BITTER

“ My name is Grabien Saxxis, and I am an Iron Warrior. I have served My Lord Perturabo since the early days of the Great Crusade, commanding the 8^th Grand Company, and I serve still. “

“ I remember our ships orbiting the lush world of Tallarn and I remember watching it being boiled to nothing when our Viral Missiles set it ablaze in a whirl wind of death. The entire planet burned and disintegrated to nothing as we prepared for war.”

“ It was my fleet of Predators and Land Raiders that made first contact with the Tallarn Army after the first poisoned winds of our virus bombs had cleared enough for combat. The ground was rough and rugged on our tracks and several of our Bane Blades to my left became immobilized by incoming fire from their hidden earth shaker cannons. The innumerous squadrons of Leman Russ tanks spread before us like a wall of steel, yet we charged forward firing our lascannons as we swerved to avoid the volley of fire.”

“Still to this day I have never seen a battle so grand , it dwarfed even the Battle for Terra in the volume of destruction. The madness of it all rivaled only by the worlds inside the Eye of Terror.”

“ Tallarns armored companies out numbered us nearly five to one, though our tactics kept is in the fight through sheer force of brutality and precision. We gave no heed the Imperials nor did they to us. Within the first hour of fighting my spearhead was reduced to my own Land Raider and two predators, one of which was slowly burning, super heated form a plasma cannon fire. The dust and smoke of tens of thousands of war machines choked the sky from the dying surface to the black skies. It was only the beginning, as my spearhead had done their job and drawn out the rats from their hiding places. The Legions Thunder Hawk transporters had been dropping in squadron after squadron of modified Rhinos and Predators while the Land Raiders and Demolishers pounded the front battle lines.”

“ The carnage was immeasurable, shredded and charred wrecks began to pile up, the battlefield becoming a graveyard of twisted metal and massive craters. Our Line breaker squadrons had formed a wedge and began dividing the Imperial force, but little did we know it would be to our own detriment. The sneaks rats of the Tallarn army had hidden in the midst of their chimeras, a full company of flame belching hellhound tanks and their corrosive spitting counterparts. Nearly sixty vindicators were lost on that push but still we advanced, determined to kill the Imperial dogs.”

“As more of my battle brothers joined me from the rear we pressed on, ramming the Imperials tanks with our dozer blades and bombarding them from our ships in low orbit. Our Lord Perturabo bid us clear a path for him as the Titans had finally set foot down from our strike cruisers. The ground shook with each step and each discharge of their massive weapons. We pushed them back for miles, our guns never ceasing their fire. As dawn was upon the wasteland that was Tallarn our Legion seemed to have the upper hand and the Gate would soon be ours. “

“ The sounds of metal bending and melting and the rumbling of a millions of tanks could be heard clearly even in the confines of my Land Raider. Through the view port I could see Old Thorin’s Predator, it’s armor pitted and covered in soot, just ahead of me firing its autocannon wildly at the dozen colossus forming a blockade. They fired all at once, the force of their blasts sending not only Old Thorin’s Predator but my own vehicle as well spinning into the air. The concussion of the blow slammed into us with a fierce jolt and everything went black.”

“ Servitors had managed to put the fire out while I was unconscious. Although we were still mobile, we had lost the use of our heavy bolters and one lascannon. All around us the Tallarns battered into us, the sheer number of Imperial armor seemed too much for our Astartes tanks. “

“ The battle continued and time seemed not to matter, we had orders and the mission was to be accomplished. The Titans that fought for us helped push back the Tallarns time and time again, but still they came, determined to fight us to death, it seemed for every one tank of theirs we laid low three more rushed up to take its place. The mighty sandstorms began to cover the area, burying some of the destroyed vehicles beneath the sands. More and more Tallarn tanks rolled out from their hidden bunkers to stop us, pummeling our flanks with their mortars and battle cannons. ”

“ It mattered not to our Lord though. Soon we would reach our quarry, we had pushed them back far enough, or so we thought. Their commander, whoever the whelp was, had held back his most prized units- his company of Bane Blades. They fired at will and nearly an hundred Rhinos were crushed or ripped in two by the fury of their cannons. The Lord Perturabo barked orders through our com links, to take out the Bane Blades at all costs, and cost us it did.”

“ The Bane Blade company had been decimated, though in the process we lost three times as many Rhinos and Land Raiders. The battle brothers inside never got the chance to feel the kick of as bolter in their hand or the roar of their chain axe one last time. Their bodies just more debris to litter the polluted barren landscape.”

“ The Remnants of our Legion roared on, chasing the Imperials into a low valley. It was too late when we realized it to be nothing more than another trick, as giant turrets shot out from the very bed rock and began pouring shrieking las fire into us. We had raced into a trap. The Tallarn armor and gun turrets in front of us , the valley walls to our sides and our own wrecks behind us. It was a massacre. “

“ My own Land Raider was finally crippled and my squad and I raced for what cover we could, the volume noise making it hard to hear the constant orders being barked over the static filled com links. Our power armor worked double time to protect us from the still dying planet, but we would not have lasted for long, my own armor had begun to smolder and I began to taste the acrid stench of the atmosphere. We held our ground for some time, setting up fire teams and keeping on the move until First Sergeant Ragunze of the 5^th opened his assault doors on his Land Raider, as I sprinted for the open hatch, the skyline was illuminated. Hundreds of Imperial battle barges had come into orbit and slipped past our own blockade. Their reinforcements had arrived. Not even the Titans that fought alongside us could repel their numbers. The order to retreat was given.”

“ As he headed back to drop site, more of our Legions armor was destroyed as we fled. What tanks we had left were rushed off the planets surface and those that were salvagabvle were dragged into our transporters. I know my own company had taken sever losses, only third of it still lived .In the end the wreckage of a million tanks was all that was left. Millions of pounds of twisted metal, burned out corpses of mighty war machines, left to rot in the dust of a dead planet.”

“ Of all the countless wars I have fought, the Battle for Tallarn still burns the most in my mind. The bitter taste of defeat not easily forgotten by any of my Legion. My own company never fully recovered, though to this day our banners still give homage to the 8^th, the first to slam head on with the stubborn Tallarn Army, and the last to leave its decrepit surface.”