The vast towering temple stretches out four hundred meters over the stern of the vestal and throbs with raw power from the mighty engines below it. Around three sides the stained-glass windows reach sixty meters up to the ornate gothic arches of the ceiling. Behind the windows the heavy armour plating of the hull is brightly lit and painted to give extra dimensions of colour and vibrancy to the glorious scenes depicted in the glass. The air hear is rich with incense and full of the bright, choral sounds from the many cherubim that circle the rafters and the deep, sonorous, tones from the large choir of Ecclesiastical Adepts.

The vast towering temple stretches out four hundred meters over the stern of the vestal and throbs with raw power from the mighty engines below it. Around three sides many of the stained-glass windows are smashed or damaged and the heavy armour plating of the hull behind them is dull, scorched and pitted. Some of the ornate gothic arches of the ceiling  sixty meters above are damaged, especially in the vicinity of the perfectly round five meter hole cut by the Eldar when they gained access here from their ship, now clamped on the outside of the Lament. The air hear is heavy with incense, cordite and burnt promethean, choral sounds praising the emperor may still be heard faintly behind the screams of men and rattle of gunfire but the cherubim mostly lie in ruins on the floor.

The Eldar had latched their damaged ship to the hull of the pious lament in the rear where turreted weapons could not target them, the had attached a sealing tube to the hull and cut a large hole through and hundreds of corsairs had dropped through. The temple is defended only by unprepared Ministorum priests and acolytes but they put up a brave fight and managed to contain the invasion for lone enough for troopers to arrive though it cost them dearly an few remain to tell of it. The troopers, under the direction of the First Officer, have prevented the Eldar from breaking out of their bridge head as all the exits to temple are forward into the ship so right now both sides are intrenched but the Eldar do seem to be setting up some sort of heavy-duty device out of sight towards the rear of the Temple.

Close behind the temple in the main body of the ship is triage station seven, here is a scene of total chaos, the corridor blocked by wounded people and their helpers with no sign of any of his medical staff at all, these people have arrived at the back of a que with no one to tell them what to do or where to go. In the station itself all of the medical staff are working desperately to stabilise wounded people and prevent their imitate death, many hygrine protocols have gone out of the window as people will die if the medics pause and the corpses of those who haven’t made it lie everywhere.
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The captain moves through the crowd at the head of a relief column of troops heading to the temple. As they hit the wall of wounded she orders a dozen troops to move off to assist organising the wounded and triaging them, those who can wait further away, those beyond help be left, those needing immediate help are attempted to be seen by a medicae staff member if possible.

The captain herself moves into the Cathedral, shield held up as she moves towards the XO to get a sit-rep and figure out what to do from there.

By the time the Captain arrives in the Temple things have reached a stalemate with the xenos holding the rear end of the vast space and the ship's troops holding the forward, fortunately access to the rest of the ship  was in the hands of the friendly forces but they could do little to dislodge the Eldar as they received withering fire whenever they tried to make a move. These Eldar were not the silver clad elites that had tried to take the bridge, these were corsairs, each clad differently and with their own selection of xeno weaponry, even so the average human trooper was totally outmatched and it was only superiour numbers that was keeping things in check.

Apart from getting rid of these invaders there were two problems facing the defenders, one was the machinery that they had bought in through the hole in the ceiling, the Eldar were constructing something in the back of the hall out of sight and who knew what that was for. The other problem was the hole itself, currently sealed off by the alien ship, if it pulled away or was removed by any means the Temple would decompress in seconds and anyone in here would be sucked out into space or, if they did manage to hold on to something, be left breathing vacuum.
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"We need a combat repair team down here for when that hole get opened and we need to cross over to them." She tells the nearest commander of the armsmen. "We need storm elements up here and weapons teams to provide covering fire" she adds heft the shield she has and the laspistol, blind firing some shots towards the eldar from cover then dropping back down "Perhaps get a rhino or chimera up here, Emmaline  or Megara's might would do it."

Hadrian jogged up and gave her a nod of greeting, "Lord-Captain." He has Thunder Hammer in hand and it was...smeared in blood and other bits. He looked like he had been in combat himself, from the look of his clothing if nothing else. "Let me know later if you want a report on what I dealt with or I'll run it up the chain."

He peeked in to the Temple and frowned. "Hm. That looks...dangerous." He looked back to the Captain. "They apparently set up some kind of...gateway...where I was, that they could pass through. I wonder if that's what they're building back there. I don't know how many are on your ship right now, or where."

"I've heard stories of the Aeldari appearing as if from thin air and assumed it was some sort of teleportation technology. A couple of grenade launchers would be handy right now." She says popping up to fire another burst at the xenos.

"Are there any boarding troops with shields around here? We can storm the enemy hopefully at least break their lines, have the armsmen provide cover fire, get some grenades into their cover. We also need someone up there" at this she points the barrel of the gun at the boarding tube "That needs to be sealable incase they pull out suddenly. If we get the chance we could counterboard, but first we need to clear this"

After administration of two ampoules of 2-acetoxybenzoic acid and the recitation of the Efficacious Prayer of the Emperor's Succor ("Take wing, agony!"), Gregory is ready to fight again, for the most part. After getting as many of his men together as he can, he heads over to Searlait's location. As he listens to a brief of the situation along the way, he resists the urge to curse out loud; he could have been shooting xenos and collecting trophies all this while!

Regardless, he is here now, and the xenos will assuredly taste the wrath of his storm bolter this time...

"Reporting for duty, ma'am! I brought everyone from the auspex fin that I could get to help out. UNless Otherwise DIRected, I will begin coordinating and directing operations against  the intruders."
This message was last edited by the player at 12:29, Mon 27 Mar 2023.

Gregory makes some calls and before long troops start to turn up in large numbers, officers comandeer nearby passageways where they can organise and prepare the men and by the time one of the rhinos trundles onto the scene there are plenty of troopers for a full scale assault, with more arriving all of the time.

Apart from the several hundred troops already holding the Eldar at bay there are 150 Breachers on hand, 200 men from the assault Company and the whole of the first company of regulars under Colonel, Bottrell, which is 500 men. Meanwhile, in the hall of St Gothren the two thousand men of the  2nd Reserve battalion are forming up under Colonel Kinrade. And the rhino of course.

The estimated enemy strength is between 150 and 250.
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Hadrian waited as patiently as he could. He saw things were forming up quite nicely. Perhaps even overpoweringly - but then again, with the xenos, who knew. He rolled his head around on his neck a bit, loosening up once more when he saw things might be nearing readiness.

He hefted the thunder hammer and looked their captain. He asked quietly, "Permission to join in and smash some Eldar, Lord-Captain?"