My Little Xeno

The next day was the day of the muster of the new PDF. Stormy had gone to school in the morning and now Antonius entered the throne room. He was wearing his neatly polished armor and weapons, his helmet attached to his belt. The preparations were running at full blast. A fairly big table was set up in front of the throne, behind this table were three chairs, the central one appropriately sized for a Space Marine.

"Hello, Antonius!" Celestia and Luna greeted him,
"ready to take a look at the applicants?"

"Of course. Have you planned anything specific in addition to our agreement?"

"No," Celestia told him,
"the ponies come in one by one and we evaluate them. We'll start in half an hour."

"Are the swords ready?"

"Yes," Luna answered and pointed at two servants who were carrying a weapons rack into the room.

"Excellent," Antonius nodded.

He and the princesses spent the time until the muster with attuning their basis of assessment and setting priorities, then they sat down at the table; Antonius in the middle, Celestia to his left, Luna to his right.
Now Raven, Celestia's secretary, gave her a scroll and left again.

"Okay, I've got the list of the applicants. Ready to start?" Celestia asked.

Antonius and Luna answered in the affirmative and she said:

"Send in the first applicant."

Then she turned to them and added:

"The first one is Lemon Lime, a unicorn stallion."

Unicorn. So, a magic user. Antonius honestly hoped for a decent number of them, since defeating a Chaos Space Marine with pony-strength alone would prove to be... difficult.

A lime green pony entered the room and greeted:

"Good day, Princess Celestia, Princess Luna and Lord Commander Varus. I'm here to apply for the new guard."

"Rather defense force than guard," Celestia said kindly,
"but anyway: Why do you apply?"

"Well, I heard that the Lord Commander is about to get his own guard, like the Royal- and Night Guard. So I thought I apply. A fancy uniform certainly isn't bad, either."

Antonius facepalmed. What a great start of this muster. A short glance at the princesses told him that they were just as stunned as he was.

"Didn't you read the proclamation?" Luna asked with irritation,
"the PDF is not just another guard!"

"Oh?" Lemon Lime asked in surprise,
"actually, no. I just heard that a new guard was about to be formed and thought I'd join. What makes this PDF so different, if I may ask?"

Antonius was not sure if he should answer him or slap this moron out of the room. He chose the former:

"The PDF will not be an ceremonial unit. We expect its soldiers to fight an extremely dangerous foe and be ready to give their lives if necessary."

The unicorn paled and started stammering:

"Oh? Oh! Well, I think... I mean... umm... may I cancel my application?"

"Yes, of course," Celestia sighed.

Lemon Lime darted out of the room and was gone.

"That was somewhat suboptimal," Antonius stated dryly.

"At least it can't get worse - probably," Luna opined.

"Let's continue with applicant number two: Gentle Breeze, a pegasus mare," Celestia said.

"What?" Antonius and Luna shouted.

Indeed: Gentle Breeze came walking in through the door, smiling cordially.

"Hello, Princess Celestia. Hello, Princess Luna. And hello, Lord Commander Varus. It's nice to see you again. Oh, by the way, Princess Luna, I've got the prints you wanted. Here they are!" she greeted and put the mentioned prints on the table in front of Luna.

"Ah, I knew I had heard the name before," Celestia said,
"so, you are the mare from Hope who paid Moonlight and Blackwing a visit? Nice to meet you."

"Thank you, Gentle Breeze, it really is a pleasure seeing you again, though I have to admit that I am somewhat surprised to see you here. You really want to join the PDF?" Luna asked.

Antonius was a bit surprised, too, but thinking about it, Gentle Breeze's application absolutely made sense.

"Yes, I want to," she answered,
"I have seen what Chaos can do, and I want to protect others from the fate my hometown had to suffer."

"You do not have any military experience, do you?"

"No, Princess Luna, but I'm a quick learner, and I promise I will never let you down."

The princesses looked at Antonius, and he started talking:

"While we are looking for military experience, a brave heart is nothing to dismiss easily. How far does your loyalty go? Would you die for ponykind?"

"Yes, if that would be necessary."

"So you ready the proclamation..."

