Servants of the Truth

The Servants of the Truth are a Chaos Warband formed at the end of the Horus Heresy by Blood Angels that turned away from the Imperium. The Servants of the Truth are primarily driven by their belief that in his final moments the Primarch Sanguinius turned to Chaos before being slain by not Horus, but the Emperor. Thus, by their service to the Ruinous Powers, they are fulfilling their gene-father’s final orders.

Origins
The 212th Company of the Blood Angels Legion was lead with dignity and valor throughout the latter stage of the Great Crusade by Captain Abdiel Tiberian. They fought for their Primarch valiantly, enduring the hardships of the Signus Campaign and fighting to defend the Imperial Palace during the final apocalyptic Battle of Terra. By the end of the Horus Heresy, the company was down to 25 Marines. As they sat in a camp in the Himalazian Mountains (Himalayas) waiting to return to Baal, a deafening crash rang out a short distance away. Running to it, a scouting party found a badly wounded Sanguinary Guardsman. The Guardsman claimed to be a survivor of the battle aboard the Vengeful Spirit, and he broke dire news to the 212th. He claimed to them that during the battle, their gene-father Sanguinius had turned to Chaos before his death. He said that Sanguinius did not die fighting Horus, as was commonly believed, but that he was slain by the Emperor Himself. Before he died, he beseeched the 212th to obey their gene-father’s last orders, and serve the Primordial Truth. Over the following week, the 212th snuck around the Blood Angels Legion, assembling more Battle-Brothers to their cause. Then, as they left Terra, they rose up in unison, highjacking several vessels and making a beeline for the Eye of Terror. All of this was done in secret, and the vessels were presumed 'Lost to the Warp' by their loyal brethren.

Awakening
After fleeing to the Eye of Terror, the Servants began to launch occasional raids into nearby space. They did not try to challenge the Imperium during the Scouring, save a few occasions where they sent forces out to do battle, mostly skirmishing with their loyalist cousins and former battle-brothers. Those forces that stayed in the Eye of Terror infiltrated other Warbands, seeking Blood Angels amongst their ranks, and sharing the Truth of their gene-sire's death to these Brothers, and bringing them back to join the Servants. Many Blood Angels obliged, and the Servants of the Truth swelled in number, becoming a major player amongst the non-legionary Warbands. With most heretical Blood Angels united under their leadership, the Servants of the Truth began to attack the Imperium, just as the Great Scouring was coming to a close.

Gene-Seed
The Servants of the Truth have very interesting geneseed. They do suffer from the Red Thirst, but not the Black Rage,something they see as Sanguinius’ blessing from the Warp. The Red Thirst manifests itself particularly powerfull, but the Servants believe that it brings those afflicted with it closer to Sanguinius, and as such it is a status symbol of sorts. Those who suffer the Red Thirst join the Angel’s Chosen, the Servant’s equivalent of Khornate Berserkers.

Notable Campaigns
With the Servants being successors of a Loyalist Legion, the Servants of the Truth were singled out early on by the Emperor’s Children when they started their slave raids. After several minor clashes that resulted in Servant slaves being stolen by the Children, the Servants of the Truth rallied their full strength and fought back. The Emperor’s Children had underestimated the small Warband, and sent only 500 Astartes to attack the Servants’ 300. The Emperor’s Children fleet was ambushed as it was deploying, causing considerable losses and driving it off, leaving those deployed on Kaitos with no method of escaping. In the following ground battle, Kaitos’ central mountain range was used to isolate the Emperor’s Children, using the void superiority to outmaneuver them and defeat them in detail. After this victory, Abdiel ordered the Servants of the Truth to abandon the planet, knowing that the Emperor’s Children would be back in greater numbers, numbers far too great for them to withstand. Fleeing Kaitos, the Servants of the Truth would fight alongside elements of the Sons of Horus against the Emperor’s Children in several different battles. However, this alliance would not last, and once the fighting of the Legions turned Fulgrim’s attention away from the Servants, there was a skirmish between the Sons and the Servants, which did prove to be a minor Servants of the Truth victory, with several vessels being captured. In the aftermath of the Battle of Skalathrax, the Servants assaulted several World Eaters warbands. In a close-fought battle over Meitov, these warbands rallied together to resist the Servants, and they nearly overran them before their boarding parties were repulsed and their fleet destroyed or captured. Now in possession of a sizeable fleet, the Servants required more materiel to supply their armies, so they attacked a Tzeentch-allied Hellforge.This Hellforge was defended by a Thousand Sons warband, and the reverse of the Battle of Kaitos almost occurred as their fleet only entered auspex range until midway through the Servants’ deployment. It was only by Abdiel and his captains swinging their fleet around as one, organized body and seamlessly shifting formation to move through an asteroid field that they managed to form an effective defense and win the orbital battle. On the ground, the Servants dropped directly onto the Thousand Sons, engaging them in a melee they were ill suited for, and forcing the surrender of the Hellforge, providing enough loot to supply the Servants for the rest of the war, and again yielding plenty of ships, including several hulks that had still been in construction. At the end of the war they would engage in another climactic battle for Kaitos,chasing the forces of the Emperor’s Children there. During the war their numbers had swelled considerably, and they were then strong enough to actually defeat the shard of the shattered Legion. Kaitos was absolutely destroyed during the fighting, and fierce ship to ship boarding actions saw a considerable number of Emperor’s children vessels captured by the Servants of the Truth. The Servants were now overstretched. Their fleet was much larger than a Warband of their size could hope to maintain and protect, so they assembled their hulks and heavily damaged vessels into one of the system’s Lagrange Points, pushing them together and taking advantage of gravity to push them into a massive hulk that would form the foundation of the Red Tear.
 * The Legion Wars, early M31

