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Lion El'Jonson

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Lion El'Jonson or The Lion was the Primarch of the Dark Angels Space Marine Chapter. He was scattered along with the other Primarchs to the far corners of the galaxy. He finally came to rest on the world Caliban, a beautiful but blighted world tainted by Chaos due to its proximity to the Eye of Terror.

Contents

Life

Youth

Jonson's capsule landed in a remote area of Caliban, far from any human habitation. There are no records of how he survived or what he encountered in the jungle during his early years and any normal man would have died within minutes of being exposed to the planet. He lived for a decade in the jungle, alone and with no one to aid him. At the end of this decade he encountered his first humans.

Jonson was found by a group of warrior knights of The Order during one of their quests across the planet. While the knights prepared to kill Jonson, one of their number, a man named Luther, sensed something not immediately apparent about this seemingly wild man and prevented his fellow knights from attacking. Luther and the band brought Jonson back to their Fortress Monastery and named him 'Lion El'Jonson' which means The Lion, the Son of the Forest after the location and circumstances they found him in.

Jonson quickly grew up and adapted to the customs of the planet's inhabitants, learning to speak at an extremely rapid speed, though he never would speak of his first ten years of life. Luther and Jonson formed a strong friendship which complimented each others abilities and skills. It was now that Jonson's primary skills were discovered. He was a brilliant strategist and unstoppable once he decided on a course of action. Together, the two warriors rose through the ranks of the Order and spread the name of the Order through the quests they undertook together.

Crusade against the Great Beasts

When the Order's ranks had swelled with new recruits, Jonson and Luther petitioned for a crusade against the terrible Beasts which lived within the forest. Luther used his oratory skills to convince many of the Grand Masters of other monasteries to join the Order in this quest and within a single decade the planet was free from the Great Beasts, the armies having been led by Jonson. In recognition of his achievements, Jonson was given the title Supreme Grand Master of the Order, which created jealousy within Luther.

Arrival of the Emperor

Eventually a unit of the Emperor's forwards scouts arrived at Caliban. Jonson was immediately given command of the First Legion when the Emperor realised he had found a lost son. Luther and the other members of the Order who passed the Astartes' trials were formed into First Legion soldiers, either as fully fledged Astartes if they were young enough, or through genetic manipulation to increase their abilities in which they were too old for the process. After the new Astartes were ready, Jonson publicly re-named the First Legion the Dark Angels after an old Caliban myth. Luther, too old to be a Space Marine, was the first to be genetically modified and became Jonson's second in command, as he had been during the crusade. Jonson then left with the Emperor and the newly re-named Dark Angels.

Great Crusade

Shortly after their entry into the Great Crusade, and following the Sarosh Campaign, the Lion sent Luther and several hundred Dark Angels, mainly Calibanites, back to their homeworld. This was ostensibly to accelerate the recruitment of new Legionnaires, but Luther felt they had been exiled. Fifty years later, and following great success in recruiting, training, and equipping new Dark Angels, Luther and his lieutenants were faced by a widespread rebellion on Caliban. Following investigations on the part of the Librarian Zahariel, it was revealed that Caliban was plagued by a resurgence of monsters; and that the insurgency raised against them included former Knights of the Order who felt that the Lion had betrayed them. At the center of the entire affair was a mysterious cabal of Terran sorcerers somehow linked to the emergence of warp-monsters and twisted undead corpses. Having learned of Horus' rebellion against the Emperor, Luther declared the independence of Caliban and his opposition to Terra and the Lion alike.

The Lion and the Wolf

Few tales have been recorded regarding the Lion and the conduct of his Legion during the Great Crusade. One of them is that which is now known as the saga of "The Lion and the Wolf".

At some point during The Great Crusade the Dark Angels and the Space Wolves were assaulting a planet that had not given in to The Imperium's demands. The leader of the rebels had insulted Leman Russ by naming him "The Emperor's Lapdog". Leman Russ and his Space Wolves planned to attack for this blemish on their honour. While they were busy planning, The Dark Angels took the fight to the capital and The Lion himself killed their leader. Russ found The Lion with the dead leader at his feet and immediately attacked his brother Primarch. They fought for many hours, it ended when The Lion threw Russ through a table, when Russ got up he started laughing at the foolishness of their quarrel. The Lion, incensed that his brother appeared to be mocking him hit him square in the jaw, knocking Russ out cold. Russ awakened many hours later to find that Lion El'Jonson and his Dark Angels had left the planet. Honour Duels are still fought between members of The Space Wolves and The Dark Angels.1-p67

