Traitor Titan Legions

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The Traitor Titan Legions are those of the Collegia Titanica that had repudiated their oaths of loyalty to the Emperor of Mankind and willingly embraced the fickle blessing of the Chaos Gods. Driven by hatred towards the False Emperor and the Adeptus Mechanicus, these towering, warped monstrosities are an horror to behold, possessing an immense firepower that can only be matched by their loyalist counterparts, and an insanity that allows them to happily partake in undiscriminating slaughter. They are a part of the Dark Mechanicus, the Hereteks maintain these terror-inspiring war machines and grant their help to various Chaos Lords, Sorcerers and Daemon Princes in exchange for slaves, souls, raw materiel and other services.

The Traitor Titans are often warped and mutated beyond recognition, the once-noble, resplendent figures, revered for their connection to the Machine God's divinity, turned into a cruel, menacing mockery of their former selves. Now they are entirely corrupted, their forms twisted by the powers of the Warp, their Machine Spirits replaced by possessing daemons and their crews' minds driven to madness by endless torment -- traits that only serve to mold them into even more fearsome adversaries.

The Adeptus Mechanicus harbour a deep-seated hatred of the Traitor Titans, particularly of their crews, as their actions have damned the once-divine machines, something that the Tech-priests hold as a great sacrilege. This enmity is entirely mutual, as the loathing the Traitor Titans have for the Mechanicus of Mars and the Collegia Titanica may very well exceed the rancour felt towards the Emperor himself.

History
Most of these Legions' betrayals happened during the Horus Heresy, when Titan elements attached to the expeditionary fleets of the Space Marine Legions decided to support the Warmaster's cause by virtue of their devotion to Horus and their commanding Primarchs, and because of their fading loyalty towards the distant Emperor. Other Legions supported the Heresy on Mars due to their affiliation with the subversise schemes of Fabricator-General Kelbor-Hal and the Dark Mechanicus, who were increasingly reluctantly tolerating the Imperium and the unfulfilled provisions of the Treaty of Mars. Not all these seditions, however, occured as a direct effect of the Warmaster's ferment, as Titan Legions are known to have decided to cast their fate into the whims of Chaos long after the Horus Heresy.

Regardless of the reasons for betrayal, each and every time a Titan Legion, or indeed even a single of these towering war machines, has been lost to the Ruinous Powers, it represented a distinct threat to the Imperium, as well as a stain on the Collegia Titanica's honour -- one that can only be hoped to be washed away with the blood of Traitors.

Horus Heresy
When the Great Crusade reached its peak, Warmaster Horus had long since been under the sway of the Ruinous Powers and was already planning his betrayal. When the first fratricidal shots were fired, those member of the Collegia Titanica that would become known as the Traitor Titan Legions had already chosen their sides and eagerly engaged in the internecine conflict that would change the galaxy and the Imperium for millenia to come.

The Traitor Titans aided Horus' forces from the beginning of the revolt, most notably the infamous Legio Mortis who had battled the Loyalists on the of Istvaan III following the virus-bombing of the planet that sparked the war, and took part in the Drop Site Massacre on Istvaan V. Other Titan Legions that had been attached to expeditionary fleets also have sided with the Traitors, amongst them the Legio Argentum (who were part of Primarch Perturabo's forces), and the Legios Vulcanum, to name but a few.

Schism of Mars
The climate on Mars was full of discontent during this tumultuous time in the days just before Horus openly declared his rebelltion against the Emperor. There were tense relations between the various Mechanicus Magi who governed Mars with sporadic outbreaks of espionage and violence being committed against the various forges that represented the primary sociopolitical units of Mars. There were even unconfirmed suspicions thath the various Titan Legions of the Collegia Titanica, the most potent military forces available to the Tech-priests, had already secretly chose sides in case of a potential conflict within the Mechanicus.