Acting upon information from an infiltrator within the Black Legion, the Warband rallied their forces in an effort to retrieve Spear of Telesto, the weapon used by their Genefather during the Great Crusade. They sent in several Brothers, including Captain Cerviel Nentre, to the Black Legion to retrieve it. The Spear was found to be on the planet of Wiunus in the possession of Nariam Domaris, a Blood Angel who had fallen to the worship of Tzeentch, and who was holed up in a fortress with a group of followers. The Servants couldn’t assault it directly without provoking the might of the Black Legion. So, Cerviel Nentre recruited a strike force of Black Legionnaires to assault the fortress. Several Blood Angels serving with the Black Legion joined this strike force, as did several dozen Fallen, descended of Lion’El Johnson. In minority, Astartes were present that were sons of all of the Traitor primarchs. As the Strike Force descended on Wiunus, Nariam Domaris was unaware of their approach. In fact, the first Stormbirds were able to deploy their troops before the alarm was raised. A fierce firefight ensued, with the Servants forces using melta bombs to collapse the walls of Domaris’ fortress. Once the breach had been made, the Blood Angels among the Strike Force lead the way through it, with the others following close behind. For hours they cut through Domaris’ followers, Astarte and mortal alike. Nentre was at the tip of the spear, rending all those who thought they could stand up to him. The Strike Team made a beeline for Domaris’ makeshift throne room, where the Spear was kept. Once they reached the door, the sons of other Primarchs turned around and began to spread out throughout the fortress, leaving the Sons of Sanguinius to enter. Cerviel Nentre made this decision not out of a desire for glory, but in prediction of what would happen. Sure enough, as the force entered, Nariam Domaris fired at them with the Spear of Telesto itself. Had the Servants brought their allies in with them, every last one of said allies would have been killed by this blast. Not expecting them to survive, Nariam was caught off guard when Cerviel rushed him, totally unharmed. Grasping the Spear of Telesto, far too large for Nariam to effectively use to defend himself, Cerviel cast it aside. Domaris barely drew his power sword to block Cerviel’s next blow, and a lengthy duel ensued between the two. The men were evenly matched, because the Lord of Trickery himself was providing Nariam with brief prescience, enabling him to see Cerviel’s blows before he struck them. At one point,Nariam’s guard faltered, and Cerviel’s blade cut deep into his arm. Shocked by the sudden betrayal of his patron, and of the overall situation of the battle, he gave in to the Black Rage, throwing himself with abandon at Cerviel, only to be cut down. In the following hours, the Strike Team cleared the fortress of Nariam Domaris’ followers, and secured the Spear of Telesto for the Servants of the Truth. In the aftermath, all of the Strike Team, including those who were not descendent of Sanguinius, joined the Warband. Though still predominantly Blood Angel, Astartes of all geneseeds had joined the Servants during the Legion Wars, and they were now bolstered by the Strike Team members. In the early days, when numbers were of a serious concern, geneseed was gratefully used regardless of its origin. In later millennia, where Blood Angels geneseed was much easier to steal, much of the other geneseed was bred out, though there are still Servants of the Truth that can trace their genes back to the Lion. The Spear itself would be a valued artifact by the Servants of the Truth for millennia until it was later lost.
 * The Quest for the Spear, 021.M31:


 * The Thirteenth Black Crusade, 999.M41


 * The Fall of Cornelia, early M42: During the Great Expansion, the Dark Librarians of the Servants of the Truth detected a great battle being fought in their fleet's vicinity. They moved en masse to intervene, and found a perfect situation to exploit. The Corpse Kings and Astral Warriors Chapters had been locked in costly siege warfare for several months, and the Warriors' final charge was underway. The Servants swept down upon them, attacking both sides. 300 Berserkers lead the way as they slammed into the surface. The skies over the planet of Cornelia darkened as they arrived. The Berserkers, under Captain Nentre, assaulted the Astral Warriors directly, landing on them in the middle of their charge, and running rampant among their battered ranks. The Warriors put up a valiant resistance, but against the veteran and more importantly fresh Servants of the Truth, they could not put up a serious fight. The Warriors were annihilated under this new attack, and the Corpse Kings maimed and driven from the field. In the aftermath, the Servants helped themselves to a bounty of loot. Terminator Armor, Custom Vehicles, and all sorts of other technology were taken into the Warband’s stocks, and gene-seed was collected for sale to Fabius Bile.

Warlord Abdiel Tiberian
Abdiel has been leading the Servants since their inception at the end of the Horus Heresy. A true veteran of almost all the Warband’s major conflicts, he is highly respected among the Warband, and among the Heretic Astartes at large. His command style is brutal, and rebellion is punished with death. Such a style is necessary in the Heretic Astartes, especially when a Warband is partially devoted to multiple aspects of the Primordial Truth.

Captain Cerviel Nentre
Captain Nentre is one of the Original 25 Blood Angels who defected and formed the Servants of the Truth. Nentre was one of the first Marines to become afflicted with the Red Thirst. He serves as Abdiel’s right hand, leading the Angel's Chosen in battle, and serving as one of the Warband's greatest tacticians.

Warband Fleet
The Servants of the Truth, being primarily fleet based, possess considerable naval power. 1 Space Hulk, the Red Tear

15 Battleships

5 Despoiler class

3 Descrator class

2 Desolator class

5 Battle Barges

70 Cruisers

20 Grand Cruisers

3 Avenger Class

5 Retaliator class

10 Executor class

2 Repulsive class

20 Heavy Cruisers

10 Styx class

6 Hecate class

2 Hades class

2 Hellfire class

40 Light Cruisers

10 Murder class

5 Slaughter class

5 Inferno class

5 Devastation class

10 Slaughter cruisers

5 Hellbringer class

170 Escort Squads