The Siege Of Janus

Audio by Paper2Audio

The Siege Of Janus

Captain Khora crouched in the thick grass which was covered in morning dew. His camo cloak was draped in leaves and netting, a bolt sniper rifle was clipped onto his cobalt blue jump-pack. He was holding a long serrated combat knife. Khora scanned the surrounding jungle for any traces of traitor-marines.

Nothing.

Long, tall bamboo culms stretched high into the sky, the buttress roots snaked along the path with an orange liquid spewing out of tiny holes in the trees.

He crawled through the dense undergrowth, his ammunition swinging at his side.

“Crack!” Khora spun around and stabbed at the figure behind him. Blood splattered the captain's ultima. The chaos cultist dropped to the floor leaving a patch of crimson-stained grass.

He exhaled. The heretic was dead.

He trudged on through the jungle, the City of Janus was a two day walk from his current position.

The guardsmen sat at their gunning nests high in the City of Janus watching horrified at the sight of hundreds of thousands of chaos cultists streaming into the capital and setting fire to everything they met. The city was a large town with an expansive underground complex where hundreds of thousands of people had been evacuated. Its thick iron walls stopped all manner of bombs from harming its contents.

Despite all this, it was a blood bath on the ground as the cultists took no prisoners. The streets were covered in smears of blood and guts. Commissar Yuriy sat in his bunker watching it all unfold. “Commissar Yuriy,” A trooper said to the commissar, “They have taken the barracks on Emperor Road, what shall we do?”

Captain Khora lay down on the stony edge of a cliff overlooking a chaos cultist camp. His bolt sniper rifle's stock was wedged firmly into his shoulder. He picked off the cultists one by one till no one remained and the dead bodies of the corrupt beings littered the camp. As the space marine approached the camp, his vox whirled into life as the small earpiece spoke to him, “ This is commissar Yuriy of the 21st Janus division group, please return to the capital immediately,” It said.

“I have almost cleared all the surrounding camps I just have…” the captain said in a young male voice before he was interrupted by the commissar again,

“The city is under attack, we request you return here immediately," Yuriy shouted through the comms. Khora sets off, running towards the burning city.

Kat, the recon trooper, was barricaded into St Ollanius Puis cathedral along with Sam, the sergeant, and Will, the gunner.

“Kat, move that crate to you, use it to block the doors. Will, block the windows with those wooden beams,” Sam ordered them, “No enemies can find us.” The interior of the cathedral was old and battle worn despite being one of the newest parts of Janus' capital city. The priest and the monks (which had been evacuated from the monasteries years before the great heretic siege) had been included in the first wave of evacuation.

“Ummmm… Sam,” Will said, “something is about to break through the door.”

“Crash!” The door flew off its hinges and crashed into the golden altar behind the startled guardsmen. As the dust settled, in the doorway was a towering figure surrounded by traitor corpses

It was Captain Khora.

The traitor space marines gathered on the bridge of their ship the Night Hawk . Their leader Horus Luperca stood in the center of the stolen imperial freighters bridge. Flashing lights and multi-coloured buttons lay on metal blood-covered consoles. The heretic astartes in their gleaming black armour stood around the fiendish primarch.

“ Rise my children! And destroy their planet Janus, and then the universe!” Horus announced followed by the agreeing grunts of the surrounding black legion.

Captain Khora led the terrified guardsmen out of the cathedral.

“Thank the emperor you found us!” Kat said bowing his head, “We would have been killed if it weren't for you Khora.”

The space marine said nothing, he just kept walking towards the planning bunker where Yuriy had sent him. The street was strewn with corpses not of the locals but of the renegade cultists. “Ummm…” Kat said uncertainly, “What happened and where are you taking us?”

“I am taking you to the planning bunker, Commissar Yuriy has requested my presence,” Khora said planely, ignoring the first question. Kat seemed to jerk back startled,”We-e can't go there!” Sam said hurriedly. The space marine stopped, you could hear the sound of moving gravel as he twisted and turned around, “Why?” The space marine asked suspiciously, then it hit him.