"Of course I did. Why else should I be here?"

Antonius smiled and got up.

"Let's see if you can handle a sword - or is it 'mouthle'?"

He fetched two swords and gave one to Gentle Breeze. The other one, just a dagger to him, he kept.

"Now, show me what you think an attack should look like."

Gentle Breeze started circling him in a wide arc, the hilt of the sword in her mouth. Antonius decided to play along and started doing the same. Suddenly, the pegasus stopped and smiled.

"Gotcha!" she said.

Well, she had not really gotten him, they had not even started yet. Antonius quickly examined the situation and got an idea what she was talking about.

"Tell us what you mean," he asked her.

"Well," she explained, grabbing her sword with a wing to free her muzzle,
"you are now inside a triangle, formed by the princesses and myself. That means that we could attack you from three different angles simultaneously, and since you only have two arms, one of the attacks would be unblockable, wouldn't it?"

Antonius smiled.

"Not bad. Not completely right, since you overlooked my armor and perhaps a few other details, but, all told, not bad, especially for a first attempt. A brains-over-brawn approach."

He turned to the princesses:

"I vote for giving her a chance. What do you think?"

Luna and Celestia agreed. The PDF had its first member.

Some time later, the ponies who had followed Gentle Breeze up to that point had also passed the muster. Some of them had been veterans of the Royal Guard, some had been members of local police forces. The last applicant had even been a valued Night Guard veteran.

"It's getting better and better," Antonius rejoiced,
"let's continue with the next one!"

"Umm..." Celestia said as she took a look at the list,
"there might be a little problem with that."

"What is wrong?"

"We don't have any applicants left."

Antonius did not put too much effort into hiding his disappointment.

"Oh? That makes... how many? 13?"

"Indeed," Luna sighed and closed her eyes for a second,
"2 unicorns, 4 earth ponies, 6 pegasi, 1 batpony."

"That's quite a lot of pegasi - at least compared to the other kinds," Antonius remarked.

"That's not really surprising," Celestia explained,
"pegasi originally were a warrior tribe. A lot of them still tend to have a propensity towards physical conflict."

"Hmm... somehow I'm just trying to imaging Fluttershy charging into battle, waving a sword and roaring..."

The princesses snickered.

"Doesn't work, does it?" Celestia asked.

"Not really, no."

"Well, she is the element of kindness for a reason, but you shouldn't underestimate her. If she's angry enough, she can be downright terrifying... But back to business: 13 ponies. Will they be enough?"

"To be honest, I had hoped for more. Especially more unicorns. However, it's no use complaining. We will train the 13 of them. Hmm... 13... that's the number of my Legion. Let's see that as a good omen."

"Do you really believe in such stuff?" Luna asked incredulously.

"No. But as matters now stand, I take what I can get."

After lunch, the newly founded PDF came together for their first training. Antonius inspected the line of ponies, who all had snapped to attention as soon as he and Luna had entered the room.

"Ponies," he started,
"you are now members of the Planetary Defense Force. From now on, you are the breakwater that protects ponykind from the tides of Chaos! You will never falter, never surrender. You will be the guardians of ponykind! Are you ready to fulfill this duty?"

"Yes, Lord Commander!" the ponies shouted.

"This duty will not be easy," Antonius continued,
"you know the risks you all have agreed to take, risks greater than what members of the Guards have to face."

A buff earth pony stallion with a brown coat and a black mane opened his mouth, but hesitated to say anything.
Antonius turned to him:

"Speak up, Black Harrow. You are supposed to be the future trainers of many more PDF recruits, so if you have a question, ask."

"Lord Commander," Black Harrow said,
"we know that this job can - and probably will - get dangerous. This information was part of the proclamation, and you told us during our interview. Yet, we are here to stay. We are willing to do our duty and even die if necessary."

"Good. Now, Princess Luna and I will teach you to survive and make your enemy die instead. Sounds better, doesn't it?"

Some ponies chuckled for a second, then Black Harrow said:

"We are looking forward to learning the art of war."

