a third of their fleet was wrecked and Astartes losses mounted in the thousands. Its failure was nearly total.

## Departure

Thankfully this xenos threat was content to allow the Imperial forces to retreat. It is believed that their fleet could have been heavily damaged at the time although it was difficult to identify; Mass ejection of fluids was detected at various intervals of the brief battle. It was assumed that the xenos species was aquatic based and these were atmospheric breeches after impacts. Ultimately these retroactive analysis to save the taskforce's pride achieved little, moral was at an all time low.

Survey teams returned to their operations and in the meantime the taskforce was restructured. Fresh inductee forces were brought in that the colonies had been raising, and changes were brought in as well that had been desired by Xenaphi in the past and now were of greater importance. The official formation of cross legion Orders and Brotherhoods that encouraged collaboration between various specialisms that existed within each one, was one such change. Inductee formations were rotated through the commands to learn from each's core of veterans.

As the end of these reforms came the latest reports of the survey teams. There were still no further sub dominions found but a cluster of star systems that included human settlements were identified.

## Significant Events

### Xenocide Beta

#### The First Hero Dies

Crult Alypsar, the High Admiral and defacto leader of Expedition in the void, conducted the Xenocide of the Beta Dominion to his last breath, a year short of its conclusion. Bedridden and wasting away from a genetic plague, consequences of repetitive rejuve treatments, he was still barking orders as his heart gave out. The man coordinated over two dozen concurrent warzones that saw the Dominions own military divided and selectively annihilated, the Imperials own critical advantage stemming from excellent intelligence gatherings; Most notably from their Pale Nomad attachments, and a newly discovered ally. Many heroes would fall during the Expeditions campaigns, and Crult Alypsar was most notably the first and perhaps greatest. The final year of the campaign was already concluded, and gave the Expedition a safe period to adjust to the vacuum left by the giant.

#### New Allies

The Star Hunters had always conducted themselves as a clandestine Force Reconnaissance, to sabotage and raid ahead of their brethren legions. Unnoticed, fiercely independent and martyrs to their solitude. An entire chapter had assigned themselves to the 99th Expedition and had operated throughout the first Xenocide seemingly invisible to both sides. However the Raven Guard attachment had drawn close to confronting these mysterious allies. During the 2nd Xenocide they achieved this, and forced the Star Hunters into a conference. While the 99th Expedition had drifted for decades, the Star Hunters had travelled before the Anomaly had formed, for 89 years they had conducted their operations alone, mirroring the scouting parties of the Expedition, though refusing to link with them. They had expanded their ranks, but also become perilously low on resources. Their units on starvation rations, ammunition scarce, but still doggedly fighting alone and pushing their forces beyond reason. The Expeditions scouting parties had all been reinforced and resupplied, gratefully giving their caches of freshly forged Astartes to replenish the frontlines losses in return. While the Raven Guard were unable to immediately coerce a reciprocal action with the Star Hunters, they were able to pin the Astartes down until Xenaphi arrived. The Praetor, and the authority of Vikolaus in the stead of the Emperor, made the Star Hunters join the Expedition. Nearly half of their forces were redistributed across the Expedition, their intelligence was assimilated but they were resupplied excessively. Since their guerilla campaign Xenaphi prized these small autonomous divisions, these Star Hunters seemed to him to be a heaven sent gift. They were allowed greater autonomy to respect their reluctance to join at all.

With the Star Hunters corralled, the already growing intelligence gathering and raiding strategies of the Expedition was magnified. When asked to provide a companion for Xenaphi, they sent their oldest warrior, Yesukhei, a veteran of their depleted destroyer cadres, determined that only their best single warrior fought beside their new patron. Yesukhei was quickly valued for their incredible experience in asymmetrical hunting. Another critical development of these events was the genesis of research into new armaments for the Taskforce; In particular their recon forces. The Star Hunters had eventually settled to using just lasgun, las fusil and las cannon weaponry amongst their Astartes to combat their exhausted supplies. This pragmatism was an achievement in their utility as long ranged units and the Expedition's command, believing their isolation to well be permanent, began research into novel Astartes suitable personal las weapons. These would be the genesis of the Akotaine Astartes class Lasgun, Hellgun and Las Fusil that would eventually see use in the Expeditions later operations.

