Legio XIX: Iron Locusts

Legio XIX: Iron Locusts

Primarch's Name: Maikhaira
Homeworld: Asprsyatā
Background: Fighter
Psychic Potential: Normal
Gene-seed: Unstable
Talent: Berzerker
Legio XIX: Iron Locusts Legion
Colors: Orange with red trimmings
Battle Cry: The locusts are here! The swarm is upon you!

History

Asprsyatā had a different name once, before Maikhaira walked upon its surface, in the times when Men of Iron fought Men of Gold, when a god was born from the pleasure of an empire. It was rich in oxygen, and the insects that were seeded there as part of a terraformation process grew large and dominant over the land. Vast cities dotted the plains, and the calm skies of the thick atmosphere with its gentle winds were perfect for men in flying machines that soared and swooped in the air.

Then Long Night fell, and they were cut off from other men. It was at this time the swarms appeared. Locusts like those of Terra, except grown to the size of a cat and granted the ferocity and tenacity of a rabid dog, began to gather in vast black clouds that devoured everything that fell under their shadow. Those who could afford it took their flying machines above the clouds where the swarms could not follow. The industrialists of the cities undertook great projects to raise their municipalities upon legs, or tracks to keep them out of the paths of the locusts. Those who could not pay to join the aristocracy aboard their new sky-palaces, or were deemed too useless for life aboard the traction-cities were cast off into the newly formed wastes, once verdant forests stripped dry by the locusts and churned into mud by the cityfolk. These were the Downtrodden, the Untouchables, and they eked out a living, adapting to their position over thousands of years. Some who dwelled upon those plains that could regrow quickly became like ungulates of Terran history, hoofed and horned with grazing muzzles. Others adapted to the mud, with long limbs and large, splayed hands and feet. They were a sad and twisted people, ignored by the cloud-lords and exploited and enslaved by the urbanites.

When the Primarch fell from the skies in his gestation pod, it is said that he tore a hole through the protective metal walls of one of the greatest cities there was. The mayor-king tried to care for him, but saw how quickly and how large he grew, and ordered the infant Maikhaira cast away from the city. And so, was the Sky-Lord found in the churned mud by the Downtrodden, who could not spare the food or time for him, yet raised him anyway.

Maikhaira soon became leader of the tribe, and began to unite with other tribes, from beastmen and mudfolk to the scaly desert-dwellers and the scavenging roach-people who crawled in the ruins of dead cities and in the arteries of living ones. Under his rule, they traded knowledge, tools and services and their lot began to improve. They began to herd animals, speak a common language, set up small farms, challenge the power of the cities and even defend themselves from small swarms of the locusts.

Yet still they had to stay moving, for fear that they would be found by one of the greater swarms that even a Primarch could not fight. Maikhaira tired of this, knowing that such a life of fear was no life at all, and so he decided to climb to the top of Sikhara, the tallest mountain on the planet, where he and his people could dwell away from the locust and the city, where they could be at peace.

The trek of Maikhaira's Downtrodden up Sikhara led them to discover an abandoned city, dominated by a great monastery of some unknown order. The brick was weathered and the frescoes were faded and indistinct, yet it somehow inspired Maikhaira. Over the next few years, he and his followers began to renovate the area, reactivating the old farms and mines and fortifying the great monastery. Under his guidance, the mountain colony began to flourish, and more Downtrodden flocked to it as its fame spread.

Then the cloud-kings came. They used Sikhara as a place to exchange people so as to prevent inbreeding. When they saw the renovated houses and monastery, they were surprised, but regarded it with the same disdainful contempt they afforded everything that walked on the surface, using their aircraft and drones to attack the Downtrodden. The cloud-kings were led by the great Arrall aboard his sky-cruiser Diwani, a great beast of a floating ship from before Long Night that carried hundreds of smaller craft.

Maikhaira led his people into the monastery, hoping to be able to persuade the attackers to leave his people alone. He tried to speak to the soldiers as they entered the temple, but they laughed at his words and began to gun down the temple's inhabitants.