"'The art of war'?" Antonius repeated, an eyebrow raised,
"war is not an art. War is science. Observation, assessment, planning and execution. Those four processes form an endless circle. You gather information about your enemy's actions and determine his goals. Then, you come up with an adequate strategy to counter or attack him and then you do so.
As your experience grows, the processes will become more sophisticated and the iterations of the circle will become faster. You will learn to observe meticulously, to avoid jumping to conclusions, to select the appropriate strategy and the fighting skills to crush your enemy.
And you will learn the principles of Theoretica and Practica, the hypothetical, but realistic problem and the specific procedure to solve it. That is the way the Ultramarines wage war, and we successfully do so for over ten thousand years now."

The ponies just stared at him now, until Shadow Stalker, the Night Guard veteran, said:

"I have never before heard such a factual summary of fighting. It is in equal shares impressive and dire to see killing reduced to some kind of equation."

Antonius turned to him:

"Maybe, but dark times are about to come. You will have to overcome your innate inhibition against killing. While you should probably not start actually liking it, you shouldn't see it as an atrocity - it is simply craft. If your species shall survive, you will have to learn to kill without hesitation, mercy or remorse, for you can be sure, Chaos will slaughter you at every possible opportunity - or worse."

"He is right," Gentle Breeze remarked,
"I have seen what Chaos can do. We have to accept the Lord Commander's teachings, even if they seem... somewhat fierce and brutally cold to us. We must not judge them in view of our normal life, but in view of a mad, daemonic power that wants to wipe us out."

"That will be fun, eh?" Black Harrow said sarcastically.

"Wanna quit?" Antonius asked him.

"No, Lord Commander!" he answered,
"as I said, I am here to stay."

Luna was honestly surprised how this first training session went. Of course there was fighting - a fighting demonstration of her and Antonius and also slow motion fights where he explained critical aspects of melee - but there was also an important theoretical part.

Sometimes it was a bit hard to listen to, even for Luna; killing really just was some sort of craft to him, a profession, but he seemed to know that ponies would have some problems with that, so he tried to ease the situation every now and then with a joke or anecdote. He had said he would look to it that things wouldn't get too grim, and he did just that. The hours flew by and finally Antonius said:

"Recruits, I say we'll call it a day. Good work, especially for the first day. Now, enjoy your free time and then get some rest, so that we can continue tomorrow. Dismissed!"

The ponies left and Luna and Antonius were alone in the room.

"Really," she said with a smile,
"I'm almost as much a student here as I'm a teacher. Well, the gathered experiences of ten thousand years of perpetual war of course surpass my own."

"Actually," Antonius replied,
"those are teachings of the Codex Astartes, written by our revered Primarch Guilliman. He went to great lengths to codify war, every aspect of it, every nuance. We still live by his word, and every written issue of the Codex is a holy relic."

"You seem a bit... sad," Luna noticed compassionately.

"Maybe. The Codes Astartes was never meant to be shared with non-humans, yet this is what I do. I can, however, not find another sensible course of action. I know I'm doing what is necessary, but it still leaves me a bit... uneasy."

Hmm... this xenophobia his Imperium propagated, taught by bad experiences, did not make it especially easy for Antonius to help ponykind. Luna felt sorry for him. Well, she was his friend, so she would do her best to cheer him up:

"Each of your decisions up to now has been led by honor. You fight evil and help the innocent. There cannot possibly be anything wrong with that."

"Hmm."

"Oh, and your speech: You got inspired by this Tigurius, didn't you? I mean this 'breakwater' thing."

Antonius smiled:

"Yes, I have to admit that. I'm not a fan of giving speeches, but if I have to, I try to learn from the best."

Luna smiled, too, then she yawned.

"Sorry, Antonius, but I'm really tired now. I better go to bed."

"I'll escort you to your quarters."

When Luna had entered her room, Antonius went to his own quarters. He arrived just when Stormy returned from school.

"Hello, Stormy. How was school?" he asked.

"As always. How was being the big boss of this new guard?" Stormy grinned.

"Just the boss," Antonius smiled back,
"Luna is the big boss, as she is my commander."

"So, the boss is bigger than the big boss in this case?"

