Alpha Legion - The Harrowing: Unlike the other Legiones Astartes in which could be discerned patterns of Terran culture and the ethnic origins of their intake of recruitment, the Alpha Legion and their primarch were to all intents and purposes, one and the same. Their hallmarks were unity, power and the confusion that outsiders encountered in dealing with them.Right from the very beginning, even the Imperialis Logistica could not confirm even the most basic details of the Legion with any certainty, be it their Legion's preliminary spheres of recruitment, its livery or anything remotely approaching a true gauge of its operating strength. It was a Legion seemingly sprung whole in its entirety, as if from nowhere, complete with tens of thousands of fully-equipped Legionaries and a capable war fleet that operated with veteran skill.Even the name under which it operated seemed in doubt, for while the name of "Alpha Legion" gained common currency, official battle reports saw it operating under self-given titles such as the "Unbroken Chain" or more sinister appellations such as "The Harrowing", as it called itself in the xenocidal campaigns of the Perfidian Gap Extermination.Likewise, many accounts occur of individual members of the XXth Legion referring to themselves to outsiders by the name of "Alpharius" or simply as "One of Many", often infuriating and confounding the forces they served alongside. Whether this policy of anonymity was the result of the unusual focus the Legion placed on unity and solidarity in its ranks, or mere outright addiction to secrecy or a deliberate attempt to mask its numbers is unknown.Other contrary accounts exist which belie this practice, however. Multiple sources of evidence exist of names originating in ancient long-thought lost dialects being used by the XXth Legion both in communication and as personal cognomen for its members. Further, on at least one occasion, analysis of after-action reports involving a battalion of the Alpha Legion (in this case serving alongside the Klarkash Imperialis Auxillia regiment against the Khrave at Memlock), the names and code words used by its Legionaries were later found to exactly correlate to the population of a recidivist human world the Alpha Legion itself had previously exterminated.The reason for this falsehood or the function this macabre practice served remains unknown. Such attitudes of deception -- in their broadest sense at least -- appear to have been tacitly accepted and tolerated by the Emperor and later by Horus as the Imperial Warmaster, though to what true ends remains unclear. In battle the Alpha Legion proved itself capable of wielding a devastating mixture of subtlety and overwhelming force, revelling in both meticulous planning and the exercising of imaginative cruelty in war.Quickly, the Alpha Legion developed an unmatched reputation among the Legiones Astartes -- save perhaps by the Raven Guard -- for the use of espionage, infiltration and sabotage in its strategic planning. But where the Raven Guard sought to use such tactics to achieve victory without unnecessary attrition, or spare a human population it sought to liberate, the Alpha Legion had other, darker, purposes in mind.To them, such covert tactics seemed almost a deadly game of prelude. Where it could, the Alpha Legion would spread confusion and disorder seemingly for its own sake as well as any tactical gain it conferred, or even perhaps for the bloody spectacle of it. They maimed and bled the foe, forced them to chase phantoms and turn on each other in panic before they struck.Such tactics often brought the Alpha Legion's target to an agonised fever pitch while simultaneously robbing them of their real strength and forcing them into such vulnerable configurations as the Alpha Legion wished. Then would come the kill. Often this final attack, or "Harrowing," would be in the form of an assault from a hundred directions at once, a blizzard of different tactics and attack plans used against a foe either utterly unaware of the true danger or already brought to the brink of chaos.The result was almost inevitable catastrophe for the Alpha Legion's victims, as the full might of the XXth Legion would then descend at the point of their enemy's greatest weakness, and what would follow would be, to the onlooker, more akin to murder than battle. To their allies, the Alpha Legion represented a shifting, protean entity of uncertain identity and active deceit, coupled with undeniable military strength, unknowable goals -- and to some observers -- unproven loyalty -- a dangerous combination and one that did not breed trust.To their enemies they were a true nightmare; a foe that could strike from any direction, a foe that seemed to thwart any stratagem and strike at weakness no matter how well hidden. The Alpha Legion was a foe that knew neither mercy, nor honour, nor quarter, and always seemed to delight in destruction for its own sake, and the chaos and anarchy it could inspire before the death blow.Although its history as an active Legion is a short one compared to many -- at least under its own name -- it proved quickly determined to match any of its brethren in glory -- or perhaps more accurately prove itself superior to them -- and its tally of victories mounted with surpassing speed. The Alpha Legion, ever watchful, was far from adverse from studying the strengths of their fellow Legions, and their weaknesses, and adapting the weapons and tactics of the other Legiones Astartes to their own ends.In this the Legion was not so different in strategic observances as the Ultramarines Legion and their master Roboute Guilliman, although it is doubtful that the Lord of Ultramar would have cared much for the comparison, even before the two Legions later came to bitter bloodshed. Such zealousness to prove themselves as part of the Great Crusade at any cost, and the often over-elaborate and needlessly complex and malign way in which the Alpha Legion chose to wage war, saw them quickly gain infamy more than fame.This, coupled with growing distrust due to their insular and deceptive nature, brought rivalry and acrimony between the Alpha Legion and much of the rest of the Legiones Astartes. As time passed, the relationship between the Alpha Legion and its peers soured further. The nature of the Alpha