WRITTEN IN THE DUSTby Jeffrey ArpHere be my new work. This piece is a reworking of the small sampler "The Saints of Gothenburg" that I posted several weeks ago (note that it does not figure in right away). Enjoy! -Jeffrey Arp For You have armed me with strength What man has the power to contest his fate when one
cannot even perceive it? ************ Sabaoth knelt before the profrane altar. The blood of the victims pooled into the cracks and rifts of the battle-scarred cement floor. The Imperial planet of Gothenburg, named for its capital city, was shattered. A massive warhost had laid siege to the industrial planet, and the subsequent invasion broke the spirit and strength of its defenders. Numerous parties of Chaos Marines roamed its small hives, searching for the remnants of Imperial citizens yet to be sacrificed upon the black altar of Chaos. Despair was upon the tongues of the innocent, their death-wails drowned by the ceaseless hunger of the orbiting Chaos battlefleet, whose ancient guns pierced through the murky smoke of the burning hives with devastating accuracy. The perpetrator of Gothenburg's ruination remained motionlessbefore the bloodied altar. The Dark Gods of Chaos no longer spoke to Sabaoth, and the choruses of embittered hate no longer soothed him with their dark promises. They had grown silent, and in their absence the void of humanity within him grew cold and cancerous. The hungry darkness of ten thousand years began to gnaw from within, and only the blood-voice of his murderous rage kept him sane. He thought back upon the distant past, of a time to which he belonged. In this the materium, the realm of men, the time of Sabaoth should have been eternally cut-off from the present. But dark pacts and the selling of souls had corrupted the natural order of things, and from the Imperium's subterranean past came Sabaoth and his kind, the hosts of Chaos, that fed on things elsewise forbidden. They were the serpent of eternity, the multi-headed dragon of Chaos, the unrelenting Leviathan of antiquity that fed upon its own descendants. Memories of Colchis flooded the Chaos Lord's flesh with the sharpness of reality as it existed only within the Warp. Had not Lorgar, his Primarch, been granted the boon of insight of which the others of his race deeply lacked? Before the Eye of Horus first gazed upon the firmament of evil within his soul, had not Lorgar already known the watery depths of the Ancient Ones? Lorgar had already spoken in tongues and beheld great and terrifying visions when the suckling infant Horus learned of his true heritage and fate. The Word Bearers had known of the Dark Gods and had praised them and had built bloodful temples in their forbidden names. They had scribed upon their flesh the gods' whispering dictates and darkest commands, and they had been glorified by the unholy praise of the gods of Chaos. The Word Bearers of Lorgar had known the treachery and hypocrisy of the False Emperor long before the tendrils of corruption first touched upon the Warmaster Horus. Coming out of his reverie, Sabaoth glanced upon the blood-stained corpse in front of him. The blood ran deep enough for the victim's mangled hand to float gently upon the cement floor beneath it. He wondered how long he would endure the silence of the gods. "Lord Tubal-Kahn." The voice impregnated the stilled air of the profaned Imperial temple. Sabaoth focused his mind upon the voice's origin. "Which of my servants is it that seeks me?" "It is I, a chaplain of your hosts. I am known as Eshek, and I have fought in your ranks for more than seven millenia." "What is it that you seek?" Sabaoth knew the chaplain well; he was one of his greatest champions. "We have sacked Gothenburg for the purpose you have given unto us, so that the gods of Chaos may find favor with us and lead us to a final apocalypse with our accursed brethren, the loyalist thralls of the False Emperor of Man..." Eshek's voice dropped into silence, as he waited for Sabaoth's reaction to the concerns his chaplain was soon to raise. "Continue." "I ask of you, Lord Tubal-Kahn, the Bearer of Woe and Bringer of Hosts, to give me understanding of your attack on this planet. Surely the gods would have found greater favor with a prize such as Avanlar, Teitus, or Sylna Priorus. As it stands, our altars have been bathed only in the soft and thin blood of the ignorant commoner. Our men...your men...scream for the divinity of blood born in combat, and my fellow Chaplains...your Chaplains...themselves now bray for that which is the milk of life, the sustenance of our kin. I am solid in the belief and knowledge that your fell hand shall carve apart for us, in our own image, the accursed Imperium of Man, and that you yourself shall smash aside the Gates of Terra, and smash asunder the false Prophet who cast us into the lapping waters of hateful eternity. I speak to you only of concern fo rthe warriors of your hosts. You have been given up unto the glorified realms of the Pantheon so that you may lead us, the lost tribes of antiquity, up from the serpent's nest and into the bosom of our miscast brethren, so that we may destroy with flame and plasma, steel and icon, they who have attempted to silence us and smite our existence for a half-score of millenias. I have founded my faith upon your sword, Lord Tubal-Kahn, and I have nothing further to raise upon my tongue." Fibers of bloodlust began to stich through Sabaoth's archaic armour and inhuman body. Hearing that his warriors thrsted for battle stirred within him the ancient bloodlust of his kind. Using the serrated edges of his armoured power goves, Sabaoth leaned forward and, with a singular