"Yes. In halfway decent societies, the big boss may be smaller than the boss."

Counterexample: Orks. The bigger they were, the more power they had.

"If the big boss grew taller than the boss, would she become the big big boss? Or bigger big boss? Or just bigger boss?" Stormy continued.

Hmm... if he kept to this point, he would probably get a headache.

"You're in a funny mood today, hmm?" Antonius asked and changed the subject.

"Yep!" she grinned.

Antonius changed back to his 'civil' clothes and they spent the time until dinner playing Stormy's beloved board games.
When they finally entered the dining room, they were already expected by Celestia, Twilight and Spike.

"Hello, Antonius," Celestia greeted,
"how was your first day training the new PDF?"

"Very good. They are all capable ponies. With Luna's help, they'll become good trainers for future recruits."

"Glad to hear that. Apropos Luna, my sister is apparently a little late for dinner..."

"Just a little, sister," Luna said, walking into the room.

To call her 'sleepy' would have been putting it mildly.

"Luna, I think you are overexerting yourself," Celestia opined,
"you look terrible."

"Charming," Luna deadpanned and took a seat.

"Really, Luna, you should take it easy."

"I have my duties, sister, just like you."

"Yes, my duty is to take care of the day, yours is to take care of the night. At the moment, you try to do both, since the PDF training is in the daytime."

"We can't properly train them at night. The recruits won't be very active while they're asleep."

Before this conversation could evolve into an argument, Antonius said:

"Perhaps we can, as an additional training."

"How do you mean that?" Luna wanted to know.

"You told me you can create shared dreams, right?"

"Well, yes, I can."

"Then, in addition to the two training sessions during the day, we can perform a dream-training-simulation at night. I suggest you skip the morning training and are present for the afternoon- and the new night training. That way, you can get some sleep and still help training the PDF. What do you think?"

"Well, that sounds like a compromise. Okay! I would not start tonight, though. The recruits have quite a lot to process and need their sleep and a chance to dream their own dreams."

"Agreed."

Now the waiters served the food and everyone started eating.
After dinner, they bid goodnight and Antonius and Stormy went to their quarters.

That night, Antonius was once again visited in his dreams by Luna. She had recreated the Fortress of Hera, where she was waiting for him.

"What a nice choice," Antonius smiled and looked around,
"I suppose that means that we are not fighting some dangerous creatures tonight, hmm?"

"Well," Luna answered,
"in fact, that depends on you. Tell me, do you want to use those dream-training sessions to toughen the PDF up?"

"It is an opportunity to slowly make them familiar with the enemy they'll have to fight. Furthermore, that way we can test and train their skills better than in our standard fights."

"Hmm, I thought so. Now that you are going to share the wisdom of your chapter with us, I wondered what it is like to be a Space Marine. I know you already told me a lot about that, but I would like to see what it really is like. I mean, would you show me the memories of one of your missions?"

What? Luna had no idea what she was asking for...

"Are you sure you want to see that? Those memories are somewhat... intense," Antonius pointed out.

"More intense than what I have seen in Hope?" Luna asked calmly.

"Some of them are, especially when we fought Chaos."

"Well, then what about fighting those 'xenos'? Show me why you hate them all so much. Oh, I have an idea: When you gave my sister that 'purity seal' you told her you fought Tyna... what was their name?"

Oh, that was a probably a bad choice.

"Tyranids," he told her.

"Yeah, that! Would you show me this fight?"

"Luna, I think you might have a problem with those xenos."

"But I have to get to know the truth about the galaxy. No matter what is out there, it won't go away just because I ignore it."

Antonius took a deep breath.

"Well, if you really want to see this specific memory, I will show it to you," he said a bit reluctantly.

"Oh, I have another request..."

"Yeah?"

"May I experience this memory as you?"

"Huh?"

"I mean, I would like to be inside your brain as a spectator and really experience what is going on instead of standing apart and just watching it. I want to see the true, unblemished memory of that encounter. Could you grant me that favor?"

Antonius scratched his head.

"You have no idea what you will see," he finally warned her.