It was here that Maikhaira first fell into the Larā'i-Mohā, the battle-trance. He beat the soldiers to death with his bare hands, before taking one of their swords and storming outside, his people following behind him. Accounts of the subsequent events are vague or fanciful, and the Primarch does not seem to want to rectify that. What is known is that he captured the Diwani and the other ships of the cloud-kings, and made them his vassals. He then began to subjugate the other skylords, placing their ships under the command of his chosen, before leading a massive offensive against the cityfolk.

Striking from the sky, his fleet would darken the skies above their target before warriors, abhuman and aristocrat alike, descended upon ropes or Dark Age technology to ravage the cities, Maikhaira himself at their forefront. A group of the most powerful cities gathered to destroy the mountain he called home, but Maikhaira lured a gigantic swarm of locusts upon them, and they were destroyed. Soon, Maikhaira was the undisputed ruler of the planet.

When the Emperor came, Maikhaira submitted to this rule willingly, but was dismayed when his father decried his friendship with abhumans and told him that they could not be used to create his children, the Space Marines he named the Iron Locusts. Unable to use those he felt compassion towards, and unwilling to use the cityfolk, Maikhaira turned to the sons of the cloud-kings to make his soldiers. He renamed his Legion after a nickname the cityfolk had given him and his people - the Iron Locusts.

Legion Organization

Loose would be the simplest description of the Iron Locusts' command chain. There are no permanent, appointed captains or commanders, nor are there set squads or companies or chapters.

When the Primarch, or any member of his personal guard the Raksakā, are not present with the Legion, Chapter-master level commanders are those generally agreed upon by the veterans, the Jhunā Dhbansakārī, to be the best suited for the battle ahead or, in less dangerous battles, with the most to prove. The other veterans act as advisors or sub-commanders to the appointee of the day.

In positions where companies would normally be used, a Jhunā Dhbansakārī will round up a large number of Dhbansakārī and Grāsakārī in what is colloquially known as a March. Squad sized units are rare, as the legion prefers massed fighting, but when they occur, it is normally a Dhbansakārī in charge of a group of Grāsakārī, normally numbering around twenty. The few times smaller groups are necessary, for example in assassinations or sabotage, are the only times a formal group is appointed. These claves are normally between three to ten in strength, are made solely of Dhbansakārī, and epitomize the nature of the Iron Locusts - the dynamic, rapid, overwhelming and concentrated attack.

Combat Doctrine

The Iron Locusts hit hard and fast, striking from the air. Thousands of marines drop from the sky on their jetpacks to overwhelm the weakest point of an enemy force, tearing it apart in melee or with concentrated fire, before taking to the air once again, landing somewhere else in the battle to destroy another segment of the enemy. Heavy weapons are equipped with suspensor webs that make it possible for them to be carried via jump pack, the reduced range being an unimportant sacrifice. Most vehicles and other parts of the army that cannot leap around the battlefield so easily are delivered by drop-pod, preferably on top of the enemy. The legion has a strong aeronautical wing, which focus mostly on hunting armour or destroying gun emplacements.

Small terror tactics are commonplace, with the Locusts being more than happy to flood radio signals and communications with the unpleasant droning of the Asprsyatā locusts, whilst their jump packs have sirens attached that scream as they descend from the sky. Explosive usage is liberal, and it is not uncommon to see grenades dropping from the sky like particularly unpleasant hail.

Unlike most other legions, the Locusts have no taboo regarding running from a battle. If ambushed, it is in fact standard practice to jump out of battle in order to regroup and create a battle plan.

For all this focus on dynamism, shock tactics and overwhelming the enemy, the Locusts are more than happy to assassinate targets in a relatively covert manner. If an army can be rendered useless at one stroke, a clave will be sent in to kill the target. Most targets tend not to be left in many pieces afterwards.

The Scouts of the Iron Locusts, the Sukākīta, do not have power armour or jump packs, and must undergo several tests in order to earn their 'wings'. These tend to involve hunting down those who have escaped the Legion's wrath, or holding cities after they have been taken.

