The WoffBoot Chronicles: Tyranids

Tyranids

Hive Fleet Afanc

"I know thy quest," said she; "thou art going to encounter the Addanc, and he will slay thee, and that not by courage, but by craft."

-from Peredur the Son of Evrawc

A tiny Hive Fleet by any normal standard, Afanc is still incomprehensibly vast by human reckoning. Gradually seething out of the void and into systems around Rylstone, its tendrils are slim and winding. They seem to select very particular planets to infest, sometimes taking a single world from a system instead of devouring everything in their path as other Hive Fleets sometimes do.

One theory behind this is that what has so far been detected is in fact an extremely small outlying part of the swarm. The main bulk is still very far behind this forward tendril, still merely tasting the worlds ahead of it before selecting its final destination.

Afanc seems to favour particularly dense swarms. Tervigons are often seen as forward bastions of its advances, belching slick hordes of termagants towards defensive positions before overrunning them in the sheer weight of bodies. But more than some Hive Fleets, Afanc is adaptable, often changing tactics or even abandoning what seemed to be a successful invasion to withdraw and strike elsewhere.

Currently, the Hive Fleet is invading the important supply nexus of the Lethe and Drawbridge systems, both of which provide logistic support for a huge network of Imperial Guard and Navy worlds. The slow process of redeploying the regiments dependent on these systems to actually defend them has already begun.

This will take many years, however, and much rides on the initial defenders of the systems - Mantis Warrior Space Marines backed by Hagan Lamprey Tempestus Scion teams. If their thin lines fall, the defence will be over before it can truly begin, and Imperial campaigns against the T'Pau in Rylstone or the Reclamation Crusade to take Mombassa Superior back from the Necrons are doomed.

The Zamaroon Campaign