Sons of Horus Tactical Support.

 

It is an Age of Darkness.

The Galaxy is aflame.

Brother turns on Brother.

This is M.31.

*****

Great palls of fire reached towards the sky as another shattering bombardment fell from orbit. The traitor spaceships rained punishing ordnance upon the void shields of the Imperial Palace.

Far below, in the sprawling cityscape which had grown around the seat of Imperial Governance, running battles were taking place as the traitors slowly advanced.

The loyalists defending paid with their lives for every foot of ground the traitors took, organising counter attacks to retake the ground as they fought on the cradle of humanity.

Kalharle led his support Squad forwards through the Himalazian dusk, crunching through rubble and masonry, even as another building was blasted to pieces about a quarter mile away.

His squad, walking with the practice of those Legionaries who have been cannon-slingers for decades, swept their autocannons to cover the roadway ahead.

Reports had been inconclusive, but a platoon of mortal infantry had been ambushed around here, and a force had been sent to secure the road, as it was a vital supply line. Without the road open, their forces at the front would be starved of ammunition and other supplies.

Their helmets clicked as they voxed each other on the squad channel, bemoaning being placed into this patrol because of the useless mortal infantry which couldn't do it's job.

Kalharle let the men gripe, uncaring of the lack of discipline for the moment.

That quickly changed when spikes of temperature glowed orange on his helmet display. 

"Enough, contact ahead one thousand feet" he growled at his squad, affirmatives echoed back as they locked the readings.

"Close in and open fire at my command" Kalharle said and the squad broke into the awkward jogging motion as they wrestled with their cannon as they ran.

The readings on the display resolved themselves into three dozen mortal auxiliaries, and a tank holding up behind cover at the intersection.

"Tagror, target the tank, the rest of you, the infantry, open fire" he ordered as they came within range.

Lasfire spitting at them, well past its lethal range, it splashed off their armour. The infantry had noticed as we're trying to bring heavier weapons to bear.

Kalharle smiled inside his helmet as he pressed the trigger on his Combi-Plasma, the superheated ball of energy incinerating a section of the barricade and a few of the unfortunate humans next to it. The defeating roar, accompanied by the bass throb and fireball announced the autocannons opening fire.

Men were thrown backwards as puppets with strings cut, limbs were separated from torsos, heads vanished under the punishing firepower, only the tank remained, armour sparking under Tagror's assault.

He grunted as one of his rounds touched off a fuel line of caught the turret mantle. The tank hatches explosively bent out and smoke poured from the gaps, clearly something had gone up inside.

"Move to clear the area, I'll vox Praetor Sichar and get reinforcements sent, we'll be back on the front soon!".

*****

Here we have a squad which I wasn't planning to finish this quickly, but these things kind of happen when you're enjoying painting something I guess.

A couple of weeks back, whilst in training in Nottingham I took a visit to Warhammer World after we finished for the day.

I had intended to just pick up Gotrek Gurnisson, who I missed out on when he was released for AoS at the last Black Library Weekender, but they had a few copies in stock so I thought I'd grab him whilst in the area.

As you do, I took a walk into the Forge World store and after admiring the kits on display, decided that I should pick something up as I was there.

With the Horus Heresy focussing my modelling recently, I decided upon a blister of Autocannons to make a Tactical Support Squad with.

Here is the result:

All the same paint scheme as the Cataphractii I previously posted, but this time in Mark IV armour.

I purposely chose to use the studded legs and shoulder pads on the left shoulder. Reasoning that these Astartes will be stood more side on to the enemy a lot of the time, so the rivets of Ceramite add to their armours defences.

I know it's 30k, but it still needs SKULLS on the bases!

Their right shoulder pads are missing at the moment because I am going to use the proper sculpted Sons of Horus pads available. I just need to order them, but want to do it in bulk to make it cheaper on shipping.

With two squads and a character now complete the Sons of Horus are advancing, I think I'm going to make a proper tactical squad and maybe a destroyer squad next.

Hobby bingo gives me another unit box completed for another ten points, bringing me to eight hundred total.

I've a few more things nearly finished, so it may be a few posts away for my next Heresy unit, but they are coming...

Until next time...