Legion Beliefs and Practices

The Iron Locusts seem to abide by the Imperial Truth, and if they do not, it is unlikely that others will ever find out. The Legion's interactions with other institutions, be they Imperial authorities or other Space Marine legions are universally polite, concise and unrevealing. The legion is strongly independent, and Iron Locust marines will ignore any orders they are given that they do not agree with, and if confronted about it will apologize. They rarely show much emotion outside of these bounds, but it has been noted that when involved in a battle, especially battles where they are allowed to be mobile, they become almost euphoric.

Locusts make no changes to their armour, and the difference between a Grāsakārī, a Dhbansakārī and a Jhunā Dhbansakārī is difficult to distinguish - one has to look at the equipment they hold, or their service records in order to distinguish them. The Raksakā can be identified by a relatively simple headwrap around the helmet.

Strangely enough, the Iron Locusts hold many informal occasions that those who have ingratiated themselves to the legion will be invited to. Marines of the legion are encouraged to make the clothes they wear to these events themselves, and the tailoring skills of the average Space Marine being what they are, these tend to be simple robes with a spirited yet poor attempt at embroidery.

Recruitment and Flaws

The gung-ho, all-or-nothing style of the Locusts leads to the relatively low numbers of this legion, especially combined with the slow recruitment rate caused by Asprsyatā's low recruitable population.

The unstable gene-steed of the Legion manifests mostly in physical mutations of the legion. Common, though far from universal, mutations include strange hardening of the skin into plates, rasping voices with a tendency to make sounds that can only be described as chittering and a tendency for the normally brown skin of Asprsyatāns to yellow with age and become speckled with large black blotches. When still inductees into the ranks, they have a tendency to suffer from sudden needs to binge on food, consuming vast quantities in short periods of time. The oldest members have also been observed to slip into a battle trance, the Larā'i-Mohā as they call it, in which they become entirely focused on battle and unresponsive to unrelated stimuli such as commands.

[Magos' Revisional Note]: As of late, the Primarch has gained access to growth enhancement & acceleration facilities, and appears to be making much use of them. Possibly related, I have noticed another anomaly appear amongst members of the legion - they seem to be mentally connected upon some level, capable of finishing each other's sentences, and moving in perfect synchronicity. Perhaps I am overreacting, but I shall place my concerns before those who can do something about it.

The Great Crusade

The true extent of Iron Locust conquests during the Great Crusade was difficult to estimate, as the Legion’s record-keeping could be only charitably described as situational. The official records on Terra suggested that the Nineteenth Legion had one of the smaller conquest tallies to its name, however, it is subject to some debate due to the Locusts’ penchant for free-form campaigning, and the habit for spreading out across multiple war zones.

The chronicles of Terra made some additional, potentially disturbing insinuations that could have explained the smaller number of prominent victories attributed to Maikhaira and his sons. They claimed that far from the model Imperial Legion, the Iron Locusts did not seem to possess the same natural revulsion at the sight of abhumans and certain breeds of mutants encountered in the Great Crusade, and often coopted such pitiful creatures as the Legion’s agents, or even as auxiliary forces. On more than one occasion, this attitude led to calls for the Legion’s censure.

Matters came to head during a campaign against the Yavi, a now-extinct xenos species oppressing the population of humans so far removed from the baseline stock that the Imperial commanders present considered their eventual extermination to be an act of mercy. Though the Iron Locusts’ sudden arrival ended the hard-fought campaign in a matter of days, Maikhaira quickly found himself at odds with the Imperial Army generals advocating complete depopulation of the newly conquered worlds so that they could be resettled with untainted human settlers.

As the Imperial Navy warships placed themselves in positions to bombard the population centers of the newly compliant worlds, Maikhaira ordered his Marines to board the vessels of his erstwhile allies to prevent the genocide. The resultant battle was brief and relatively one-sided, however, the Imperial Army general present  was able to get the message out to the Throne World, requesting official inquiry into the events and accusing the Nineteenth Primarch of outright treason.

