Orphean War - The Minotaur and the Reaper: Having observed how the battle unfolded on his own holo-sphere, Asterion Moloc, the bleak Master of the Minotaurs, had drawn his own conclusions from the defeat of Battlefleet Orpheus. Grand Admiral Carew had tried to match the Necron fleet in terms of long-range bombardment, firepower and manoeuvrability and lost. Using the same tactical approach would likely see the Minotaurs defeated as well, therefore Moloc ordered his fleet to ready itself for a close range assault. As target, he designated the Dead Hand, for the Daeadalos Krata’s ancient Cogitators had discerned that it had been the Dead Hand that had left Amarah's orbit first and also opened fire upon the Imperial fleet, the tell-tale sign of a flagship. This therefore had to be the throneship of the enemy commander, an entity Moloc and his Minotaurs set out to destroy.The Minotaurs fleet adopted their Chapter's favoured attack position in the form of a bull's head. At the centre, the Daedalos Krata would form the bull's protected skull, with the Chapter's three Battle Barges forming its jaw and the eight Strike Cruisers its horns. The Minotaurs' fleet smashed into the heart of the battle, engines at full burn, but their guns remained silent until the last moment. Closing with the foe, the Minotaurs then unleashed hell from their Bombardment Cannons and plasma batteries, focusing their wrath on the Dead Hand, heedless of any stricken Imperial vessel caught in their path.Those Necron raiders that tried to interpose themselves between the Minotaurs and their target were mercilessly shredded as the fleet plunged headlong at the Dead Hand. Two Harvest Ships turned sharply to engage the attack formation, their strange weaponry forcing the Battle Barge Daughter of Tempests, once the pride of the Lamenters' fleet and taken as a spoil of war in the wake of the Badab War, to drop out of formation, its entire foresection disintegrating, the venerable warship gutted.The Dead Hand’s own guns retaliated, catching the Fidelitas Lambda on her portside and shattering it as well as destroying three Strike Cruisers of the left horn. Still, the Minotaurs pressed on, the Daedalos Krata still intact as at point-blank range it unleashed boarding torpedoes, Caestus Assault Rams and Thunderhawk gunships, every remaining ship concentrated on destroying the Dead Hand’s escorts or rupturing the great Tomb Ship's hull to let the boarders in.A dozen assault craft succeeded in making a coordinated landing and managed to penetrate inside the great Cairn-class Tomb Ship. Inside, the air was still, as if burdened by the weight of time but reeking with the odour of spilled blood, a true slaughterhouse. Black corridors, filled with strange, alien sepulchres made up the interior of the great pyramid atop the Tomb Ship, its interior walls and floors crawling with malevolent scarab engines that launched themselves at the Space Marines. These were soon joined by Necron Wraiths, their immaterial form phasing through the solid walls to repel the boarders, drawn to the Minotaurs like anti-bodies trying to fight back a virulent infection invading a living body.Implacable and unrelenting, the Minotaurs fought their way through these gathered opponents, bleeding for every step they took, every turn in the near-endless corridors revealing new, untiring machines trying to bar their way. The darkness was filled with the barks of the Minotaurs' Bolters and their battlecries, while the Necron fought on with eerie silence. One by one, the Space Marines fell, their armour scorched black by Gauss rays or punctured by the sharp claws of Wraiths and Flayed Ones, stalking in the shadows until only one squad remained--Terminator Squad Ixthalion.Only five Battle-Brothers remained to press on, led by Veteran Sergeant Ixthalion whose Power Sword hacked and slashed tirelessly at the skeletal figures before him. Blast-scarred and bloody, the valiant brothers penetrated at last into the ship's vast central chamber, a cold and haunted place nearly a kilometer across that lay at the heart of the Tomb Ship. Strange alien obelisks covered in strange symbols had been erected around a central space where ranks upon rank of sarcophagi lay, bathed in a strange ghost-light.In the centre of the room, a dais had been raised upon which the Necron Overlord stood, shrouded in pure darkness. It would be the last sight the honoured Battle-Brothers of Squad Ixthalion would ever witness. From the sarcophagi a phalanx of praetorians rose and slaughtered them for their transgression. Yet the martyrdom of Squad Ixthalion would not be in vain, for they had located the enemy commander--and perhaps more importantly, activated the Teleport Homer they were carrying...Close enough to crash into the Tomb Ship, the Daedalos Krata -- now badly wounded, her dense armour carrying great rents from the Dead Hand’s heavy weapons -- pivoted her Bombardment Cannon and fired at point blank range, locking onto the beacon set by Squad Ixthalion. The fusillade of macro-shells pierced the Dead Hand’s armour and reached far into the interior of the Necron ship, exposing the vaulted chamber within to open space in a thundering bang of decompression and screaming wind.The mighty Tomb Ship bucked away like a wounded animal, one of its crescent-shaped superstructures colliding with the Daedalos Krata, further denting her armour and sending the mighty assault carrier spinning, but this no longer mattered. The damage had been done. For as long as the Dead Hand’s armour had been intact, the Tomb Ship's interior had been impenetrable to the Imperial Auspexes. Now, with a massive, gaping rent in its hull, the ancient targeting arrays and sensors of the Daedalos Krata could get a clear fix on it. In an instant, the ancient teleporter engine of the Minotaurs' flagship came to life, delivering their baleful cargo right into the heart of the Dead Hand.As the pulsing shockwave of teleportation cleared, Asterion Moloc and his bodyguard of thirty Terminator-clad Veterans and two Contemptor Pattern Dreadnoughts stood upon the deck of the Dead Hand’s central mausoleum, still venting atmosphere. They had come to confront