The company of Pathfinders all began picking their targets, silent in their endeavour and deliberate in their pace. Whenever an enemy was to tilt the balance of the battle, a silent bliss would deliver them to oblivion - here an Ork Knob and his goons were about to overrun an Imperial resistance, but suddenly grew limp and quiet under no apparent force. There a human Sergeant was organizing his fire line all-too well, but suddenly his barking orders were no more. In the crucible of battle, who was to know that the Eldar were dictating the flow? Like the masterful hand of the music's director, the Children Of The Stars conducted the rhythm of this violent orchestra.

Galgradak himself rode close to the front of the ork horde, his own massive warbike had opened fire with its veritable arsenal of dakka and beamies opening up.
Not close behind the warboss was Megabashes battle fortress filled with Galgradaks personal guards, they where he and they where the true force of the orks, countless boyz and lesser nobs where all sorta well equipped for orks in due to the massive amount of scrap from basecamp, and since Galgradaks waaagh was allready picking pace they had sacked other planets.
The ork boyz of the horde where all driven to a frenzy, they dident care that a nob here and there fell, their own warboss was here and with all the other orks they where a fearless force of tough green skin just itching for close combat.
The real danger to the horde where the deciplined firering lines of the imperials and the bombartments of the horde, luckily the fighta bombers had begun to get some coherence and where flying towards the imperial lines to bomb them silly or get shot down in the process.
"WAAAAAAAAGH" Galgradak roared the large orks voice allready a grand boom only inhanced by the voxcaster he carried, and as he yelled the singular orkish warcry so did all the boyz answer, as they charged the trench lines guns blasting and blood pumping.

Inquisitor Azrael watched from a hill top as the ork and imperial forces collided on the battlefield. He was slightly entertained by the battle insuing. The Black Templars around him, however; were not so happy about it.

"Release us Inquisitor Azrael. We can help win this battle we are sure of it." One of the Black Templars said.

"The only thing I am sure of is that you have no authority here," Azael spoke in anger. He did think for a moment longer, "Though I suppose that the Black Templars could use some warming up. Order for two squads and one Dreadnought two deploy, time now. Make sure they understand this is an orbital assault." With that one of the Black Templars made a brief call through his vox.

Within minutes three drop pods, consumed in fire, began to descend from the sky. They impacted with three large craters and with a quickness two squads of tactical marines, Chaplain Marcus, and one Dreadnought joined the battle. Fire began to pour out from their bolters and other weapons, hoping to turn the green ride away. Though green rides are known to be tough and it would surely not be an easy battle.

As the Astartes fire rained like doom down from the skies, the Watcher of the Pathfinder squad turned from Faolchu's Eye with a more concerned look upon his face.
"Space Marines," he mentioned. The Eldar stopped their silent attack. "They'll overrun the greenskins."
"Hm," pondered the Master Pathfinder. "If the Imperials crush the Orks before their own numbers are thinned we'll lose too many of our own in the following Cleansing," she said, her eyes veiled by the cloak she wore.
"Retreat, Intemperate Ones," Caedessin ordered. The Pathfinders all shimmered into view and turned to disappear like a half-forgotten nightmare. Only her - the Fae Lacerai - remained, standing there like a morbid sculpture. Only her and her deadly figure dressed in blades and cloak and secrets.

"We play with big toys now."
A feline smile, an unnatural glow underneath the Ranger cloak grew to shine like an entire galaxy of stars sprouting from the Corsair´s hand. The Webway Portal was then active.

Out of nowhere, out of the darkest book of fairytales, the forces of the Eldar came into view - imposing tanks of graceful features strode the plains like a Lynx on deadly prowl, jetbikes swooping past Caedessin, blowing her hair in wild black patterns and corsair Ynnead wearing jump-packs walking proud to meet their foes.

"Charming snakes that dance the mythos", said the Corsair Princess, and then the entire Strikeforce raced to meet the Astartes. The instructions within the Eldar metaphor were clear - the Corsairs were to strike like lighting to draw the Space Marines´attention, then they would retreat, driving the Astartes away from the greenskin tide.

"HOW LONG TILL WE ARRIVE TO DA FOIGHT, BOSS?"
The ork was trying to outshout the roaring noise created from his ramshakle rokkit pak, in order to get Ead Ztompa's attention.

"ONZE WE'S DERE, OI'LL PUNCH YA TO LET YA KNOW, SNOTGROB!"
Krooza nob answered to his subordinate, while looking through the lenses of some pilot goggles, almost unfitting for his cibork eyes. Thanks to those implants, actually, the ork really didn't need any cover from the air, but he was convinced those glasses made him fly more precisely.