In response to these events, the Emperor summoned his son to his presence. There, on board the Emperor’s own flagship leading the Great Crusade, Maikhaira stood accused before his father and brothers, calm yet defiant to the end. He claimed that while the people he had saved diverted from baseline humanity in body, they remained part of the species, and it was his duty to protect them from the alien depredations. Was Hedon not allowed to continue its own cybernetization practices, he asked Echelon? Were the unique physical characteristics of sons of Kthuln not an acceptable price to pay for their effectiveness?

To this, his accusers, led by Nyxos and Rogr Hemri, countered that the human form was meant to be pure and untainted. Though some deviations were, of course, inevitable, there were lines that were not meant to be crossed, after which the people had diverged so far from the human standard that they were no longer part of the same species. These Primarchs and officials argued that Maikhaira had committed a cardinal crime of spilling the blood of true humans in the defense of the misguided, mutated creatures.

Though Maikhaira’s arguments were reasoned and won him some acclaim from the likes of Gideon, it was Iskanderos’ influence that finally swayed the Emperor’s mind. The Conqueror argued that every manner of being had a role in the Imperium, bringing to mind the unity offered by his own Apellene Network, and even the brotherhood of the Primarchs. Would they truly compromise the unity of the Imperium because of creatures that were of no consequence, and that would make for loyal subjects due to their deliverance from alien oppression?

With these, and other, arguments, the Emperor took some time to deliberate before making his final decree. The abhumans, the Emperor said, were at best offering dead-end evolutionary paths and doing little to advance the rest of the human species. However, they could be useful in some capacity… as long as they were confined to the worlds where they would never compromise the evolution of the rest of the species. For that reason, he allowed Maikhaira to return to his Legion, however, only with the strictest of provisions – the Iron Locusts would no longer be allowed to keep attached forces of abhumans, and would still comply with the orders to destroy any societies considered deviant by the rulers of Terra. As for the fate of the people whose defense was the cause for the trial, the Emperor decreed that they were to be exterminated, with the Lion Guard given the honor of the deed.

For the rest of the Great Crusade, the Iron Locusts became even more insular, their activities always shrouded in miscommunication and secrecy. It is not known how strictly they followed the Emperor’s edict, or if they even followed it at all. It is, however, noted that the sons of Maikhaira made a pointed effort to avoid joint engagements with the Lion Guard and the Grim Angels, even when such alliances would have made tactical and strategic sense.

During the Heresy

Maikhaira never forgave the Emperor, Rogr Hemri, and Nyxos for their actions during his trial, and, in retrospect, it is easy to see why he joined Iskanderos with minimal persuasion. While not present at Apella, the Iron Locusts fully pledged themselves to the rebellion shortly after Starfall, and became some of Iskanderos’ most enthusiastic and loyal supporters.

Instead of fighting as one unified force, the Iron Locusts spread out in a multitude of claves and smaller units, formenting rebellion on the Council worlds, partaking in assassination and sabotage missions, and attempting to misdirect and divide the Council forces. Some of these units were known to be augmented using sorcerous and archaeotech means, though, as with all things related to the Iron Locusts, the extent of such modifications through the Legion remained unknown.

A detachment of Iron Locusts was present during the campaign against Corwin and his Angel Kings, wreaking havoc behind the enemy lines and softening the loyalists in preparation for the Warblades and the Iconoclasts assaulting the Angel Kings’ worlds. Once Iskanderos began to have doubts about Baelic’s loyalty, it fell to the Iron Locusts to stop the Eleventh Primarch before he could switch sides in the conflict; while the entire assassination force was lost, it ensured that Baelic and the Warblades played no further role in Iskanderos’ march to Terra.