At the outset of the Heresy, Horus sent Regulus, an Adeptus Mechanicus representative who had already thrown in his low with the Warmaster, to Mars to secure tentative support of the Fabricator-General of the Adeptus Mechanicus, Kelbor-Hal. Regulus convinced the Fabricator-General of the Warmaster's resolve to support increased autonomy for the Mechanicus against the autocratic rule of the Emperor. As a show of his appreciation for the Fabricator-General's support, Horus provided information to Kelbor-Hal that allowed the Tech Priest to open a repository of forbidden knowledge known as the Vaults of Moravec, which the Emperor had ordered sealed two centuries earlier -- for they contained innumerable artefacts of technology that had been fashioned or corrupted by the malign power of Chaos. But their dark bargain was struck, and the Fabricator-General accepted Horus' proposal and joined forces with the Warmaster, assisting the Traitors with all of the technology of Mankind at his disposal.

Later histories would record that the first blow of the Martian civil war was struck Magos Mattias Kefra, whose forge in the Sinus Sabaeus region was housed within the Madler crater, Titans of the Legio Magna marched from the souther Noachis region and within minutes had smashed down the gates of Kefra's forge. Howling engines daubed in red, orange, yellow and black, decorated with flaming horned skull devices, ran amok within the high walls of the crater, crushing everything living beneath them and destroying thousands of years of accumulated wisdom in a fury of fire. Vast libraries burned and weapon shops that served the Solar Guard were reduced to molten slag as the indiscriminate slaughter continued long into the night, the Legio Magna's trumpeting warhorns sounding like the atavistic screams of primitive savages.

Amid the Athabasca Valles, the war machines of the Legio Ignatium and the Burning Stars Legion fought in bloody close quarters through the teardrop landforms caused by catastrophic flooding in an earlier, ancient age of the Red Planet. Neither force could gain the advantage, nor could either claim victory, so after a night’s undignified scrapping, both withdrew to lick their wounds.

Along the borders of the Lunae Palus and Arcadia regions, what previously been simply heated debate between the partisans of the Emperor and the Warmaster erupted into outright warfare as Princeps Ulriche of the Death Stalkers unleashed his engines upon the fortress of Maxen Vledig’s Legio Honorum. Caught by surprise, the Legio Honorum lost nineteen Titans in the first hour of battle, before withdrawing into the frozen wastes of the Mare Boreum and seeking refuge in the dune fields of Olympia Undae. Their calls for reinforcement went unanswered, for all of Mars was tearing itself apart as the plague of war spread across the planet in a raging firestorm.

The Fabricator-General's betrayal had only begun to unfold, and would soon see the Dark Mechanicus and the Traitor Titans of Mars joining Horus in open war against the Emperor on Terra itself.

Battle of Terra
The siege of Terra by the Traitor forces of Horus began with an orbital bombardment by the Warmaster's fleet as the prelude to invasion. After days of shelling, the Chaos Space Marines landed on the surface of Terra in Drop Pods and advanced on the two spaceports nearest the location of the Imperial Palace to secure them in preparation for the main landings of the Traitor forces. Elements from five of the Traitor Legions participated in the battle, aided by Traitor forces already on the surface. Despite the brave efforts of the Loyalists, the Eternity Wall and the Lion's Gate Spaceports fell within hours to the Forces of Chaos. With them secured, Horus' remaining troops of the Traitor Legions and their Traitor Imperial Army and Dark Mechanicus support forces landed en masse, and the hulking transports carried thousands of troops each as well as bringing to the battlefield the terrible Traitor Titans that served the Warmaster's cause and had been infected with the daemonic forces of Chaos. The transports' immense size made them prime targets for Terra's defence lasers. Although many of the Traitor landing craft were destroyed in-atmosphere, notably the transport vessel of the Legio Damnatus, the Legion's name thusly passing into history, many more made it to the surface, disgorging yet more soldiers, main battle tanks and Traitor Titans to add to the besieger's strenght. They met stiff resistance from the Loyalists as the Imperial defenders knew that the survival of their homeworld, their Emperor, and the entirety of the human race rested on their shoulders.

The siege of the Imperial Palace then began in earnest. Three times the Forces of Chaos scaled the walls, and three were hurled back by the defenders. Frustrated at this lack of progress, Horus granted the Legio Mortis the singular honour of breaching the walls of the Imperial Palace. Using the many powerful weapons at their disposal, they eagerly set about the task. By virtue of their insane fury they accomplished this near-suicidal endeavour, despite suffering the loss of over thirty Titans in one evening of fierce fighting. The Chaos Warlord-class Titans broke the outer walls and let inwards a flood of Traitors.