Legion's way of war and their lack of alliance to the commands of other Legions placed over them in the field brought Alpharius and his brothers Guilliman of the Ultramarines and Mortarion of the Death Guard into conflict on several separate occasions, with incidents notably occurring both in the aftermath of the Ullanor Crusade and the later Vasalius Uprisings.More pointedly Rogal Dorn of the Imperial Fists quickly grew to see the entire Alpha Legion as an "...honourless assassin, not fit to bear the Emperor's mark," and only the direst intervention of the Emperor Himself forestalled blood being spilt between the higher-ranking officers of the two Legions in an affair of honour after the fall of the Fortress of Jakalla during the Avalorn Compliance.Beyond these more famous incidents, Konrad Curze of the Night Lords is recorded in the secret transcripts of the Legio Custodes to have openly condemned the XXth Legion as "hiding their true sins in a shroud of lies", while the evidence also seems to suggest that the Alpha Legion were discreetly shunned and avoided by the Thousand Sons Legion where possible, although no cause for this discord has ever come to light.Conversely, if the Alpha Legion could be said to have had an ally or friend among the primarchs, it was Horus himself, and a potent ally he would prove. Horus saw the XXth Legion as a unique weapon in the Imperium's arsenal, its ambition laudable and its tactics not so very far removed from those favoured by his own XVIth Legion.Furthermore, the XXth Legion is also known (perhaps surprisingly) to have successfully campaigned beside both the Dark Angels and the Iron Hands without incident on multiple occasions before the outbreak of the war of the Horus Heresy, and also displayed a talent for successfully formulating battle plans which incorporated non-Legiones Astartes forces in its campaigns with great effect, although spending the power and lives of those who served alongside the Legion with coldly calculated efficiency.Standing also in favour of the Alpha Legion was an enviable record of success in military terms, particularly in forcing the Imperial Compliance of recalcitrant human colonies, and exposing and rooting out rebellion and treachery on recently Compliant worlds. It had also developed a reputation for hunting down and exterminating Warp-capable raiding forces, nomadic xenos threats and human Renegades, at which it had also proven remarkably successful.After his ascension to the rank of Imperial Warmaster, where he gained control over the outward campaigns of the Great Crusade, Horus increasingly gave free reign to the Alpha Legion to operate independently of other Legiones Astartes forces. The Alpha Legion during this time noticeably and swiftly expanded in size, creating the core of several Expeditionary Fleets and splitting to form scores of independent deep-range raiding forces, often operating alongside Rogue Traders and reaching into the unknown void well beyond the Great Crusade's frontlines.In the final years before the outbreak of the Horus Heresy, there is fragmentary evidence to indicate that even Horus was beginning to doubt his grip on the Alpha Legion, and doubt also the veracity of his own knowledge about the XXth Legion, its goals and who it truly served. Secret reports prepared for both the Warmaster and the Imperial Court on Terra during this period show a growing unease about the Alpha Legion, some implying that it was increasingly beyond the Imperium's ability to measure or to control.Furthermore, that perhaps some obsession or madness was taking hold of the Legion's psyche in the way it operated and made war. It has been suggested that the Alpha Legion had begun to seek out battles to fight for the challenge they offered, rather than to suit the needs of the Great Crusade, orchestrating ever more apocalyptic displays of their arcane and malevolent methods of war, even when mere conventional assault would have proved more efficient and expedient.The most notorious example of this took place on the world of Tesstra Prime, where the Alpha Legion, instead of taking the opportunity to capture the planetary capital city and thus force the world's surrender, allowed the enemy to dig in and defend it so that they could then expertly take the defending forces apart in a number of different ways. After a solar week of suffering seemingly random mishaps and deadly sabotage as well as brutal ambushes, the defenders were forced to capitulate, having taken 90% casualties.When asked why the XXth Legion had not taken the simpler strategy, Alpharius is reported to have replied that they avoided it as "...it would have been too easy." This campaign brought Alpharius censure from almost all of his brother primarchs; Guilliman in particular raged at Alpharius' conduct of the war, labeling the drawn-out operation as a "...mere exercise in cruelty and the wasting of the Great Crusade's time and resources" in a formal protest to the Warmaster. The Alpha Legion would not serve again directly alongside the Ultramarines in the Great Crusade.In time the accusations had started to become such common currency among the Terran Court and many Imperial commanders that the Alpha Legion had now become seemingly addicted to bringing low civilisations by anarchy, fire and blood that might have been brought into Imperial Compliance readily through negotiation or a limited display of force, rather than be turned into strife-torn ruins as a test of the Alpha Legion's skills.Worse, it was alleged that this need to orchestrate the elaborate destruction of their foes was no mere affection but a pathological flaw, and one that was only worsening as the Great Crusade progressed. Such accusations the Warmaster pointedly dismissed. As the time of the Horus Heresy drew closer, the Alpha Legion, as if in response to the growing cloud of suspicion and distrust of them in some quarters, drew further into the outer darkness at the fringes of known space, or at least appeared to.Their deceptions multiplied, as too, it appears, did the names that the XXth Legion and its agents were known under, particularly in the dark stars beyond the Imperium's borders, where many of those it came into contact with had no idea of their destroyer's true nature or allegiance until it was too late.