The Nineteenth Legion gathered in strength only twice during the civil war – first, to divert Ashur’s Midnight Riders from the Death March campaign, allowing Iskanderos to face off against the Doom Reavers alone; and second, during events immediately preceding the Fall of Terra, when all rebel forces attempted to converge on Segmentum Solar. In both of these campaigns, the Iron Locusts displayed considerable coordination even by the standards of the Adeptus Astartes, while their numbers seemed to be considerably larger than should have been reasonable in light of their well-known difficulties with maintaining their numbers. More disturbingly, certain Council-aligned historians alleged that a number of the Iron Locust Marines displayed prominent mutations typically associated with a variety of abhuman breeds. It is not certain if Maikhaira had found a way to finally induct abhumans into his Legion, or if the Iron Locust gene-seed instability had finally manifested itself.

As the civil war progressed, it became apparent that the Iron Locusts diverged even further from their cousins in the other Legions. Where the influence of Chaos typically led to Legionaries losing discipline and diverting their considerable prowess to selfish and short-sighted means, the Iron Locusts became, if anything, more unified than they ever were. As a result, Iskanderos continued to rely on the Nineteenth Legion as one of his most elite formations, usually tasked with the operations requiring discipline, precision, and extensive functions behind enemy lines with little to no allied support.

When the Legion was assembled in larger concentrations, the Locusts were utilized to perform rapid altitude descent strikes, orbital insertions, and other attacks where they got to test their mettle against the enemy elites. Where the considerably less disciplined Gargoyles were typically unleashed to sow terror against mortal troops, civilian populations, or lower quality Astartes formations, it is the sign of Iskanderos’ trust in the Nineteenth Legion that the Iron Locusts were both allowed significant latitude in interpretation of their orders, and were frequently given assignments critical to the success of the Conqueror’s plans.

It was the Nineteenth Legion that was instrumental in suppressing the resistance of the Consecrators during the battle in Sol System’s asteroid belt, so that the rebels could begin to land considerable forces on Terra. Though the Iron Locusts had suffered considerable casualties, their resolve and discipline remained undiminished, and they were one of the key contributors to the events that finally allowed the Arch-Traitor to contest the Throne World itself.

Post-Heresy

While Iskanderos implored his surviving allies to aid him in the building of his new Imperium, the Iron Locusts remained apart from the rest of the rebel command structure. In the skies above Terra, the last gathering of the Nineteenth Legion took place. Sonorous hymns were chanted into the blackness of space as the entirety of the Legion assembled, from the youngest neophyte to the most experienced of the Raksaka, with no outsiders permitted on board the Iron Locust warships. Here, Maikhaira addressed his sons for the final time.

It is not known what was said, or even what exactly had happened between the Iron Locusts and their Primarch. On the third day of the gathering, the entirety of the Nineteenth Legion fleet came to life, maneuvering with coordination beyond even that achieved via AI-linked protocols of the pre-Imperial technology. Then, as one, the fleet had scattered, departing on a number of different trajectories that suggested no singular destination, or no clear plan of action.

Though the new master of Terra would normally have attempted to pursue his erstwhile allies, Iskanderos was still not entirely secure on his throne, and spent considerable energy attempting to keep the disparate rebel factions under control; within a decade, the Conqueror was dead, and the power struggle on Terra prevented any of the factions from giving the Iron Locusts much thought. It was nearly a century before the first reports of the Iron Locust activities began to trickle in.

Though the sons of Maikhaira could be found in almost any part of the galaxy, they remain an entity to themselves. While their actions may seem random to outsiders, the discipline and coordination of these warriors remains second to none, and many of the Iron Locust attacks appear to be synchronized not just across multiple planets, but frequently over multiple systems or even sectors. Not even the sorcerers steeped in the lore of the Immaterium or the most educated savants of the Imperial successor states managed to surmise how it is possible, considering the imprecise nature of Warp travel and communication. These events lead many to believe that the Nineteenth Legion continues to pursue some sort of an agenda, though what that agenda may be remains unknown.