"Do not worry, I have faced lots of horrifying nightmares before. Furthermore, I know it will just be a memory. I will be fine."

"If you insist... ready when you are."

Luna lit her horn.

It had worked.
Luna was in Antonius' brain inside the memory. She had her own thoughts and feelings, but at the same time, she could discern what Antonius had thought and felt. This was... unparalleled. In a way, she had downright become Antonius!

She could see a lot of numbers and runes that were added to her field of view. She looked up what those were in Antonius' mind: armor status, ammunition counter, targeting reticle and much more information was available to her. A 'HUD'. Intriguing.

At the moment she - respectively Antonius - was standing on broad marble steps that lead from a large plaza in concentric half-circles up to a bridge. She knew that beyond that bridge there was the local space port, the critical installation of this mission. Antonius did not take a look at it, he was surveilling the plaza down the steps, scanning the buildings and roads behind the plaza, his bolter in his hands, ready to fire.

Humans were pouring out of these roads and hurried towards the space port. There were mostly families, fear clearly visible in their faces. It was a stark contrast to Antonius: There was no sign of fear, although he knew what was coming towards them: Tyranids.

Despite the martial prowess of the Ultramarines, they had come too late to save the planet. When they had arrived, the swarm had already been too numerous to defeat. Billions of those xenos...
billions? Yeah, billions... oh dear...
...had taken over more than half of the planet already. The only thing the Ultramarines could do now was to evacuate the remaining citizens and then deny the Tyranids this source of food by incinerating the planet.
Incinerating?

Second company was in the city and slowing the advance of the xenos, while Seventh made sure that the space port stayed operational. Until now, it was. Just at that moment, the deafening roar of a starting voidship, packed with humans, proved that.

"Enemy incoming. Mostly Hormagaunts, some Termagaunts" came over the company vox.

So, the fight was about to begin. Thankfully, the evacuation was almost complete and the last citizens were hurrying past the Ultramarines' line.

"Brothers," a hard voice bellowed,
"the abomination that is the Tyranids is here at last. Let us make them regret the day they entered our galaxy!"

Chaplain Cassius. He had come here with Seventh as reinforcements to oversee the evacuation. He had given a purity seal to Antonius, and Antonius was determined to prove himself worthy of it.

Now, a wave of some sort came into view, flowing around the buildings and...
Oh dear...
This wave consisted of living creatures! Luna could not believe it, although she saw it with her own eyes... well, actually, Antonius' eyes.
A seething mass of talons and teeth, running towards the space port at ridiculous speed.

Luna had to remind herself that this was just a memory, Antonius would survive this.
Antonius himself stayed eerily calm. She could just discern a spike of precisely directed hatred for those aliens. Other than that, he waited, his bolter set to single fire due to the rather large distance to the enemy.

The HUD outlined those monsters and showed her, in addition to that, what the other Ultramarines were aiming at; an interlinked targeting system. Wow.

But that was nothing compared to what went on in Antonius' subconsciousness: it provided him - and her - with a flood of calculations of angles, speeds and distances as well as information how to kill those creatures in the most efficient way, a lexicon of the enemy units. Unbelievable. Luna had to blank this stream of information out, it was too much for her without time to get used to it.

"Open Fire!" Cassius shouted, and an enormous thunder filled the air.

Dozens, hundreds of bolts were fired, tearing into the enemy lines and ripping limbs from bodies and heads from necks. The Tyranids, though, just ignored their losses and continued running towards the Ultramarines. The ammunition counter steadily counted down.

As they came closer, Brother Maximus to Antonius' left switched to burst fire mode. Other Marines did the same. Two seconds later, Antonius and a second tier of Marines switched firing modes. Luna could see the ammo counter in Antonius' display counting down way faster now. Then, Luna heard the characteristic 'click' of an empty magazine. Maximus. He reloaded his bolter while Antonius kept firing.

Now, Antonius' magazine was at an end, but not before Maximus had opened fire again.
So, that had been the meaning of this tiered changing of firing modes. It prevented the Ultramarines from having to reload all at the same time!

