Red Tear

The Red Tear was a Battle Barge of the IX Blood Angels Space Marine Legion, that served as the flagship of Primarch Sanguinius during the Great Crusade and the Horus Heresy. The Red Tear was part of the Emperor's grand fleet before the age of the Great Crusade. When the Emperor reunited with his long-lost son on the world of Baal, he gifted the Angel with the magnificent vessel to lead his Legion into the stars. Within and without, the Red Tear was a shipwright’s work of art. The vessel carried the flag of the Blood Angels whenever the Primarch left the Legion home world of Baal, and like Sanguinius himself, his craft was a sight to behold.

Viewed from the bow, the Battle Barge resembled an arrowhead ten kilometres from stem to stern, lined in bright copper, bronze and crimson steel. The maws of nova cannon, mega-lasers, mass-drivers and torpedo hives encrusted the forward quarter, presenting an arsenal comparable to that of a whole fleet of smaller vessels. Acres of towers ranged away down the length of the craft, extending out from the dorsal and ventral hulls. In the fashion of Imperial starships, modelled on the deck-by-deck design ethic laid down for the Red Tear’s ancient, ocean-going ancestors, a massive citadel rose from the aft quarter. This huge conning tower resembled a gigantic fortress, an outer keep of soaring adamantium walls and glassaic windows forming the base and a wide cylindrical donjon rising higher still. At its apex, among the saw-tooth battlements and point-defence batteries, a massive transparent dome looked out into the void like an unblinking eye.

Similarly, beneath the central plane of the main hull, a blade-like keel dropped away, thinning to a wicked point. Here were many of the battle-barge’s secondary cannons and the hangars for the warship’s auxiliary craft. Cavernous docking bays, large enough to house and maintain a brace of escort frigates, ran the width of the vertical structure. But it was from above that the true martial glory of the Red Tear was revealed. If an observer could place themselves at a point high up over the centre of the warship’s hull, looking down they would see that the ship gave iron reality to its name. The Battle Barge was built around the form of a great ruby teardrop, and from its port and starboard sides, winglets bearing engine clusters and troop bays reached outwards, mimicking the design of the Legion sigil of the Blood Angels. Against the black and infinite dark, the Red Tear was a sculpture that showed the proud defiance of humankind. It was at once monument, weapon and fortress of the sons of Sanguinius – and a worthy chariot for a Primarch.