He may have been also right about an increased efficiency in flight, but currently the glasses were only harming the stormnob's sense of orientation.
The Deffskull, infact, had momentarily lost track of the main ground force, even though gun shooting and war cries could be heard in the distance. Nobody of his lads dared to correct their boss, though, as they remembered what happened to th recruit who pointed out that Deffskull orks weren't meant for leading.
It was quite a show, that day, a flayed ork running around the boot camp while chased by a Globba squig.

Luckily for Ead Ztompa, the first real fight came in the form of a scouting chimera.
"OHI SNOTGROB! WE'Z ARRIVED!"
With that said, the stormnob closed the gap from the subordinate and violently hit him in the face. The stunned ork lost control of his jump pak, starting twirling around until he crashed on the top hull of the imperial vehicle. The crash should have taken off guard the crew, as they suddenly stopped the vehicle to assess the situation. The following inertia forced the greenskin stuck on top of the chimera to roll forward, falling right in front of the humans' viewfinder. And their heavy flamer.

The ork barely got the time to get back up, before a wall of flames enveloped him, incenerating metal, meat and flesh almost in an instant.
Satisifed by his subordinate's forward scouting to assess the enemy weaponry, Ead Ztompa prepared the rest of the crew for the assault.

"ALROIGHT YA LOT! TOIME FOR "DA BIG 'EAD AKE" MANOUVVAR!"
As the ork launched his order, the rest of the stormboys got into compact formation behind their leader, after which they started gaining elevation.
After reaching a certain altitude, Ead Ztompa pulled out of his belt a couple of stikk bombs, an action the rest of his squad imitated. Launching a savage war cry, Krooza Nob dive bombed towards the enemy vehicle while triggering the grenades, closely followed from his squad.
One after the other, the orks dropped at the very last moment their explosive payload on the top of the enemy vehicle, before they abruptly steered to avoid a violent impact. Somehow, the manouver was a success and the relatively lightly armored surface was torn apart from the hammering detonations, exposing the hidden crew.

Ead Ztompa didn't waste time and landed first on top of the destroyed chimera. Among the smoke coming from the cabin, a las shot was fired, almost hitting the ork face, but the greenskin was quick to react.
He dunk his cibork hand inside the darkness of the wreckage, after which it pulled out tightly holding a human's head in his punch.

As soon as he took his prisoner, Ead Ztompa was surrounded by his band, looking at him waiting impatiently for the next order. After jumping on the ground, the stormnob made a quick gesture with his free hand,
allowing his exalted subordinates to unleash their sluggas into the cabin, tearing apart any remaining survivor.

While pain cries and the sound of machinery being wrecked for loot was heard on the background, Ead Ztompa looked curiously at his captive. Despite covered in blood and burnt, clearly shaken by the blast, the man was still kicking to try desperately to set himself free from the xenos' held.

Those humans clearly knew how to give a fight, ead Ztompa admitted.

"Ohy ya lil wun! Oi'z got a queshun fer ya, why da zog ya and yer now-duff band of humies were hangin' round ere, instead of gettin in da fight with da rest of ya lot?"

The ork barely opened his artificial hand to let the human breath and speak, only the necessary to get what he wanted
"You filthy monsters, why should you care? You just want to fight, how could my duty bother you?"

With a smiling face, the ork replied
"Well, ya humie, see. Oi's got sume experience from beatin ya lil wuns, and Oi learnt sumefing: if ya tell us wut ya doin, Oi kan know what ye'r up to, so Oi kan krump moar of ya. Now, if Oi kan krump moar of ya, dat'll mean Oi kan get moar loot from yer beaten soft boddies. See, Oi'z a smart wun, ain't Oi?"

In all despise, the guardsman just tried to kick the ork's chin, but it resulted like a pleasing scratch for ead Ztompa.
"Dat es real gud, but saddly Oi kan't ztay ere all day, got moar of ya gits to krump!"

To conclude the discussion, Krooza Nob squeezed the human's head until it exploded in a fountain of gore, covering the ork's blue paint with red fresh blood.

As he left behind the dead body to get back to his crew, Ead Ztompa was approached by one of his stormboys, carrying with him a recently stolen vox communicator.

"Ohi Boss! Got diz noisy fing ere from dat humie trukk dere. Thought it kould interest ya."
The Deffskul took the object and thanked the subordinate by vigorously slapping his face.
He was proud of his boys, he really taught them well not to keep for themselves the flashiest gear, unless they wouldn't miss so much the lack of their hands.

and that was some flashy stuff indeed: it was transmitting the current position of the other patrolling chimeras.
Sure, Ead Ztompa didn't understand a crap about coodinates and such, but if the communicator started recording sightings of a band of stormboys, that would have meant the little buggers were close.

After gathering his crew, Ead Ztompa showcased his current objective
"Lads, dere's a bunch'o dem sneaky humies in deir metal cans having a nice walk in da Kountryzzide. Galgradak and his lads can soften up da bigga lot'o humies for da time being. How'bout we make diz little grots' exkurshun a lil more intereztin?"