The battle went on and the Tyranids managed to advance steadily. Despite their horrendous losses, they just kept coming, unstoppable, like a sea that had decided to flood the area.

The Space Marines had switched to full auto now and the Tyranids were close enough that Luna could take a closer look at them. Those things looked as if they came out of the darkest nightmare not even imaginable, horrors beyond compare. Talons like scythes, mouths that made even the fiercest predator in Equestria look like a pussycat in comparison. And they kept coming, climbing over their own dead to reach their prey.

A 'click' again and Maximus started reloading. This time, one of the Tyranids used that moment and jumped at him. Fortunately, Antonius sent a bolt into the creature's head, the impact stopping it and sending it to the ground in front of Maximus. The Space Marine nodded in gratitude and started firing again.

'Click'. Luna started to hate that sound.
Antonius ejected the depleted magazine and slammed a new one into the bolter. Before he could open fire again, though, a Hormagaunt - Luna had looked that up by now - slammed into him and dragged him to the ground. Talons made ruts into his armor and a drooling maw tried to bite into his helmet. Antonius punched the creature, but it refused to let go and held on to him. Yet, the punch had not been in vain: He had managed to level his bolter at the xeno and now he pulled the trigger. Bolts slammed into the Hormagaunt's body, exploding it from the inside.

Antonius shoved the mutilated corpse away and fired into the incoming Tyranids again, still lying on the ground, not having the time to get up again.
Just as his magazine was about to run dry again, he noticed that the wave of Tyranids also had run dry. The battle field was littered with ragged corpses, but his autosenses did not pick up a living xeno anymore. The first wave was defeated.

"Antonius," he heard the voice of Sergeant Seneca over the vox,
"please get up again. You make this assignment look too easy if you're lying around while fighting."

Luna was completely stunned. She really had not expected such a lighthearted comment in such a grim situation.
Antonius got up again, aided by Maximus' helping hand.

"You okay?" Maximus asked.

"Sure. Just a few scratches, nothing worth mentioning," Antonius replied.

"Squad, reload and restock," Seneca ordered,
"the first wave may be defeated, but there are many more to come."

Damnit, more? The Ultramarines must have killed hundreds, thousands of those creatures already. Luna had to remind herself that this was an evacuation mission. The planet was already lost, teeming with countless billions of those horrifying things.

Within half a minute, Antonius had restocked and was ready for battle again. Then, there was movement in the streets beyond the plaza, but instead of Tyranids, Second company and more civilians appeared and made their way through the organic rubble.

When they had reached the lines of Seventh, Antonius heard Chaplain Cassius ask:

"Where is Captain Sicarius and the rest of Second?"

"They are still in the city, escorting the governor and her entourage," a member of Second answered.

Cassius walked up to Antonius and Maximus and said:

"You two, with me. Let's take a look what takes them so long."

WHAT? Luna was speechless. What took them so long? Tyranids, that's what took them so long!
Going into this city was suicide in her opinion, but, on the other hoof, they had to help their brothers. Luna though about all of this. They had to go, and in taking just two Space Marines with him, Cassius ensured that the remaining force was still strong enough to defend the space port.

Cassius, Antonius and Maximus crossed the plaza and entered the roads. They were empty. No sign of Tyranid activity, but they knew that this could change any moment.

"Captain Sicarius," Cassius said over the vox,
"this is Chaplain Cassius. I'm on my way to assist you."

It took a second, then Sicarius responded:

"This is Sicarius. While I appreciate your help, I actually want our troops to leave the city instead of entering it."

"Noted. I have two Battle Brothers with me. We are closing in."

It did not take long to find Sicarius and his remaining men. They were retreating - constantly firing at small groups of Tyranids that attacked them - with the limping governor and her entourage in their midst. Surprisingly, this entourage was a little girl.
Cassius, Antonius and Maximus immediately joined the fight.

"Greetings, Captain. I hope you have left some of those foul xenos over for us," Cassius growled, killing a Tyranid with a precise headshot.

"Just a few billions," Sicarius answered,
"I just wonder what they are planning. They could attack us with far more force than that."

"The strike force they sent to attack the space port was also just to test our defenses."

