A young officer adjusts his head set, his fingers dance over the runes, depressing and activating others. He turns to view a secondary monitor that crackles to life to show an ageing commander in full dress uniform, the green visual crackles with horizontal lines. The colonel, an embodiment to the numerous campaigns he has seen in his long and prestigious career, raises on e greying eyebrow and his left hand eye clicks and bleeps with the sound of thousands of neuro-linkages.
“Sir, an Imperial cruiser requests per….”
“I know who it is, just let them land and inform the Ring crew that Inquisitor Argo has arrived.”
The superior snappily said in a coarse voice. “His honour requires quarters and a meeting of the bridge officers. That is all.” The commander salutes and the monitor blinks off. Lieutenant Forcae turns back to the comm.
“Righteous Fire you have permission to dock, please proceed to port 45 and we shall ready for his honour.”
The comm fizzes with static and dies down. The lieutenant gazes at the view screen, tracking the path taken by the cruiser. “ By the Emperor, what is going on?” He takes a gulp of air and gets up. He passes the warp signature scanner, its holographic imager alive with information and runes. One though was new, Lambda. It seemed to be situated within a growing warp disturbance. Forcae tapped a button on his headset and the small diode change from green to blue.
“Gamma flight you out there. This is Forcae; look I’ve got a reading of a warp storm coming but its different. Look, could you make a pass near the nebula at sector Tao, seven, niner. It could be nothing or it could be a problem. I’ll contact Sector Command and see if they have anything.”
“Affirmative. We’ll make a pass and then head back to the ‘Barn’. Clear skies.”
“Yeah, clear skies,” acknowledged the Lieutenant. Though something was familiar about the readings he was getting on the scanner.
Forcae approached the comm. once more and depressed a few runes. Just static. He repeated the process and again all he got was static. Slamming his fist on the console his worst fear had been confirmed. A Tyranid shadow, which meant one thing, a Hive fleet near Sol, in the western fringe, in Segmentum Tempestus. Today was not going to be a very good day for the living and the dead.
Admiral Hargate stood at the command console facing out over the balcony above the command pit. The broad shouldered man rubbed a black leather gloved hand and then proceeded to brush down his royal blue trench coat, checking the gold braiding every so often. The admirals attention though at this moment was divided, watching both the bridge crew at work, and the silent super structure of the Righteous Fire, tiny lights of view ports just visible to the naked eye betray its cold exterior. Massive windows, 5 inches thick, decorated with gargoyles and ornate bulkhead linings, encircle the bridge. Behind Hargate was the green ball of Delos IV, and before him was the void of space. Communication officer Tai twitch his fingers as electrical impulses flowed up neuro-hardware to his fingertips. Awkwardly the officer adjusted the optical implant, the unsightly cable clamped with claws onto the side of his pale face.
“Admiral, we can only just hear the Righteous Fire, seems like some sort of gravitational disturbance emanating from the nebula. They say they have scanned a number of…” Tai tapped a button on the implant in order to clear any static. “They’re gone?”
“Whhaaattt!’ raged Hargate. He looked out into the void to see a large cloud of plasma engulf the ‘Fire. The plasma was soon to be clouded over. A large cluster of bodies much like a swarm of locusts lapped around the wreck. Three pinpricks of light closed in on the Ring.
“This is Gamma flight. Raise shields, raise shiel… Aarrgghhhhhhh!”
“What is going on!?” shouted Hargate. “I want shields now. Activated planetary defences. Get me Sector Command now!”
“We can’t sir.” panted Forcae.
The cloud of purple spores and spines shattered on the shield, sprays of acidic bile crackled and evaporated on the energy barrier. Sections of the ring were smashed of in the rain of the organic projectiles.
“Sir, it’s Leviathan.”
The cloud of Tyranid weapons moved on to the planet, moving through the haywire wall of laser blasts, to eventually reveal the enormous coiled shell of the Hive ship.
About the author
I'm 17 and have been playing 40k for nearly 4 years. I am a devote lover of the Tyranids or anything tinted by their DNA. I originally played Epic and now have sizeable forces for all games. They include Chaos Knights, Epic Space Wolves and Tyranids, GorkaMorka Orks, Skaven for Mordheim and Necromundan Spyrers.
Other games I take part in are Star Wars and Vampire role-play games, and Magic:tG.
Other interests include any good horror movie, sci-fi, lots of Buffy and listening to Heavy_Thrash_Grunge_Nu_Death_Black_Metal.
Oh on a final note I live in Kington Hereford and for the forum my name is DNA.