Horus Heresy

Jonson was campaigning in the Shield Worlds against the Gordian League4 when he recieved news about Horus' betrayal. The Lion knew that if Horus was to triumph in his rebellion he would eventually have to confront the Emperor at Terra, for as long as the Emperor remained safe in the confines of the Imperial Palace, Horus could never truly triumph and become the new master of mankind. The Lion decided to act in order to prevent Horus from being able to successfully assault the Imperial Palace. He led a small force to the forge world Diamat in order to secure several highly powerful siege weapons that Horus would need in order to assault Terra. Faced with superior odds, the Lion nonetheless succeeded in securing the siege weapons, and thus 'performed a master stroke,': rather than confronting Horus directly, he had seemingly defeated the Warmaster with only a handful of troops.5

Following his victory, the Lion met with Perturabo, who, along with other Legions, was on his way to join Ferrus Manus in confronting Horus at Isstvan V. Jonson, seeing the opportunity to become the new Warmaster following Horus' seemingly inevitable defeat, traded the siege weapons to Perturabo in exchange for his support in his bid to become the new Warmaster. Tragically, Perturabo was in fact an ally of Horus, as revealed by his actions at Isstvan V.6

Immediately following the siege of Diamat and Perturabo aquiring the siege engines from Jonson, the Primarch of the Dark Angels returned to the Shield Worlds where the majority of his legion were operating with the intention of heading to Terra immediatly, this being prior to Isstvan V. It is unknown what activities the Dark Angels engaged in between this time and the final siege of Terra; they and the Space Wolves arriving to break the Siege of Terra is stated to be what forced Horus to face the Emperor in single combat.

Return to Caliban

Jonson, wracked with grief, returned to Caliban to reinforce his Dark Angels and recover in general. When the ships arrived in orbit, they were hit by a savage salvo of fire from the surface. The fleet pulled back and Jonson tried to find out what was happening. He learnt from a merchant ship that Luther had poisoned the minds of the Space Marine garrison on the world and taken control. It could only be seen by Jonson as the taint of Chaos. Jonson's fury was let loose and the planet suffered. He ordered a systematic bombardment of the planet, destroying everything they could to rid the world of Chaos for all time.

The planet burned and the defences were whittled down to nothing. Jonson led his forces personally against the defenders who had taken refuge in the Order's Fortress Monastery. Jonson found Luther and saw him to be completely corrupted, nothing of his old friend had survived. Luther had been elevated to a strength equal to Jonson by the Chaos Gods and the two met in a combat the likes of which would not be seen again. They levelled the monastery around them but the planet was also taking a heavy toll. The bombardment began to crack the surface of the planet, the Dark Angels in orbit unable to see the damage they were doing.

The final battle

The battle between Luther and Jonson was titanic, but ended with a psychic attack that mortally wounded Jonson. Luther then realised what he had done, as if a veil had been lifted from in front of his eyes. He fell to the floor, unwilling to fight any more, but it was too late for Jonson. The gods of Chaos realised they had lost again, and sent a massive warp storm to wrack the surface of the planet. It then broke apart under the strain, destroyed all but for the monastery of the Order which had been protected by vast force-fields. When the Dark Angels descended to the, now, asteroid, they searched the ruins and found Luther mumbling that Jonson had been taken by the Watchers in the Dark and would return one day and forgive him for his sins. The Dark Angels could not find any trace of their Primarch. The rest of the Dark Angels who had been converted by Luther were sucked into the warp and scattered around the galaxy, now named The Fallen.

The Fate of Jonson

The final secret known only to a very select few is that, buried even deeper within the Rock than Luther, Jonson lies sleeping, waiting with the Watchers in the Dark for the time when he will be needed again, to lead the Dark Angels in a new and greater crusade. The Emperor is one who also knows of this secret.1-p14

Etymology

Lion El'Jonson's name is inspired by the English poet Lionel Johnson, the author of "The Dark Angel". Originally the name was spelt "Lyyn Elgonsen"2-p138. In a 1987 White Dwarf article3 he is also referred to as "Lynol Jacobsen or Jonsen", the point being that very little knowledge of Dark Angels' early history has survived.

Sacred objects

See also

Sources

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