the Necron Overlord believed to be none other than Kutlakh the World Killer, Nemesor of the Maynarkh Dynasty and the Necrons' supreme military commander.No preamble preceded the clash of the two warriors, no warrior's salute nor a true challenge was issued. Instead, Asterion Moloc simply raised his weapon, the Black Spear, and unleashed its destructive power. A focused ray of energy erupted from the spear's tip, potent enough to pierce the armour of a battle tank and connected with the sinister figure of Kuthlak upon his throne-like dais. The powerful las-blast hit the Overlord in the shoulder, rocking him back, but failing to slay him outright.With an eerie hissing howl, Kutlakh vocalised his anger at being struck by such an insolent warrior of an inferior species, and summoned his own weapon to his side. The great, cleaver-like blade of pale obsidian that was his weapon, Obsidax, apparently solidified out of thin air, materialising right into Kutlakh’s outstretched skeletal hand. Lightning quick, Kutlakh threw himself from the dais, slicing through the first Terminator with a savage backhand blow as if the veteran Marine's treasured armour, the most durable piece of equipment in service to the Imperium, was mere paper.In a moment, battle was joined and the great chamber erupted in fury, the bark of the Terminators' Storm Bolters and Assault Cannons bleeding away into the void as air was greedily sucked from the great rent in the ship's hull. Glimmering gold and crimson in the surrounding darkness, illuminated by the Minotaurs' fire, their true opponents emerged -- Triarch Praetorians and Lychguards, their armoured forms bearing gilded and corroded death marks. In their hands, the Necrons bore great cleaving blades and tall segmented shields capable of repelling the densest concentration of fire, or arcane staff weapons blazing with ghostly luminescence that were able to reduce their foes to ash.The Minotaurs were soon hard-pressed, even if they had already accounted for twice their own numbers. Yet, still more Necron constructs emerged from the darkness or reassembled themselves at the feet of their opponents. Soon, the Terminators were forming a defensive circle, but even their heavy firepower could not hold the advancing Necrons at bay indefinitely.Moloc raged and slew as tirelessly as the machine-constructs he was facing, the Black Spear lashing and piercing without rest, his eyes burning with cold fury that was unmatched by the baleful malevolence of the Necrons. His ornate Storm Shield resounded with the blows of his opponents, while still the Black Spear hewed mechanical limbs from torsos, staved in skulls, slashed across vertebrae or punched through armoured carapaces.Kutlakh, the dark overlord of the Necrons, fought and slew his way towards Asterion Moloc, no Terminator able to stop his advance, all of the Chapter Master's loyal Minotaurs bodyguards dying to buy their lord a little extra time. Leaving a trail of dismembered corpses and rent armour behind him, Kutlakh was suddenly stopped when the entire Tomb Ship rocked after taking an immense blow. The Dead Hand’s artificial gravity momentarily deactivated and the Necron Overlord unceremoniously fell to his knees.Before he could rise again, the armoured form of Ancient Geryon, one of the two ancient Contemptor Pattern Dreadnoughts accompanying the Chapter Master, loomed over Kutlakh, fist ready to strike. Shrouded in destructive energy, Geryon's fist descended upon his foe, but just before the hammer-blow could land, Kutlakh interposed his blade, Obsidax, and the Dreadnought’s entire forearm exploded in flame and spinning pieces of shrapnel. The Tomb Ship tilted and Geryon staggered and reeled, the massive armoured feet of his Dreadnought frame skidding and losing purchase, a welcome diversion Kutlakh used to attack.The Overlord sprang right at Geryon, striking with two hands at his opponent, his great blade splintering ceramite and sending a shower of sparks flying from the Dreadnought's frame. One actuator was severed, and Geryon fell to his knees, brackish blood and silvery amniotic fluid leaking from the wounds he had taken and spinning in the low gravity like trails of smoke. Kutlakh positioned himself over Geryon, ready to deliver the killing blow before the Black Spear found him.Pushing the relic-weapon cleanly through Kutlakh's back, the Black Spear -- wreathed in pale flame and lightning -- suddenly erupted from Kutlakh's chest, exploding from the gilded ankh-glyph the Overlord bore on his chest. Impaled on the Black Spear, Kutlakh spasmed, undoubtedly feeling pain as his death-mask was thrown back, releasing a silent scream, jerking on the Space Marine weapon's blade before Asterion Moloc rammed his Storm Shield into the Necron's head, clearing his spear-blade from the weight of the wounded Nemesor's metallic body.Just as Moloc was about to deliver the final blow, the Dead Hand was rocked by fresh impacts, the pure white flame of plasma discharges burning at the edge of the great rent in the vessel's chamber walls, illuminating the fierce hand-to-hand fighting in a fierce light. Moloc reacted instantly, with the instinct of a warrior that had been honed on a thousand battlefields. He raised his ornate Storm Shield, before his senses had even registered Kutlahk's falling blade, halting a blow that would have surely ended the life of the Chapter Master.Enraged, Kutlakh hacked again and again, seeking to cleave Moloc's head in twain, but the blows were halted by the Space Marine's still-raised shield, until Moloc's energy shield field spat one last time before failing. The wild blows of the Nemesor made short work of the unpowered device, which quickly came apart under Obsidax’s dark blade.Once more their world tilted, and Kutlakh and Moloc were separated by the ship's movement, the Chapter Master feeling the waves of hate that emanated from behind the burning crimson eyes of Kutlakh's deathmask as the broken figure of the Nemesor retreated into the shadows. The Master of the Minotaurs Chapter was swept out of the chamber and into the void, the broken bodies of his proud warriors floating beside him as if caught in a whirlpool.