motion, dug into the lifeless victim's forehead, at the base of his eyebrows. With deliberate motion, he tore the flesh clean from the forehead, exposing the front section of the skull. Dipping a finger into the thick, almost jellied, blood upon the floor, Sabaoth drew upon the exposed bone an ancient and feared rune, shaped as a hateful skull, and surrounded by flame. "Eshek of my hosts, come forward before me and behold my words, I who have fought as a reaping demon and who scythes the inky blackness of the on-rushing night." Eshek moved towards the kneeling Sabaoth. Upon the floor, ripples caused by his movement pulsated through the drying pools of blood held tight underneath thin skins of blackish film speckled with torn flesh. As he stood next to Sabaoth, Eshek noticed the rune-inscribed skull, and thought upon the same rune which was engraved upon his ancient suit of power armour. "Eshek, know that even now a great silence stalks the void. Equipped with mortal suns and a decaying race, the False Emperor of Man has sent his thralls to find battle with us. Gothenburn is but a sign of our presence, the sacrifice humbled fore the gods so that they may find favor upon us. We have uncoiled ourselves from the watery darkness of the Immaterium, and seek now to rise upon the throats of the great betrayer known as Man. As our steel cleaves into the clay flesh of this unredeemed race, the worthless benefactors of the greatness of our antiquity, even then shall the False Emperor pour forth his angels and saints, so that the blood of war may be poured upon the barren ground of our destiny and their fate. We, whose thirst never slakes, shall draw open the vein of Man, and bathe in its doomed waters." Eshek was stirred by the words of his lord. As Sabaoth rose to his feet, Eshek thought of the hated loyalists who would launch their treacherous assault against the host of Word Bearers under the command of Sabaoth ibn Arpad, the fell Lord Tubal-Kahn, the Bearer of Woe, the Bringer of Hosts, and the Ashwind of Souls. He felt the dark power of Chaos course through him as he prepared for battle under the renowned Chaos Lord's ancient and blasphemous banner... ************ Phares stood before the granite chamber-doors. Upon their ancient surfaces, remnants of a once glorious mural left colourful scratches upon the mute gray, nicked and scarred by piety and battle. Within seconds, an ancient sensor clicked off the appropriate signals, and ancient gears, their teeth nearly worn to shining nubs, groaned into operation. The large chamber-doors slowly heaved upon their gnarled hinges, and the Inquisitor was allowed through. Upon the ship's bridge, Phares recognized the still frame of the ship's admiral, Etienne Lafayette. Hailing from the Imperial planet of Quebe'croix, the Admiral commanded his homeworld's beloved battleship, the Emperor-Class L'Rimouski Oceanique. It was a sainted and venerated relic of the people of Quebe'croix, and in its long history it had served the Emperor well. Ork and Eldar, Tyranid and Heretic; none were safe from the divine wrath of the idolic ship. The "Rimouski", as it was commonly known, had borne its guns into countless enemy vessels, and its tireless crews had sent numerous enemy prizes to the cold deeps of the void. Its last victim, the Retribution-Class Bull of Khorne, had been repelled by the Rimouski's devastating broadsides before its bomber-craft found the Chaos ship's soft underbelly. Plasma warheads detonated upon the armoured skin made weak by an eternity of exposure to conditions incomprehensible to mortal man. The acidic tongues of flame given brief life amidst the coldness of the void pierced the doomed ship's undersides, and moments later the Bull of Khorne shuddered and cracked, its bloodred armour peeling away from bone-melting heat as the inferno raged on from within. Escort ships pulled hard to escape the broken ship's death-wake of splintered metal and molten flesh, which floated and coagulated quickly into frozen amorphic remnants of the dead crew. That victory had occurred nearly five years ago, and now the Rimouski's crew hungered again for bloodsport. The Inquisitor stopped short of the Admiral, who was stationed directly in front of the bridge's forward bank of sensors. Standing in the center of the tired and ancient command center, with its blessed and archaic terminals and faded tapestries of the Emperor's victory over the dragons of Chaos, Phares eyed suspiciously the busy crew as they performed the myriad tasks of running the upper systems of the immense battleship. Although they had been modified so much by the tech-priests that they truly were no longer human, at least not as human as the common Imperial subject was, Phares could never get over the possibility that such common men could withhold the siren's call of corruption and taint. His instincts told him that they all should have been immediately quarantined for destruction, and that if it wasn't for the vigilance of the Emperor's chosen servants, such as himself, humanity would have de-evolved into a base genetic pool of mutants and beastmen, made foul and sickly by their unnatural desires and their weak inability to control them. He vowed to himself to keep careful watch over these humans under his command, knowing as did all his kind that the foul disease of Chaos could use these wretched vessels of flesh and bone to assault his own shining purity at any moment. While the Inquisitor pondered upon mankind's fate, the battlegroup's second-in-command, though by no means under his control, arrived upon the bridge. The giant of a Space Marine strode towards Phares, whose luminous black suit of