Azrael laughed, "Those sligh bastards. I had my suspicions about the xenos presents here. I should have know better. Order the two squads and Dreadnought to redirect their attacks on the Eldar."

Azrael looked up to the sky, "Call in the rest of the company and vehicles. I want them right there." He stretched out his and pointed to directly behind the Eldar. Again more pods began to fall from the sky which impacted to release the rest of the company and two more dreadnoughts. This time though, valkyries carrying three predators and two whirlwinds dropped them down to join the battle.

"Well this is frustrating. I was support to save my hand to deal out to the daemons of this planet. And I find myself wasting my forces on canned xenos..."

Commissar Dalimond braced himself as the tank moved forwards toward the outer perimeter of the base, the interior of the vehicle was as hot as it was noisy and stacks of boxes filled with Punisher rounds were littered everywhere. Inside the Leman Russ tank with Dalimond were six of the most experienced members of the Gortex 340th armored consignment of which included three gunners for the sponson heavy bolters and the single hull mounted lascannon, a pilot, an ammunition loader and the tank commander. Dalimond had sacrificed some of the ammunition space to install a small vox caster so that he could still effectively give orders while he was out on the front lines.

Looking out of the tank hatch at the sky overhead he noticed the crude Orkish aircraft flying over the base it clicked in the Commissar's mind that the greenskins were going to attempt to bomb the operations center into oblivon. reaching for the vox caster communicator once again he relayed a message back to Gortex command.

'Attention regimental command, enemy fighters are flying over the base, alert the anti aircraft crews and clear the skies. Notify command actual to mobilize Vendetta support to contest Ork air superiority.'

Jacob placed the vox communicator back into place on the vox operator just as the Tank commander shouted an order, almost immediately the Punisher tank screeched to a halt jerking the men forward as they braced themselves for the sudden stop. The commissar climbed to stand halfway out of the vehicles top hatch, behind the Punisher tank Dalimond could see a pair of two additional Leman russ main battle tanks draw into position behind his own vehicle including an support force of six chimeras. Five of the chimeras carried a squad of about ten guardsmen, each of them with their own flamer weapons specialist the sixth transport contained the platoon command squad with the junior officer having willfully accompanied the commissar out onto the field. As Dalimond watched the collection of vehicles formed up alongside the Punisher tank in a broadsword formation, satisfied that a successful formation had been achieved the commissar turned to face forwards.

Between the armored formation and the battle an unfinished section of prefabricated wall stood, it had previously concealed the presence of the Gortex armor allowing them to form up into the broadsword but now it merely stood in their way. Signalling to the other Leman russ tanks the two battle cannons of the armored division roared as they blasted away the wall allowing both the Leman russ squadron and the chimeras to move through into the battle beyond.

Through the resulting rockcrete dust cloud the tank squadron trundled into effective range of the Orks currently engaging the Imperial perimeter, targeting a lone mob of orks the Punisher spat a hail of shots cutting down the greenskins before they reached the perimeter. The lascannon fixing its sights on a nearby ork trukk fired a shot that bifurcated the ramshackle vehicle forcing it to a sudden halt, the two sponson heavy bolters fired sporadically at targets of opportunity cutting down individual orks as the tank moved forward.

The pair of stnadard Leman russ tanks focused their sights on the larger of the ork vehicles namely the looted wagons and managed to take down one of the vehicles just before it tried to ram a nearby Imperial bunker, the former Leman russ tank exploded as the battle cannon shots hit resulting in fiery debris raining down on the surrounding area. as the Leman russ tanks made their advance the Chimeras were choosing their targets at will targeting both Ork light vehicles and mobs with their multilasers while their heavy bolters cut a bloody swath into the advancing orks. As they arrived at the outer trenches the infantry platoon disembarked from the chimeras and into the dugouts the arrival of reinforcements bringing a cheer to the beleaguered guardsmen already present.

In but one swift operation the armored formation had successfully cleared and bolstered the defenses of an entire section of the perimeter clearing an area of the greenskins, as they reached the outer trenches the vehicles stood stationary holding back behind the dugouts. Satisfied with the result Dalimond still standing halfway out of the top hatch of the Punisher tank shouted to the guardsmen still fighting.

'Hold your positions and fight on men! The Emperor is with us this day and under his watchful gaze we will not falter!'

Like fire from the skies, the Space Marines came - but one cannot outflank the wind wake, nor can one throw a rock the river's way and hope it'll come to sudden stop. The bone coloured tide of Eldar skimmers- both Commorrite and Craftworld-like in design, were far enough from the Astartes´drop point by the time they touched down - redeploying for them was going to be a slow process, their frontal forces were isolated until then.
"We don't need to create early frictions with these foes," said the voice of Caedessin playing through the comm-jewels of the Strikeforce. "Impair."