It was also during the Battle of Terra that the Traitor Warhound-class Titans, acting on the Warmaster's orders, roamed the planet in packs and terrorised the civilian population. The massacres perpetrated by these murderous behemoths caused the High Lords of Terra, during the later reformation of the Imperium, to order the Collegia Titanica to never again allow Warhound-class Titans to operate in squads larger than two, so that such horrors may never again be visited upon Mankind. Obviously, the Chaos Titans do not feel bound by this rule.

Regardless of their efforts, Horus was ultimately laid low by the Emperor, and the Traitor forces, facing defeat, hastily retreated from Terra and sought refuge in the Eye of Terror

Post Heresy
Following the failure to take the Imperial Palace on Terra, the Traitor Titan Legions retreated to the Eye of Terror along with the majority of the Forces of Chaos. From there, as well as from other vantage points like the Maelstrom, they continue to wage the Long War against the Emperor, taking part in raids on outlying Imperial worlds, supporting Black Crusades which strike our into Imperial-held space, as well as engaging in battles between the various chaotic factions themselves.

There are two known Titan Legions that have during this time, to their and the Collegia Titanica's eternal shame, repudiated their oaths to the Emperor and betrayed Mankind -- the Legio Lacrymea and the Adamant Fury Legion.

Siege of Vraks
The Siege of Vraks was an Imperial military campaign fought over the course of 17 standard years to retake the Imperial Armoury World of Vraks Prime from the heretical Forces of Chaos led by the Apostate Cardinal Xaphan. Vraks was besieged by the forces of the Imperium of Man in 813.M41, after the attempted assassination by an agent of the Officio Assassinorum of the heretical and traitorous Cardinal-Astra of the Scarus Sector, Xaphan, failed. The Imperial Guard's 88th Siege Army was raised from line regiments of the Death Korps of Krieg to undertake the siege of Vraks and bring the renegade cardinal down in a campaign of attrition that the Administratum's Adepts calculated would take 12 standard years to successfully conclude. At the conclusion of what became a 17-year-long campaign of attrition requiring 34 Regiments of the Imperial Guard to re-take the planet for the Emperor of Mankind in 830.M41, 14 million Imperial Guardsmen had been lost and Vraks Prime's entire original population of 8 million souls had been consumed in the violence or exterminated after they fell to Chaos corruption. This campaign is, amongst other things, a prime example of the deployment of Traitor Titan Legions in support of heretic forces in the 41st millenium, as well as a clear display of their value to the Forces of Chaos.

The Traitor Titans sought to arrive on Vraks along with other forces, boarded on the transport vessel Aharon's Bane. Although the Imperial Navy managed to damage the ship, the vessel survived the planetfall and crashed west of the Chaylia Plateau, tearing a great gouge into Vraks and leaving its remains scattered across kilometres of the planet's surface. The navy commanders hoped that the damage inflicted would see the craft destroyed, but this was not to be. Although many died as a result of the landing, far more survived, and warbands disgorged from the ship's ravaged hull were now preparing for battle -- amongst them the dreaded Titans of the Legio Vulcanum I.

From there, the chaotic reinforcements moved to engage the korps besieging the defensive lines surrounding the Citadel of Vraks. The Titans soon proved their worth once they engaged Imperial forces of the 101st Death Korps of Krieg regiment, opening fire at long range and devastating Krieg armoured columns sent to face the Traitor onslaught. Clouds of brown dust stirred by the advancing tanks turned to blue-black smoke as the vehicles were smitten by the fury of Turbo-Lasers, Gatling Blasters and Volcano Cannons mounted on the massive war machines. The attempts to retaliate were all for naught, as the armour-piercing shells whined off the Titans' Void Shields with electric blue flashes. Even repeated blasts of a Shadowsword's mighty ordnance flickered harmlessly off the Titans' shields. For all its efforts, in response the great tank was disarmed by a single shot of a Turbo-laser, and its crew immolated by a succesive blast.Ultimately, the force sent to halt the heretic renforcements failed.