He lifted his bolt pistol and fired. A chaos pendant broke from her neck and dropping to the floor “chink!” Kat was left standing and staring down at the smoldering hole where her ribs were supposed to be. Both other chaos agents drew their las-pistols and fired five red rounds at the space marines breastplate they didn't even mark. Sam and Will looked at Khora with a regretful look on their faces.

The Night Hawk unfolds out of the warp rift overlooking the jungly planet, Janus. The heretic ship was covered in runes and the planet killer super weapon loomed beneath the ship's hull, pointing at the capital city of Janus. Horus Luperca stood, his reincarnated body shining as the green rays of the charging super weapon, using the power of the warp, bounced off his metallic limbs, “Soon, Janus will fall as the rest of the universe will! The imperium is doomed!” Horus shouted marvelling at his evil plan.

Captain Khora stared horrified at the looming Blackstone Fortress above the planet. The blinding green energy build up at the tip of the planet killing weapon was blinding. “No,” Khora said, his fore-finger drifting towards his vox unit, “Bless Guilliman, no!” here pressed the on button and spoke hurriedly, “We need battle cruisers in the sky now!” He rushed over to the landing pads, his face stern and serious. He ran past now homeless families pleading for help.

He entered the domed landing pad where his battle ship, The Maccarriage, a heavily armed star fighter, stood proudly among the scrappy astra militarum freighters. The hatch of the fighter slid back revealing a slick, black leather seat and countless buttons and modules and dials. He climbed up into the cockpit, all the controls and maneuvers spinning back into his mind as his hands touched the dual flight sticks. He spoke into his vox, “Open the landing dome this is The Maccarriage with clearance code 112985 requesting entry to planetary orbit.”

“Request accepted, you are clear for take off and may the spirit of the emperor forever bless you,” a recorded voice spoke to him through gaps of static. The blue hexagonal dome retracted leaving space for Captain Khora to enter the atmosphere.

The Maccarriage arced upwards towards the towering Blackstone Fortress where already an entire starfleet of Hellblade interceptors waited, missiles primed. Khora typed an encrypted protocol to Iax, each button clicked was a second closer to certain doom, as he clicked the send button he relaxed and used his in built vox system, “This is captain Khora of the 71st sharpshooter division, I need gold squadron in the air distracting the Hellblade interceptors.”

“Copy that khora,” an imperial navy man answered, “closing in on objective sir.”

The captain barrel rolled into action, his las-cannons bursting into life with a sound like thunder. Hellblades were exploding left and right and center. Khora's plan was working, they were so caught up in the battle they hadn't seen the opening warp rift.

Suddenly, the captain's men weren't winning anymore, five of the ten of his star ships had gone up in flames after a collision accident. Hellblades sped around the Blackstone Fortress guns blazing. Bullets whizzed by The Maccarriage's cockpit. Khora checked one of the screens, 100 minutes till arrival, Khora read from the console.

Three missiles came speeding towards Captain Khora's star fighter, he barrel rolled as the closest one sped past sending a relieved sigh into Khora's windpipe. The other two flew towards the captain's cockpit. Both exploding mere inches from the wings of the star ship. Sheets of polished blue metal were torn off on both wings leaving scorched, leather coloured metal.

The warp rift flickered a brilliant blue and red and green. Then, an emperor-class-battle-cruiser came out of the warp rift, and a blessing voice spoke through the vox, “We got your message Khora, thank you for warning us,” Roboute Guilliman said, “And now to blow these heretics out of the sky!”

And with that, hundreds upon hundreds of powerful cannons fired directly at the hull of the black legion ship. The hull of the Blackstone Fortress imploded with a load bang. The battle was won, “Lets go home boys, victory is ours!” Roboute Guilliman said over the vox as the ash cleared, “We all deserve it.”