By the beginning of the 33^rd Millennium, the Iron Locusts were observed traveling in what could be best described as swarms – hundreds of smaller vessels, each containing squads of Legionaries who would attack their targets in complete silence, acting as parts of the greater whole rather than as individuals trained to work together. Where the Iron Locusts attacked, very little remained – the cities were burned, whole civilizations undone, human populations slaughtered to the last. These attacks prompted a number of desperate alliances between the realms that rarely even considered working together, forcing even the normally insular Stefan Ignatiyev to personally lead several defensive efforts in coordination with the detachments from the Immortals and the Warblades mercenaries. By mid-33^rd Millennium, the Iron Locusts might have been the greatest threat to galactic equilibrium of power due to their large numbers and unnerving ability to execute complex plans across multiple theaters of war.

Just as the Iron Locust attacks seemed to create a common enemy that a number of Imperial successor states could agree on, the assaults suddenly stopped. It is not certain if the Nineteenth Legion had suffered some catastrophic setback, if it had achieved whatever obscure objective it pursued, or if something else had occurred, perhaps a greater danger drawing its forces off.

As the centuries went by, considerable amounts of degradation were noted in the gene-seed of the Iron Locusts captured or slain in battle. Remnant scientists theorize that the use of abhuman recruits and continued and careless exposure to the mutagenic substances , combined with accelerated growth techniques and the taint of Chaos, is to blame, however, the truth may never be known, as Maikhaira’s lineage was already known to suffer from gene-seed instability even before the Legion’s fall. This degradation, however, might be the primary reason why the Nineteenth Legion did not become an all-consuming, overwhelming force that it had once threatened to be, and had to withdraw from its many genocidal campaigns of the 33^rd Millennium.

Though scattered Iron Locust sightings continued for many centuries, the next large-scale interaction with the Nineteenth Legion did not occur until the 35^th Millennium, when an aspiring Imperial Redeemers warlord attempted to call upon old allegiances in recruiting an Iron Locust fleet to his cause. When the warlord was captured and interrogated by the Grim Angels several centuries later, the Chaos commander related the unnserving interactions that, while characteristically polite and civilized on the surface, had a distinctly alien character to them. Though the warlord was promptly terminated as a moral threat, subsequent observations, violent encounters, and contacts supported the Remnant findings, eventually painting a more complete picture of what the Nineteenth Legion might have become.

It appears that the forces of the Iron Locusts are no longer exclusively composed of Astartes, and include a very considerable mortal component. Curiously, these mortal supporters appear to be just as capable of extreme feats of coordination as their Space Marine masters, indicating that perhaps the connection between the two is deeper than first suspected. As during the Great Crusade, the Iron Locusts employ high number of abhumans and mutants in their auxiliary forces, who often develop heavily insect-like physical characteristics, and who tend to operate as a true Legion asset instead of attached unit in a command structure of a combined force battlegroup. These creatures appear to mingle freely with the true Space Marines, who seem to make little difference between their own kind and the mortals, as if they are merely different tools in the service of the same cause. To this effect, the mortals were noted to finish sentences spoken by the Space Marines, and to display unerring awareness of events and conversations they should not have been privy to, sometimes going all the way back to the civil war and even the Great Crusade before it.

It is uncertain if this means that the Iron Locusts had found a way to fully rebuild their strength and are preparing another genocidal war against the rest of the galaxy, or if this was their plan all along. The Nineteenth Legion’s allegiance, as always, remains a matter of some debate; though originally allied to Iskanderos, the present-day Iron Locusts seem to make little distinction between Imperial successor states and Chaos-aligned territories during their raids. When they do choose to answer vox-hails or to enter any kind of negotiations, they are as polite and understated as ever, though it should not be mistaken for unwillingness to take extreme action seemingly at a whim.

Of Maikhaira himself, there seems to be no sign. On the few occasions when the Iron Locusts do choose to communicate with others, they speak of the Primarch as if he was just recently present, or might even be in the immediate vicinity, however, no one was actually able to observe Maikhaira either in battle or in peacetime. Perhaps, this curious absence has something to do with the Nineteenth Legion’s uncanny coordination ability, its penchant for oblique goals, and its self-imposed insular attitude, however, the truth – and the ultimate fate of the Nineteenth Primarch – may never be known.