The defeat of the 101st regiment meant that the Death Korps could no longer maintain a ring surrounding the fortress. The 19th regiment had been ordered to relocate and face this grim threat to buy time for other forces in a move that would ultimately see them cut off. In such circumstances, they could not have hoped to last long, especially if the enemy made use of their Titans. Such desperate measures were required just to save the campaign from complete failure.

These deafeats prompted Lord Militant Obscurus to replace the 88th Siege Army's command staff. The commander eventually chosen for this task was Marshal Arnim Kagori. His first action, after assembling his staff, was to gather help for the beleaguered regiments on Vraks. In addition to securing aerial support of the Imperial Navy and more manpower from Krieg, Kagori sought to be able to counter enemy Titans, and to this end has petitioned the Legio Astorum -- the Warp Runners -- for help. The venerable lords of Lucius, the Legio Astorum's homeworld, agreed. A battle group of Titans would be deployed to support the 88th Siege Army, as only they could hope to match the firepower of the Traitor Titans. After their rites of battle were complete, they embarked upon their transport vessels and set off for Vraks.

Soon, Kagori's reinforcements arrived on the planet, and amongst them -- the Legio Astorum battle group, comprising of 10 Reaver-class Titans and 12 Warhound-class Titans led by the venerable High Princeps Rand Drauca, ready to face the Traitors on the battlefield and resume the war that has been ongoing for ten thousand years.

The Warp Runners supported the Marshal's new offensive to great effect, and very soon the Legio Vulcanum I took to the field to face them. Both sides were initially evenly matched, and the Legio Astorum siin suffered its first loss of the campaign -- the Reaver-class Titan Invigila Alpha. The Vraksian renegades were heavily battered by Kagori's fresh forces, and were only able to hold the tide owing to the assistance of the Traitor Titans. However, as fighting progressed, the Legio Vulcanum I found itself outmatched by their Collegia Titanica counterparts, and were eventually forced to pull back and regroup after -- according to the Warp Runners -- losing 12 war machines, a feat for which the Legio Astorum paid with the disabling of 11 of their Titans.

The Titans clashed once more at the Red Scorpions Chapter first landing site. The Space Marines arrived on Vraks heeding Marshal Kagori's plea for aid following the Departmento Munitorum's unfavourable review of the campaign and its subsequent downgrading in reinforcement and resupplying priority. They opted to descend upon the planet surface into the breach located in sector 57-44, where they deemed their assistance would be put to best effect. A plan was agreed upon, which would see a special battle group from the 11th assault korps supported by Legio Astorum Titans exploiting the breach once the Red Scorpions succeeded in securing the area. The enemy had contingency plans for assaults on the breach, and moments after the Space Marines' arrived they were already fighting the swarming heretics, including Traitor Titans. Guardsmen rushed to aid the beleaguered Red Scorpions and trailing behind the, were the Warp Runners, who eagerly engaged the Legio Vulcanum I, seeking to repeat their previous success. The great machines locked in duel as the fighting continued around them, and despite suffering the loss of even more machines, the Legio Astorum triumphed, having the Traitors retreating. High Princeps Rand Drauca could list another victory over the despised Legio Vulcanum I on his Titan's honour banner.

Imperial records bear no mention of further actions undertaken by the Traitor Titans on the battlefield, though, it can be presumed that they continued the fight, as they are known to have defended the Citadel of Vraks itself. The number of Titans deployed by Traitors on Vraks is unknown, although the Legio Astorum claims having destroyed fourteen, and losing nine of their in the process. If this is true, then the Legio Vulcanum I paid a heavy price for their involvement. How the remaining Traitor war machines -- if there were any -- escaped from Vraks following the eventual Imperial victory is also unknown. of the Legio Vulcanum's actions during the campaign perhaps only one thing is certain -- they sowed destruction and terror wherever they went.