#### Prisoner

An all too brief but significant tangent of the Xenocide included a wing of the Expedition chasing the Kythros Dominions into an isolated star system. The system was a physical phenomena as the star spread itself out as a web throughout it. The fleet, to its surprise, was enveloped and assailed by the star who had already enveloped and devoured the Dominions vessels. The World Bearers were even quicker to send their own flagship, still free, into the heart of the star to trigger a warp jump and wound the creature; Enough to give their remaining fleet a window to escape. The nature of the creature remains unknown.

## Campaigns

### Xenocide Beta

#### Theliod

The Expedition encountered several new races during their Xenocide of this Sub Dominion and the greatest of them was the Theliod. Only the 1st Legion had encountered them before and were quick to boast of their danger but slow to share the details of their strategies; In their mind this was their duty and role to shoulder alone. For Xenaphi it was the latest insubordination of theirs and a further attempt to return to battlegroups completely divided by Legion.

The Theliod were not a threat to be overshadowed by politics. This colony was specifically of the Mikro subspecies, sustaining themselves on a tithe of mostly human sacrifice, they had numerous birthing colonies within hot gas giants. The Theliod were beings crafted with exotic celestial matter, powerful souls, tamed to suits of armour to spare the environment of their exotic matter and its volatile nature. If they did nothing else but die they condemned their surroundings to a wave of corrosive plasma. This same plasma could be projected onto their foes as an ultimate killing blow at direct expense of the beings life force. Moreover each being was primarily powerful as a psyker, through their warp bound souls, and their bodies could be transformed into rudimentary combat suits. Each being was a powerhouse, and indeed before the war reached their birthing colonies they joined the war as individuals attached to Serathene units.

Initial battles were not lost but quickly saw Astartes and Imperial Army casualties mount up. Engagements could not be made cleanly, and their powerful weapons scythed through the Astartes and tanks with ease. Judicious use of plasma weaponry, as recommended by the Angels of Death, was initially drawn up as their countermeasure but it proved ultimately that the Thousand Sons contingent was their greatest asset; Alongside the other Librarians and Seers, especially those of the Star Hunters, they learned to commit mind wars upon the Theliod and countered their psychic powers. The Silent Sisterhood were deployed sparingly to directly disable the Theliod - who had no realspace derived sentience, meaning their bodies would become useless in their presence.

The Theliod proved to be an extreme danger in the void; Their void ships matched or exceeded the Expedition's battleships. Worse however were the boarding parties, where the Theliod would deliberately overcharge their bodies with energy and release catastrophic explosions of corrosive plasma in acts of mutually assured destruction. When the hot gas giants were identified as birthing colonies they became a priority target, each attack turning into a flash conflict, each battle devastating. However when deployed in consistently large numbers the Expedition were able to trade more efficiently with the Theliod.

#### Astakara

Another xenos species encountered first in this Sub Dominion was a slave caste that inhabited many hollowed out asteroids and hollows built into each populated world. They were recyclers and producers of food and water, as well as a ready source of labour as a Eurosocial species. The creatures had an aversion to light, living in pitch black and cold warrens; Their warriors wearing full protective suits. They had light capturing technology they employed via a specialised subspecies. The Astakara were not an individual threat, they were endemic and were attrition. Every conquered world had to be purged of their presence or face ceaseless coordinated night raids. The Astakara were ten limbed (In two sets conjoined pentapod bodies), and breathed a toxic atmosphere comprised partially of Methanol compounds, radioactive particles and minimal oxygen.

#### Finistrinimiseifo

Another xenos species that came to be a common threat to the Expedition were the Finistrinimiseifo, ubiquitously shortened to scutters. Ranging from horse sized hordes of younglings to leviathan elders that rivalled the titans in size.

### Xenocide Delta

#### Tharios

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