The spearheading Vyper jetbike twirled in its axis, fixings sights on the Space Marine tomb-machine. The Vyper's pilot yelled in elation and opened fire against the Dreadnaught's lower limbs, but his howl was interrupted and the Vyper crashed in flames against the prairies, rolling to stop at the feet of the foe. The Space Marines were firing back.

"Our blades as one!"

It then became a blur, the tide against the wall, the spear against the Adamantium shield. A formation of Dark Eldar jetbikes charged with their bombs and their lances, the tanks and Vypers opening fire as they made their first bloody pass through the enemy lines.

As the bikes past through space marines began to fall. But due to discipline their lines continued to fire on all the Eldar.

Azrael opened up a vox chain to his whirlwinds, "Fire on their bike formations. I do not want to lose more marines on another pass by them."

Just As he finished speaking a Valkyrie was struck by fire and almost crashed into him. Thankfully he rolled just in time to dodge it. He stood back up in anger, "Damn this xenos! My company was prepared for war against daemons not banshees."

He reopened a vox, "All units switch on the frontlines switch to Inferno rounds, we will burn this planet to the ground if we have to. All units in the back switch to anti armor rounds. All predators open fire!"

After a few seconds the scene on the battlefield had changed completely. Walls of fire could be seen everywhere. Whether any Eldar were caught in it did not seem to matter to the Inquisitor. Grass was,no longer green but burning in colors of red and orange.

"Skarlug! Oo many'o dem humies' trukks have we smashed zo far?"
Ead Ztompa yelled towards his subordinate, while listening to his stolen vox caster for any further prey.

The stormboy was on top of a smouldering wreck, proceeding to stab with his recently acquired cibork choppa the last standing guardsman.
"Oi don't know boss, Oi've lozt kount afta Lots..."

With their search-and-destroy operations, the orks lead by Krooza Nob had unwary dealt a terrible blow to the scouting operations of the imperials.
Entire sectors were no longer under surveillance by the humans, and many ork bands were gathering in those areas, following the traks of death and destruction left behind by the Urrikan Smashas.
Even the Kasrkin forces weren't able to protect efficiently the scouting patrols, as the stormboys raided and pulled off before any proper counter attack could arrive in time.

However, things were getting boring for Ead Ztompa, as the loot gathered from those skirmishes was negligible at best. Besides, communications among the scout patrols had terribly decreased, causing the orks to waste more and more time searching for targets rather than killing and pillaging.

As he was starting to think he had to stomp some of his soldiers, just for venting some frustation, the battle called Ead Ztompa once more.
The sound of swift jetbikes, explosions caused from artillery batteries and the fire of bolters, a sound the greenskin quickly learnt to fear back on Armaggedon, caught his attention.

The Deffskull quickly ripped from a dead guardsman's head his magnoculars to see what was going on the horizon.

Something really interesting was going on infact, some miles away: Eldars were battling space marines in bloody gunfights and skirmish.

Had the stormnob been leading a bigger horde, that would have been quite a nice fight. With just a little more than 20 orks on his side, instead, that would have been just a suicide. However, those Eldar jetbikes truly interested Krooza Nob.

The greenskin's little brain started grinding his gears in order to set in motion a nasty plan.
May be the panzies were too stupid to think the Urrikane Smashas to be a threat, so they would have just sent some of those fast skirmishers to deal with his lot.
The stormboys could race with those pointy ears speed freaks, and lead them in a nice spot for some devastating surprise.

As his head started aching too much, Ead Ztompa decided his plan had been fully thought out. He then headed towards his gang, to explain his evil project in details.

He first called two of his subordinates out, who were currently salvaging some grenades from a pile of human bodies.
"Zognob! Magkop!" The two stormboys, covered with all sort of explosives, mines and detonators , promptly showed up to answer their leader's orders

"We're ere bozz! Wut ya wunt?"
Ead Ztompa started sniggering, as he was thinking about what was about to happen.

"You's moy 'Xplozives Speshullists, ain't ya? Oi wunt diz plaze ere covered in all type of noisy shurprises, stikkbombs, mines, rokkits, zog it, if is necezzary, stuck yerself in da ground wif a tank'ammar!
And Oi want it readdy YEZTERDAY!!!"
The two demolition boys aknowledged the command, and started immediately laying down a minefield with everything that could be detonated.

Positively impressed by their fast response, Ead Ztompa turned to the rest of his mob.
"And da rezt'o ya! We's goin for sume "fishing", where da fish es dem fasty panzie warbikes. Dey fink dey're suppa fasta wif deir flashy engines, shuw dem da faztezt wuns are da ztormboys!"