Organisation
Due to the very nature of Chaos, the united force that Horus commanded split into bickering and warring factions following the Great Scouring. So was this the case with the Dark Mechanicus who supported the Warmaster. They took residence on a number of Dark Forge Worlds and divided themselves into different sects and cults, each pursuing their quest for knowledge in fields and ways which they deem most appropriate. The Traitor Titan Legions did not have the same liberty to serve the Ruinous Powers in their own design as the other Forces of Chaos did. The reason for this state of matters is prosaic -- as much as the Titans became warped into forms more pleasing to their new masters and possessed by daemons, they were still at least partly machines, and thusly required the tending and maintenance only the Hereteks could provide, as well as ammunition produced by slaves on Dark Forge Worlds.

Because of this, the Traitor Titan Legions are invariably tied to the Dark Mechanicus and are effectively at their commands. They protect the Dark Forge Worlds, aud the Hereteks in their expeditions searching for Archeotech and in essence act as mercenaries whose services can be obtained by various Chaos Lords, Sorcerers and Daemon Princes in exchance for slaves, souls and raw materiel granted to the Dark Tech Priests.

These war machines are usually ancient and irreplacable relics of the Horus Heresy, as the Hereteks lack the measures to efficiently replace battlefield losses the Legions sustain. However, the Traitors can replenish their numbers in other ways. One of them, predictably, is betrayal. Some Titan Legions of the Collegia Titanica are known to have embraced the blessings of Chaos long after the Horus Heresy, and it is likely that such occurences are more common, but all notions of them are being struck from Imperial records. Another manner employed by Dark Tech Priests is to salvage Loyalists machines from the battlefield, repair them and subject them to bloody rituals in order to consecrate them in the service of Chaos, much to the shame and outrage of their former masters and the Cult of Mars. The number of Traitor Titan Legions and the machines they operate is unknown, however, bearing in mind that at the outset of the Horus Heresy fully half of the Collegia Titanica declared for the Warmaster, and considering the fact that the Adeptus Titanicus deploys over a hundred Titan Legions to watch over the Eye of Terror alone, one can estimate the figures to be significant.

Crew
It were the Tech-priests', Moderati's and Princeps', who comprise a Titan's crew, actions and decision to abandon their oaths of loyalty to the Emperor and give their souls and the war machines they commanded to Chaos that damned the god machines. They are now destined to forever do battle in the service of the Ruinous Powers, and many of them have already seen millenia of constant war.

Although some Chaos Titan crews do not differ much from ther Loyalist counterparts, that is to say at least of the way they operate their machines, this is not the case with their entirety, or indeed even majority. Due to their long exposure to the warping power of Chaos, chiefly by virtue of their continued residence in the distorted reality of the Eye of Terror, most of them have mutated nearly beyond recognition and have merged with their Titans. They since became a twisted fusion of flesh and machine, united in a form solely dedicated to the purposes of the Chaos Gods, doomed to eternal servitude.

Other Titans are presumed to be operated by the daemons which possess them, their original crews being dead or possessed themselves. These are mostly the instances of Greater Daemons fusing with Emperor Titans, transforming these great war engines into towering leviathans of Warp-corrupted steel and Adamantium, a true incarnation of the power of chaos in the material realm.

Reverence
"Bow down before him, favoured of Chaos!, Tremble at his footstep, and give praise for his slaughter."

- Dark Magos Ulth'alix

Although the Chaos Titans are effectively subordinate to the Hereteks, the Dark Mechanicus do not view them as servants, but revere them, depending on the beliefs they hold, as the perfect amalgam of daemon and machine, fusion of technology and the power of the Warp, or as the incarnations of the Machine God embodied in the power of Chaos Undivided. The latter is a perversion of the Adeptus Mechanicus beliefs concerning Titans, and holds true for those Hereteks that have not scorned their faith in the Omnissiah.

Fittingly, many amongst the lesser servants of Chaos view these towering war engines as gods of fire and death in their own right, giving obeisance to them as much as they would to Greater Daemons. They are known to offer captives as sacrifice to the Titans, as well as their own lives to slake these behemoths' thirst for blood. On the battlefield they are always encouraged by such manifest presence of the power of Chaos and fight even more fiercely to prove their worth to the Ruinous Powers. There are known instances of the mere presence of Traitor Titans keeping chaotic forces from routing and emboldening them to hold the line and fight back.