South of Olympus Mons, the Tharsis highlands stretched for thousands of kilometers. On one side, a series of steep cliffs rose sharply, descending into the vast expanse of the Syria Planum.
To the south of this desolate land lay Mondus Gamma, now Mars's largest forge complex. With the destruction of Mondus Occulam, it was both the largest and most productive.
Smoke filled the Syria Planum. The forges roared ceaselessly, forging weapons and equipment for the Warmaster's armies.
Most Astartes were unaware of the new power armor filling the testing temples, where Tech-Priests worked on final calibrations.
After the first wave of the Imperial Fists' 50th Company, led by Captain Camba Diaz, had been repelled, he did not launch a hasty second attack.
He gathered the first wave of drop troops and used the Legion's private channel to request support from Sigismund, who was collecting ordnance at the Tycho Brahe munitions depots.
Diaz stared at Mondus Gamma's thick walls through the red Martian dust. He decided on a cautious approach to breach Lukas Chrom's defenses.
With a veteran defender's eye, he marked tactical runes on his display.
Scout squads moved first, advancing to positions Diaz had carefully chosen, their boltguns aimed at the walls.
A devastating volley struck the returning servitors with precision.
As mechanical limbs flew, the main Imperial Fists assault force moved quickly.
Heavy weapon squads' lascannons fired searing beams, striking the turrets Diaz had selected.
Yellow armor shuddered as missile launchers fired four-round volleys, their blazing trails covering the turret areas.
The moment a gap was torn in the defenses, the sky blazed.
One hundred drop pods streaked across the sky, slamming into Mondus Gamma's outer perimeter.
The Imperial Fists, leaping from their pods, unleashed a volley of bolt fire.
The roaring rounds shredded combat servitors.
The Vorax-class battle automata's counter-fire was also drowned out.
A tide of bolt rounds swept the area, felling automaton after automaton.
Among the tide, the heavy Domitar-class battle automata stood firm.
Diamond-hard shells hammered against their ceramic armor, deflected, exploding in bursts of fire.
Their multi-purpose missile launchers fired standard-issue Ignis-pattern missiles, manufactured by the Fabrikatus.
The moment the missiles left their launch cells, the unstable incendiary agents in their cores ignited.
Boom, boom, boom!
An Ignis missile slammed into a tower-like structure, collapsing it in a violent explosion.
Another Ignis missile struck yellow armor, releasing its deadly fragments instantly.
The Mark III power armor exploded. The Imperial Fist was torn apart by a thousand fragments.
The Imperial Fists ran. They knew the Domitar-class battle automata could not match an Astartes' speed in complex terrain.
Though the Domitar was larger than the similarly assault-oriented Castellum, and faster, it was not as agile as an Astartes.
They moved around pillars and forges, racing for their primary objective, the outer gate.
The Domitar automata's massive feet shook the ground.
The gravity hammers' fields tore apart everything in their path, ripping through metal pillars.
Bubbles of gravity chased the yellow-armored warriors, merging, their diameter tripling.
The Imperial Fists outran the spread of the bubbles. Under covering fire, the breachers reached the gate, slapping melta bombs onto the hinge controls.
The yellow-armored warriors on both sides of the gate withdrew.
As the short countdown reached zero, a pillar of fire erupted from Mondus Gamma's eastern gate.
The hinges melted in the blazing flame, ash drifting on the wind.
The armored gate toppled, slamming to the ground.
The ground shook as Diaz led the first assault troops into Mondus Gamma.
He opened the comm channel, issuing orders.
"Secure the warehouses. Eliminate the enemy."
The yellow-armored warriors raced towards the armored containers, searching for weapons to use against the heavy automata.
Bang!
A Sicaran battle tank crashed through a metal shell, its hull covered in chains restraining mechanical beasts.
The Imperial Fists slowly rotated the turret, learning to use the new equipment.
This main battle tank, a collaboration between Primarch Ferrus Manus, Nareth, and the Mechanicum, was being prioritized for the Warmaster's allies, per his orders. Legions like the Imperial Fists had yet to receive them in large numbers.
Boom!
The hull shuddered. Superheated plasma seeped into the tank, drenching the crew in sweat.
The gunner slammed the firing button. A searing lance shot forth.
The beam pierced the gravity field, striking the Domitar battle automaton.
Ceramic fragments flew. The mechanical form crashed down.
The Sicarans, from their initial unsteady movements to smooth running, formed a steel tide, advancing into the city.
