The Imperials sent a small force of ships, made up of primarily space marines as they took lead, in order to aid the planet of Christophsis. A Company sized force of the Astartes, made up of the 4 chapters. The Chapter had a battle barge, with strike cruisers as assistance. They were to attack with the Venator class star destroyers, which were only the size of the strike cruisers.
Admiral Wullf Yularen was on the ship, the Glory Caller, observing the imperial crew, and had noted, many were......directly connected to less vital systems. He watched as the captain, an older man with a cybernetic eye, sitting on a throne looking out a window into the void.
"Captain, your ship is impressive but, you need to be careful, we are not quite sure how strong the enemy here is." Wullf said.
"Admiral, you may be wise in naval theory, but I have fought Orks, Necrons and the Tyranids. The glory caller shall not faulted against your much smaller crafts." The captain, Rorick Sternhart, said, looking towards the admiral.
The Battle barge and cruiser were in the center, preparing to take out the enemy capital ship. Wullf Yularen looked at the enemy providence class dreadnaught, and realized the markings. It belonged to an enemy we once believed dead.
"Captain-" Wullf said, but was ignored as the captain gave orders.
"Prepare the lances. Once in range, open fire." The captain ordered.
"What about torpedoes?" a navel arms-men said.
"Hold those back, we need to get closer" The captain ordered.
"Captain, a word." Wullf tried to get his attention.
Rorick turned and sat on his command throne, before he raised his hand, and motioned it forward, chopping at the air.
"Load a melta torpedo. Engines to full. ATTACK!" he ordered.
The ships charged forward, before the venators opened fire. The battle in space was slow, but would be take time. As the imperials entered range, the lance batteries opened up and fired, cutting a munificent class star destroyer with ease. The ships turned, facing the battle barge, launching waves of fighter craft and firing turbo lasers and hitting the large armored prow.
"Captain, I believe that ship has an admiral who is very dangerous. We need to fall back and replan." Wullf said.
"Good, we shall decapitate the leadership! Lock course to collide that ship. I want the bombardment cannons to tear through it!" The captain commanded.
"We have a lock on the ship." a naval officer said.
"Fire the melta torpedo!" the captain commanded.
The torpedo fired, and launched at the head ship, known as the Invincible. As the torpedo slammed into the shields, it exploded, and flames spreading across the outer layer as the melta warhead created the fireball on the side.
Wullf Yularen watched in horror, the thermal shields of the ship was torn, and the ray shields were also overloaded as the nuclear fire burned across the ship's surface, and the torpedo's fragmentation cut and smashed into the ship's hull, tearing deep cuts into the body.
With the shields suddenly lowered as they were over loaded and the battle barge suddenly dived down, as if it planned to get under it, before it pushed it's armored prow up, and slammed into the CIS flagship. The ship began to be pushed up, unable to fire on the republic or imperial ships. The bombard cannons would be fired and shot through the command ship, before pushing through the front of the ship, leaving it a floating wreck.
"That was insane! You could have killed us all!" Wullf screamed.
Rorick pointed his blade at the admiral, and stood up.
"We are not the weaklings you lead. We have fought enemies who have no concept of mercy, those who do not die, and those who's power over reality can destroy us in a moment. I have faced the threats of the Immaterium, and defeated boarding parties with the Astartes on this vessel. I witnessed the death of great Cadia with one eye gone. You machine foe have not earned to even be remembered for anything more then a stone I step upon." Rorick said, seeming to look over The admiral, as he listed his accomplishments.
"I..I...I-" Wullf said, nervous.
"You shall be taken off my ship, we need to deploy the marines." He added, turning, his cape flowing with his turn.
With the Blockade broken over Christophsis, the strike cruisers would mop up,the remaining ships, with the Venators moving, and preparing to deliver supplies, and to deploy forces for the upcoming battles, to reclaim the world.
-meanwhile-
"They just destroyed the flag ship! They slammed through it as if it was a topping on food!" a droid said.
"What do we do?" another asked.
"Retreat!" one shouted.
The commanders were in disarray, without a central commander, the droids broken up. Some ships fled, others stayed, just to be destroyed, leaving the hulls floating in the skies.
The Blockade quickly faded, as leadership never expected they would be taken out, so back up commanders were all but missing.
-meanwhile, in a dark room, on a world, far from the front lines-
Darth Sidious sat in a room, looking at the scans of the imperial vessel. It was longer than the Malevolence. The use of a dense metal ram shield, and a powerful under ship laser cannon. If the republic could re-create a weapon like this, or even better, take the vessel and reverse engineer it, it would create a more powerful force of occupation, one even the Victory class would not match. Potentially, even his ultimate weapon, would be redesigned. He then looked at the information sent by Dooku.
The data was of of 4 fallen space marines. The DNA had 2 genetic signatures, along with a third set that was a bit more random. It was as if the sources didn't mix, something had changed somewhere, by the marines would turn into one of the two primary, as the organs had the matching DNA.
These marines had 2 hearts, 3 lungs, a fused rib cage, a shielding on the brain, a gland that produced acidic spit, a pre-stomach, several various other organs in the chest and head. The armor was just as complex, and the weapons were closer to automatic rocket launchers.
These "Astartes", "Angels of Death" were impressive, and if he could control them, find their weakness, or bend them into servitude, he would have the perfect Jedi killing weapon.
"Hmmm, perhaps Kaminoan cloning can, uncover the genetic signatures and place them into clones." Sidious said.
"We also have a living specimen." Dooku added this more to the document, having an image attached, one that showed a space marine in a bacta tank, he was in two parts, the top part, having a left arm, and cutting from the right shoulder, and cut down to about the left hip. The other half of the body floated, connected by tubes to keep the body alive.
The dark lord looked into the eyes, and saw anger. This Astartes would become a testing ground for his experiments, his attempts to create the perfect soldier, to kill Jedi, one he would use to rule the galaxy, in his empire.