"Well, be that as it may, we have to get the governor out of here."

"Why is she not already on a ship?"

"She refused to leave until she had made sure the citizens were all on their way to safety."

"And the girl?"

Sicarius sighed.

"Refused to be separated from her mother and I did not think it a good idea to let one of our men drag a screaming child through the city."

"Now that we are here, we could speed things up," Cassius suggested,
"Brother Varus can pick them up and carry them to the space port. We could speed our retreat then."

"Good idea."

Cassius turned to Antonius:

"You heard the plan."

Antonius took a look at the governor and her daughter. They child was not harmed, but her mother had wounds on her legs and arms; she would not be able to grab on to his armor, so he would have to carry both of them. That meant that he could not use his bolter.
Great. Running through the city during a Tyranid invasion without the ability to defend himself. Well, in Antonius' opinion, this governor had proven that she took her duties seriously, so she deserved to be rescued, even if that was not exactly easy.

He put his bolter to his hip and picked both of them up, then the Ultramarines started to retreat at a rapid pace, Antonius in their middle, the mother in his right arm, the daughter in his left. They had almost reached the plaza, but the attacks from the direction of the city were getting more furious from second to second.
While the Hormagaunts were not much of a problem, it became difficult to shield the governor and her child from the ranged attacks. Luna look up in Antonius' mind what those strange projectiles were: Borer beetles, fired by the Fleshborers of an increasing numbers of Termagaunts. He had to duck and dodge shot after shot that managed to pass the Ultramarines line. Soon, the first Borer beetle would hit her, and her injuries would become critical.

"Time for a change of plans," Sicarius muttered,
"Brother Varus, the way to the space port should be clear. Get the governor and her daughter there as fast as you can. Run!"

Antonius obeyed and started running. He had barely made a few steps when a creature stepped out of a side road, bigger than any Luna had seen until now and about as tall as Antonius. This one also had those scythe-like talons, but in addition to that, it had some sort of long-barreled... something in its hands - if those appendages were hands at all. Luna listened to Antonius thoughts again:
this creature was a Warrior, deadly in ranged combat and melee. And Antonius could not use his bolter without dropping the two humans he carried. That would be their death sentence. Inacceptable.

So, while the creature was roaring skywards in anticipated triumph, expecting easy prey, Antonius voxed

"Warrior behind you!"

and simply dashed past the thing. He knew the Warrior could fire at him, but he hoped that his armor would protect him - and the women he carried. He even smiled when he thought about this abomination, leveling its gaze again at the spot where he had been, only to see that he had vanished.

A roar told him that the Warrior had spotted him again, but what he heard next told him that it would never fire. It was the thundering of a bolter, followed by a

"Warrior down."

Maximus had taken care of the problem and Antonius kept running. A short time later he left the roads and was on the plaza again. The number of corpses there had grown and he had to jump over them every now and then. He finally reached the Ultramarines line where he was greeted by Sergeant Seneca:

"Antonius, you know I don't mind you taking a little souvenir from a battle, but don't you think you are overdoing it a bit now?"

Wow, that Space Marine was incredible! It seemed he just couldn't be serious!

"Oh, that's just one little governor and her daughter," Antonius replied,
"but seriously: could you get them into a ship? I've got to go back."

What? Okay, Antonius was just as crazy as Cassius - or just as loyal. Had almost the same effect now.

Two scouts took care of the women and Antonius dashed back over the plaza and into the streets.
He immediately encountered the retreating Ultramarines, now engaged in melee. Captain Sicarius beheaded a creature with his Tempest Blade, and Chaplain Cassius' Crozius took a heavy toll on the attacking Tyranids.
A Warrior was just about to attack Maximus, but Antonius stopped it by sending a volley of bolts into its head.

"Brother Varus," Sicarius ordered,
"shot the ranged Tyranids, concentrate on the Warriors."

"Affirmative," Antonius answered and killed another creature with his bolter.

They entered the plaza. More Tyranids were pouring in from every road and were met by the bolts of Seventh. When they were halfway across the plaza, Antonius bolter had run dry and he had to switch to melee. He was fighting next to Maximus, killing his enemies with his combat knife and fists.

