All preparations were complete.

Armageddon crouched like a steel behemoth lying dormant beneath scorched earth, holding its breath, waiting for the greenskin warlord's next wave.

The Imperium couldn't match those endless ork boyz in numbers, but war had never been about who had more bodies.

Three Primarchs held the surface. The void fleet held orbit, Bucephelus at its core. On the ground: full Astartes Legions, Titan Legions, Knight Houses, and the Armageddon Steel Legion in complete formation.

Even if Ghazghkull Mag Uruk Thraka was the genius commander everyone feared, biting down on this planet would cost him every tooth in his mouth.

And he had no idea what was waiting for him here.

Two Terran standard months later, the ork fleet came pouring out of the void.

Those "warships," welded together from scrap metal and blind optimism, shrieked with metallic groans, their engines belching black exhaust, their prows bristling with spikes and iron plates painted in every garish color imaginable.

The WAAAGH cry rolled across every Imperial comm channel at once. The sound was savage, ecstatic, pure, as if what those creatures were hurtling toward wasn't a battlefield at all, but a grand festival they'd been waiting for all their lives.

The little humies were the only opponents in this galaxy who could give them a real fight. So they'd give it everything they had.

The ork fleet crashed headlong into the ambush the Imperium had spent two months setting.

Nominal command of the void battle was shared between several senior naval officers and Kaelen, but the real authority sat with Bucephelus's machine intelligence and the handful of Men of Iron at Kaelen's disposal.

They processed the battlefield data in real time, mountains of it, and broke down the optimal tactics into clean, clear orders, distributed to each naval officer to execute independently. Experienced captains doing what experienced captains do best.

It worked. The Imperial Navy was already built on discipline and firepower. Pair that with the absolute cold-blooded tactical judgment of machine intelligence, and inside two hours they had destroyed ten ork capital ships. Their own losses: zero.

But the ork fleet's scale was something else entirely. Like a Hive Fleet. Genuinely, literally endless.

Sink ten, and twenty more took their place.

Greenskin warships kept pouring through the Mandeville Point in unbroken waves, and the Imperial Navy was starting to strain.

Kaelen received Horus's order almost the moment it was sent.

"Clear a path. Let them through."

Kaelen hesitated for exactly one second. Then he executed.

The Imperial fleet pulled back in good order, opening a gap in the line.

The greenskin boyz didn't suspect a trap. Didn't care what the Imperial fleet might do behind them. All they saw was a clear road down to the planet's surface, and so they howled and started dropping hollowed-out asteroids converted into drop pods, one after another after another, like rain.

Kaelen watched those meteors streak toward Armageddon with fiery tails, jaw tight, brow furrowed.

He had just opened his mouth to order a rotation of strike cruisers to fill the gap when Horus's holographic projection blazed back to life on the flagship bridge.

"My friend, follow the plan." Horus's voice was steady, carrying weight without force. Behind him, the surface command center hummed with controlled chaos. "Use inertial maneuvering to swing around behind the ork fleet and flank them. Don't get tangled with their main force head-on. Rotate strike cruisers down to low orbit in shifts and keep hitting their ground forces continuously."

"Remember: no direct slugging match. Wait for the Imperial Navy reinforcements to reach position, then coordinate a pincer strike and launch the full offensive."

Kaelen looked at that familiar face in the projection.

He nodded.

"I will not fail you, Wolf God."

Horus smiled. He raised his hand and stuck his thumb up at the lens.

"Fortune favor the bold. For the Emperor."

"For the Emperor."

The projection winked out.

Kaelen turned back to the holographic table, now spread wall-to-wall with star charts.

He was carrying the command authority for the entire void front. He had never commanded so much as a single escort frigate before this. Let alone a full capital fleet.

But he'd made Horus a promise. His friend had put this mission in his hands not because he was the best choice for it, but because he trusted him.

Kaelen drew a slow breath and rolled his shoulders loose.

"Come on, then. Greenskins."

On the surface, Horus, Fulgrim, and Cawl stood with their heads tilted back, watching the endless meteors fall.

Behind them, anti-air batteries and laser arrays opened up simultaneously, detonating ork drop pods by the dozen in midair. Green fragments and shredded hull plating rained down like hail.

Plenty of pods still made it through. But that didn't make the orks inside lucky.

More than a few hatches blew open to nothing. The greenskins hadn't taken their first step before the pre-calibrated Imperial artillery arrived, and that was that. Fireballs bloomed across the plains in rapid succession, soil and ork screams thrown skyward together.

"After all these years." Fulgrim stood easy in the howling wind, his silver-white hair blown flat by the artillery overpressure. His tone was somewhere between reminiscence and the quiet exasperation of a perfectionist watching something disappoint him. "The orks' methods of attack remain as consistently barbaric as ever."

"Do they truly not understand what progress is?"

"As if the Imperium of Man has progressed any better." Cawl put in, flat and unbothered.

Fulgrim gave a soft laugh and didn't argue.

"At least we're here."

"Yes. We're here." Horus spoke quietly, his eyes fixed on the scorched plain being plowed over and over by artillery fire. "And as long as we are here, we will not let the old tragedies repeat. We will not let our father's life's work drown in this dark age and sink to nothing."

He turned to face his brothers.

"Remember our duty. Defend the rights of the living. Avenge the dead. Keep our vows."

"Isn't it a little late for impromptu vows?" Fulgrim asked, smiling, and then his expression settled into something grave, each word deliberate. "I will uphold my vow. Until death."

Horus looked to Cawl.

The Lord of the Night shrugged, his tone as casual as if he were debating dinner options.

"I'm a convicted criminal working through his penance. Evading penance is just committing a different crime. I'd rather not add another line to the ledger."

The Wolf God let out a low chuckle and left it there.

Then Loken came striding up in Terminator plate, each boot strike against the earth slow and even and heavy.

"Commander, the ork Blood Axes clan has raised their scrap city. Their main force is assembling. The Astra Militarum regiments on the front line have fallen back as ordered." His voice through the helm was clear and controlled.

"Good, Malo..." The first syllable slipped out before Horus could stop it. He caught himself, moved on. "Loken. Follow the original plan. Bury every last one of them. We take our victories through encirclements and decapitation strikes, one by one."

"Your will!" Loken had heard the slip. He said nothing. He turned and walked away.

Horus looked back toward Cawl, his eyes sharpening.

"Your turn, brother."

"Go spread some fear."

The Nostramo flying rat grinned wide, showing every tooth. No madness in it, just something that looked almost professional. The anticipation of a craftsman about to do what he was made for.

"Obviously." He paused. "When this is over, I'll sew you a nice green outfit."

"HAHAHAHA! See you on the other side."

The Lord of the Night laughed and stepped off the edge, black cloak snapping open in the air, a massive, elegant bat dropping into the dark below.

His voice came through the comm channel a moment later, hoarse and delighted, calling for Sevatar and every soul in the Night Haunter Legion to move out.

➤ Next: Return to Armageddon (4)