(Please listen to this track as you read: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...W8&start_radio=1)
At the turn of the 50th century, the Symbiots, a terrifying alien race of parasitic shape-shifters, invaded the Known Worlds. Attacking first at Absolution and then at Daishan and Stigmata, the Symbiots threatened to annihilate all humanity. Whole ecosystems were turned against the humans as the very flora and fauna arose to devour them. Never before had humanity faced such a terrible and overwhelming threat. Only when their defenses mustered an elite force of psychic and theurgic warriors to combat the Symbiots were the invaders finally repelled.
In the late 4900’s, during the peak of the Emperor Wars, Countess Carmetha Decados, the newly appointed Commander of the Imperial Stigmata Garrison, mobilized the Regency fleets and armies defending Stigmata to attack the al-Malik, leaving behind a small guard with no reserve. The Brother Battle contingent and a number of Eskatonic priests were all that was left to defend the planet. The countess’s fleet engaged the al-Malik at Istakhr, Shaprut, Aylon and Criticorum while the rest of the Decados forces invaded Malignatius, which the Li Halan had left poorly defended as they attacked the League world of Rampart. Wars erupted across the Known Worlds as the Houses fought for control of the Empire, leaving planets ravaged and devastated.
Meanwhile, the Symbiots, sensing the weakness in the Regency defensive lines, launched a massive assault. The remaining troops on Stigmata lost years of progress in a month as Symbiot abominations roamed freely over the planet, attacking where and when they chose. Giant living dirigibles sprayed the world with virulent pus which seemed to spread upon touching the ground. Brother Battle fortresses fell as the Symbiots struck, rolling back humanity’s defenders onto the plains of Durem and besieging the military headquarters at Sylan. The siege drew on relentlessly. After months of continuous assault, the Garrison was down to two weeks' rations and nearly out of ammunition. As the rest of the Empire battled for the Imperial Throne, the real fate of humanity rested in the hands of a few...
Stigmata
Darmak Cathedral, Darmak City
Amalthias 6th, 4991
The ruins of the capitol city blazed on the dusky horizon. The once standing Imperial offices and agora structures now lay toppled and littered over the scorched, pitted streets. Charred husks of buildings stood gaping, billows of smoke rising from their twisted, exposed frames. Collapsed architecture of razed temples covered the caving ground, pillars and arches lying crookedly over piles of crumbling masonry. Broken, blackened statues and monuments of Saint J’waltan and his followers lay strewn over the leveled rubble, some cracked and singed, others blasted or eroded beyond recognition. Decimated remnants of Aeon hospices and sanctums smoked in the distance, their cover long since demolished. Leaning silhouettes of abandoned watchtowers broke the glaring skyline, just visible at the edges of the ruined capitol. The remains of the city’s fortified outer walls seemed low and insignificant from here.
Oblate Randwulfe stared out over the sundered cityscape as the cool evening wind blew through his robes and soothed his weathered face. Around him, support teams rushed to erect artillery equipment and ferry ammunition and supplies between posts, while medics frantically tended to the wounded or hauled away the dead. Shouted orders and agonized cries for aid blended together in a continuous bedlam that seemed almost drowned out by the melancholy serenity of the desolate scene before the Brother Battle monk’s weary gaze.
It had been nearly five months since the siege began. The Symbiot armies had flooded across the no-man's land of the southern Istal mountains and overwhelmed the Brother Battle fortresses guarding the capitol. Master Claudius de Moley and Sister Theafana al-Malik had led the warriors and theurges in defending their battlements as best they could, but against the ceaseless onslaught, their forts had fallen, one by one. Word soon came that Sylan had also fallen under attack, and Brother Emerson Long and his men were too occupied holding the eastern front to spare any troops.
And so, within a mere month of the invasion, the Garrison had lost territory that had taken years to gain. Desperate requests for the Regency to send reinforcements from Byzantium Secundus and Tethys went unanswered, as the Regent had promised out the remaining Imperial Legions to serve her own House in the wars. Without any means of holding back the invasion, Master Claudius and his contingent lost more and more ground, until finally the Symbiots fell against the walls of the capitol city itself.
Some had willingly flung themselves at the Symbiots, begging for conversion rather than death. Others, led by Master Claudius and Sister Theafana, had rallied around the central starport, building a defensive line the invaders had so far found hard to breach. Bulwarking their line was the Darmak Cathedral, the Brother Battle's Holy See on Stigmata and their best remaining defense after their main monastery in Sylan. Their line had to hold, or all would be lost – and no one would remember who won the Emperor Wars when the Symbiots broke through to claim all the Known Worlds.
Now, in this brief moment of respite and reflection, as Stigmata’s faded red sun burned low over the wastes on the horizon, Oblate Randwulfe found himself faced with a true challenge to his faith. How far Stigmata had fallen. How far the human race, as a whole, had fallen. Was this to be the Pancreator’s Will?
Meanwhile, Private Ivan Darian had other concerns as he saw to the injured troops, who were taking rest after the recent strike mere hours earlier. There were more wounded than he could administer to himself, and even with his expert cyber-enhanced skills, some would inevitably have to be left to die while others received his aid. That was the arbitrary nature of the universe. The decision of whose lives would be saved was left to him and the few others tending to troops on the Cathedral’s outer grounds. There simply weren’t enough medics to help everyone, and choices had to be made. Wounded men cried for Darian’s help from all sides as he knelt over the writhing victim of an acid burn.
As men’s cries mixed with the constant relay of orders from the few sergeants and corporals to the support teams, Lieutenant Alejandra Matilde Eduardo de Aragon overlooked the vast expanse of Durem’s plains beyond the city. The chilly wind blew through her hair and buffeted her form as her eyes searched the dusk dimmed distance. Somewhere out there was her lost brother, still alive – or so she convinced herself. But would she ever have the chance to find him? Her thoughts were broken suddenly as one of her sergeants addressed her.
"Lieutenant," said the young man curtly from behind, coming to a stop and saluting her quickly,
"we’ve just received word from our scouts. The enemy’s forces have regrouped to the south and are making their way northeast toward the coast. How should we proceed?"
This message was last edited by the GM at 09:22, Sun 03 Mar 2019.