Then, a Warrior managed to hit Maximus head. The corrosive fluids splattered across his helmet and took his sight for a second. Unfortunately, that was enough for the Warrior to stab a claw through Maximus' damaged helmet. Antonius immediately thrust his knife into the creatures head, but it was too late: Maximus was dead and his body fell to the ground.

A Hormagaunt used this gap in the Ultramarines' line and jumped. Standing on the corpses of Maximus and the dead Warrior it lashed out and hit Antonius left arm that had come up to block the strike. The armor cracked and the Gaunt cut into his flesh. Antonius returned this 'favor' and killed the creature with his knife.
Then he took a short look at Maximus body, buried under two corpses. There probably was no time to retrieve Maximus' gene-seed or the sacred armor he wore, which made the loss even worse.

"Continue to fall back!" Sicarius ordered, confirming his concerns.

They finally reached the line of Seventh and together, they retreated to the space port.
Now, the drop ships, still waiting for them, could open fire and cover the boarding of the Space Marines.
Once they were on board, they immediately started with roaring engines, quickly gaining height and leaving the atmosphere.

"Prepare to open fire on the planet," Sicarius voxed to the small fleet in orbit,
"let's make the Tyranids pay for the atrocities they committed."

"Ready to fire," came the answer,
"although I fear they won't pay as dearly as they deserve. We are picking up signals of multiple hive ships leaving the planet."

"Damnit. Fire!" Sicarius bellowed.

Now the fleet opened fire on the planet, creating a storm of fiery destruction that cleansed the alien abominations from the surface.
As they watched the screens and witnessed the inferno, Sicarius said:

"At least now we know what their plan was. They knew what we were about to do. They slowed us down to devour as much bio-mass as possible before leaving."

"Blasted xeno filth," Cassius hissed, then he turned to Antonius:
"Brother Varus, you may keep the seal I gave you. You have earned it."

"Thank you, Chaplain Cassius," Antonius answered and the memory ended.

Antonius and Luna were standing on a grassy hill, still in Luna's dreamscape. She looked a little pale, but was otherwise in good condition.

"And, Luna?" Antonius asked,
"what do you think of this experience?"

Luna looked at him for a second, then she said:

"It is hard to find words that do it justice. So much cruelty, but also so much valor. I am still wondering if it really was a victory, though: You managed to evacuate the humans, but a lot of those Tyranids escaped and you suffered quite some losses. Tell me, was it a victory?"

"Yes, it was. Oh, did you expect an easy victory? Those are very rare, even if the Astartes are involved."

"Hmm... you always seemed quite a bit... overpowered to me, but now I see that you need every bit of your prowess... and I see why you hate aliens that much. Are all of them that bad?"

"Almost. In general, they want to conquer the galaxy and wipe out or enslave all of the other species. A species that behaves differently is an extreme rarity, and even then they are just neutral towards mankind - more or less, at least. None of them are truly trustworthy, and the only alliances that exist between them and mankind are short-term alliances of convenience against a common foe. That - and our history - is why we have become convinced that xenos are abominations that we hate quite rightly."

He made a short pause and continued with a small smile:

"And now, I am here, and I have discovered ponykind, the first true exception of this rule."

"True," Luna said,
"we do not have any interest in conquering, and I can confirm that we are indeed trustworthy. I am just sad that mankind is going through such dark times."

"Well, with your help, we can probably change that a bit, for the benefit of both mankind and ponykind."

"I surely hope so. Now, my patrol will start soon. Do you need anything before I leave?"

"No, thank you. Can I help you somehow? I mean, Tyranids are not known to be especially... soporific."

Luna smiled and answered:

"No, thank you, I'll be fine. I have to admit, though, that this has been a somewhat... unsettling experience. Those monsters... such carnage... terrible."

"It is good that war is so terrible, or we would grow too fond of it," Antonius said with a smile of his own.

"Huh? That is certainly an unique way of looking at this topic."

"Primarch Guilliman once said that after a bloody battle. No matter how often I read his writings, I keep finding new truths and points of view."