A traitor Astartes of the Blood Wolves. This traitor’s armor was notable for its variation from the warband’s traditional bronze coloration.

“Your shrines will burn, your streets run with blood, your false idols shattered, your people slaughtered by the thousands, your very planet torn apart . . . and the barest fraction of my hatred will be satisfied.“—Ba’ar Zul, the Hate-Bound, Warrior of Khorne

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IMPERIAL VOXCAST ( 6 631 743.M41)—The planet Irodonia II, a Mechanicus-affiliated planet near the Heart of Darkness warp storm, has been attacked by traitor Astartes.

“A company-sized force of traitor Astartes attacked Manufactorum 732-MV2 in Sector 41/12 of the planet and engaged in 16 hours of butchery before escaping to an orbital ship that escaped the system,” reported Magos Danzotos A3U, a ranking Tech Priest within the Mechanicus war cohorts that defends the planet.

Several square kilometers of the manufactorum, as well as half the hab-blocks that housed Mechanicus menials, were destroyed in the attack. Several thousand of these laborers reportedly were taken by the traitor Astarte for purposes unknown.

Two Blood Wolves advance through the rubble of the manufactorum.

Cruel Deception

The raid was successful largely due to the duplicity of the traitor Astartes, subsequently identified by their heraldry as the Blood Wolves, Danzotos A3U said.

“The traitors arrived aboard a cargo vessel transmitting the proper Imperial codes,” he added. “The ship was scheduled to arrive in-system, and it provided the appropriate security clearances and manifest,”

With no reason to suspect foul play, the ship was allowed to launch cargo haulers and land at the manufactorum, Danzotos A3U said.

“Alas, when the loading ramps of the cargo haulers opened, traitor Astartes burst forth and opened fire. There was no warning and no security personnel nearby to respond immediately to an Astartes assault.”

The first Skitarii to answer the manufactorum’s distress call. Sadly, only two of the initial 200 Mechanicus warriors to confront the traitors survived the fighting.

Skitarii Arrive

It took time for a military response to arrive at the manufactorum. By that point, much of the facility and surrounding area were in ruins.

“The behavior of the traitors is inexplicable,” the tech priest said. “It was not enough to reduce the manufactorum to ruins, they devoted considerable time and energy into rendering the ruins into dust. There is no logic to it.”

The first Imperial unit to respond to distress calls was a sub-vanguard of Skitarii Rangers, who advanced to bring the traitors under fire—and then fell back to a defensive position and waited for the undisciplined traitors to attack.

“Tactical analysis indicated that the traitors were in a state of battle frenzy, and they would advance aggressively,” Danzotos A3U explained. “Fighting in the ruins limited visibility to 17 meters. By redeploying to the edge of more open ground, visibility increased to 24.3 meters, granting Skitarii forces an additional 2.3 seconds and two additional rounds of fire before the traitor Astartes reached their position.”

Skitarii warriors set up a firing line amidst the ruins on the edge of a neighborhood monument where lines of fire was maximized.

Mindless Charge 

“The traitors showed no great tactical finesse in the battle,” Danzotos A3U said. “Although a handful of traitors  took advantage of the terrain—using a tall monument for cover and having one warrior climb the monument to gain elevation for cover fire—the majority simply charged forward without regard to the weaponry they faced.”

Several of the traitor Astartes fell, but one traitor—encased in Terminator armor—reached the Skitarii firing line in a ruined hab-unit. At the same moment, more traitors appeared on the Skitarii right flank, and the defensive line of the Mechanicus warriors was “rolled up.”

“A Sicarian Infiltrator, who arrived and operated independently of the Rangers, managed to ambush the flanking Space Marine and delay them momentarily, but the Mechanicus warrior was eventually overwhelmed by superior numbers, and the Skitarii were forced to withdraw at considerable cost,” Danzotos A3U said.

Only two Skitarii managed to escape the rampaging traitors.

A Sicarian Infiltrator waits to launch an ambush against the traitors.

Traitor Withdrawal

Over the next few hours, more Skitarii troops arrived, and the fighting continued until nightfall., Danzotos A3U said. “Mechanicus casualties were heavy as the terrain favored the superior hand-to-hand combat skills of the traitor Astartes.”

Once  Mechanicus troops arrived in overwhelming numbers, however, a series of explosions—obviously planted charges—erupted throughout the ruins, creating billowing clouds of smoke that completely obscured the battlefield—even for infrared and soft-radar sensors.

“This was a tactic to screen the launch of the traitors’ cargo haulers, which managed to evade ground-to-air fire and reach the safety of the enemy voidship,” Danzotos A3U said. 

A Mechanicus patrol ship and three orbital gunships attempted to engage the enemy vessel, but if opened fire to devastating effect. Later analysis suggested that the weapons profile matched that of an Astartes strike cruiser.

“It is possible that the traitors disguised a strike cruiser sufficiently to avoid detection by long-range scans,” Danzotos A3U said. “Our ships were taken by surprise, and two gunships were destroyed before the remainder of our small fleet withdrew.”

This neighborhood of Manufactorum 732-MV2 was in partial ruins before the first Skitarii arrived on the scene. By the end of the battle, none of these ruins rose more than a meter above the plascrete streets.

Aftermath

The Blood Wolves wasted no time breaking orbit and heading out of the system and, given the enemy vessel outclassed the entire Mechanicus defense fleet in the system, no attempt was made to stop it.

“It will take some time to count the dead and kidnapped among the 8,000 menials who worked in Manufactorum 732-MV2,” Danzotos A3U said. “The loss of laborers, along with the extensive damage to the manufactorum, suggests a 0.12-percent decline in planetary production for the next quarter.”

No enemy casualties were recovered. It was only hours after the battle that pict recorders of the raiders could be compared to known heraldry of traitor forces.

The bronze-colored armor,  cream and blood-red colors of their unit markings, and other blasphemous icons of the Ruinous Powers closely match those used by the Blood Wolves, a renegade band of traitor Astartes, the tech priest added. A handful of the traitors, however, wore an unidentified blue-gray armor.

“We are aware that this war band has attacked a number of Imperial worlds in the Corvus Cluster,” Danzotos said. “We are preparing new tactical protocols as a precaution to any future attack.”

+ END TRANSMISSION +

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