Diaz ordered the Jovian Grenadiers to land and secure the captured equipment, then led his troops towards the eastern sector's most important objective: the munitions depot.
He saw the massive cylindrical building as the ground shook.
Ten-meter-tall, sea-green machines emerged ahead. Their spherical chassis were supported by tracks. Their crimson bionic eyes fixed on the Imperial Fists.
The scouts raised their newly captured melta guns, targeting the machines.
Molten fire splashed against their forms.
Sparks flew. The machines stood firm, raising their mechanical arms.
Devastating radiation beams struck the Mark III Iron-pattern power armor.
Four yellow-armored warriors' armor grew dull, as if left unpainted in corrosive seawater.
Bang!
Diaz watched four runes vanish in an instant. He looked at the hundreds of machines pouring out, and gave the order.
"They are equipped with personal shields."
"Sicarans, fire!"
Boom, boom, boom!
Beams hammered the sea-green machines.
With a crack, the beams overwhelmed five.
The machines' three bionic eyes blinked in unison, locking onto the Sicarans.
Their tracks rumbled. Their steel arms rose like a forest.
A torrent of black flame roared, coalescing into a sea of fire, consuming the Sicarans.
Pillars of fire rose. Flame and steel fragments flew.
Diaz quickly formulated a plan, marking the command relay station at two o'clock.
"10th Company, draw their fire."
"Everyone else, follow me. Destroy the command relay."
Once the relay was destroyed, the Magos Dominus could not precisely control the automata.
Operating under automatic protocols, they would be far less effective.
The Imperial Fists of the 10th Company formed ranks, raising plasma guns and melta guns, pouring fire into the sea-green machines.
Searing suns hammered the charging machines. Their personal shields crackled.
With a roar, a shield collapsed. Melta beams struck several sea-green forms.
Pillars of fire rose. Mechanical fragments scattered.
The machines' terrible black flame washed over the yellow line.
The flame consumed the Mark III power armor, immolating the Imperial Fists.
With every step Diaz took, more black runes scrolled across his tactical display.
In the short five-hundred-meter charge, two hundred warriors of the 10th Company had died.
But their sacrifice had been worth it. The Dominus Magos's war-engines had not yet reacted. The automata's fire could not stop their advance.
"Melta bombs, twenty-second countdown." Diaz shouted over the command channel.
As he spoke, a sickly green light flickered.
A beam of radiation grazed past. Forty-nine warriors of the 50th Company fell.
A sense of foreboding filled Diaz. The new machines reacted too quickly, not like simple automata following fixed protocols.
But, with the tower in sight, he decided to see the plan through.
He raised his melta gun, firing at the sea-green automata.
Three breacher squads raced for the tower. The remaining 50th Company warriors raised their weapons, firing at the automata.
Black flame rolled towards them. Yellow-armored warriors fell, one by one.
His Lieutenant led the breacher squads towards the tower. A hundred meters from it, two sea-green machines emerged from either side.
Their crimson eyes flashed with mockery. Pillars of black flame shot out.
The fire struck the Imperial Fists' right hands with precision.
Boom, boom, boom!
The melta bombs detonated.
'It's an ambush… these machines… Abominable Intelligences.'
An impossible thought crossed Diaz's mind. The Emperor had banned Abominable Intelligences.
The rebels had fallen so far as to mass-produce them.
He looked at the wave of Abominable Intelligences, then at the fifty yellow runes remaining on his visor, and gave the order.
"Disperse! Retreat!"
The surviving Imperial Fists scattered, retreating.
The Abominable Intelligences' crimson eyes swept the area. They formed hunting squads, pursuing them.
Diaz retreated, firing to draw their fire.
Machine after machine, their hatred burning, joined the hunt for him.
Boom!
A crimson beam struck the ground meters ahead of him. The shockwave threw him to the ground.
Dozens of crimson beams struck him. The Abominable Intelligences converged, raising their arms.
Suddenly, beams of light shot out, striking the machines.
A familiar figure leaped before him, his blade swinging.
With a series of crackling blasts, Sigismund cut down machine after machine.
Bang!
With a final shriek, his blade pierced the abdomen of a sea-green machine.
Sigismund retreated. The mechanical corpse crashed to the ground.
Diaz refused his help, rising to his feet.
"Sigismund, we must withdraw."
He glanced to his right at the dozens of Jovian Grenadiers consumed by the black flame.
"I will order the Jovian Grenadiers to hold their ground. They will buy us time."
"We will use that time to take everything we can."
....
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