Terminator Armour hung like vulture's skin upon the feared Inquisitor's rigid frame. While just as tall as the Marine Commander, Phares did not possess the other's robustness of size, and the similarly armoured Marine, his suit a deep red lacquered like wet blood, seemed to overpower the Inquisitor's personal space with his brute presence and murderous silence. There existed no friendship or unity of purpose between the two, and only a fraudulent web of cordiality occupied the vast gulf between them. "Inquisitor Phares, why are you delaying our arrival at Gothenburg? Is not our best option but to strike and to strike fast? We are Adeptus Astartes, and before our screaming talons and scythes countless enemies of the blessed Emperor have found themselves scattered across the lifeless void! Why have you denyed us this contract of the dead, this litany of faith that we have inscribed upon the skull of every heretic, who knows in his trembling heart that vengeful ghosts ride upon the eternal nightmares of the guilty, where day brings no comfort and the beams of his wretched faith are choked out and blotted with our very hands? But you, you have given the guiltful time to escape, and the heretic now debauches himself in the sanctuary of this, his ill-gotten knowledge!" "Master Rhadamanthys, I urge you to keep no tone of discord or ill-repute with me!" The Inquistor's eyes flared with empassioned righteousness. "I shall keep the tone I see fit to behold unto you." "If your tongue betrays you, then by it you shall hang, my dear friend. You need not worry about being delayed from the appointed realm of Gothenburg, for that is not our true destination." "Then what is, my liege?" The piercing viciousness of the last words stabbed the Inquisitor with their savage mockery. Visions of heresy flared brightly before him, briefly giving him cause to suspect and condemn, but soon the Inquisitor's mind regained its focus. "Dhadhikras Rhadamanthys, Master of the Crusaders Militant chapter of Marines, you have been given unto me for a task most severe in its reward. The Inquisition acknowledges no legitimate secret withheld from its righteous awareness, and yet one of your kind practices such deceit as we stand and breathe! Your chapter is known for its piousness towards the Emperor, and that you yourself have served as a boon of Mankind for over two hundred years. You have rained terror upon those who would overrun the beneficient temples of the Ecclesiarchy and its bound and loyal servants, and have marched under the banner of the High Lords since the dawning of your chapter's existence." The Inquisitor momentarily eyed the others inside the bridge. The servitors and crew seemed unaware of the unfolding conversation, as were most of the officers. Admiral Lafayette remained stationary at the front banks, his back turned towards the Inquisitor, yet Phares suspected that the Admiral had picked up on every word of the conversation. Numbing his burning hatred of the Marine before him, he dropped his voice to match the secrecy of the mission. "Master Rhadamanthys, we know also of your chapter's dislike, even hatred, of the Unforgiven, of those chapters whose names need not be mentioned, but known already upon your dogmatic heart." The Marine Commander nodded his head in conspiratorial agreement. "Master Rhadamanthys, I search for a key to unlock and discover that which is kept hidden by those most accursed brethren of yours, and that key shall be found if I must scourge every planet of wickedness and secrecy. Nearby, our true destination awaits. Gothenburg is currently under attack by a raiding force of Chaos Marines. Do not feel concern for those who are expendable, Rhadamanthys; in due time we shall deal with Them as well. But for now precedence guides my hand. This key resides upon a desolate rock, a barren planet that has never known life native to it. Yet life lives upon and inside its surface, and the key that I search for looms like a desolate angel of enlightenment in its most darkest recesses. You and your men shall stave off any evil we encounter, save for those creatures daemonic in their incubation and existence; for them, I have brought along my own bodyguard of Grey Knights, adept and sufficient for any task we may need undertake. But beware, Commander, and know that as soon as we find this key, angels and devils may descend upon us, intent on feasting upon the truth that we may uncover. Know then that ahead of us, upon and inside an alien clime where man is but a shadow given flesh, that in your madness you shall forsake the Emperor, and in your delirium the Emperor shall judge you and find you righteous, and bring you and your kind back to your health. Fear not this transgression that you shall shortly make, for I fear...and know...that there shall be no other option given up unto us when that breakage of mortal soul that follows the unbinding of daemonic pacts screams forth for such blasphemy. Know then, Master Rhadamanthys, and trust in that most ancient of knowledge: your *Emperor* is your life; guard him well." And with that, the much-feared Inquisitor left the bridge... ************ As Sabaoth stood upon the remnant of the temple's once sacred entrance, where jutting fangs of burnt rock marked where gold-inscribed walls once stood, the small red light situated inside his helmet, just to the left of his forehead, began silently pulsating. It was the indicator that Siccarus, one of many of Sabaoth's mighty champions, sought an audience with him. Aboard the *Dead Hand of Authority*, Sabaoth's heavily retro-fitted Desolator-class battleship, Siccarus was currently serving as Sabaoth's Master of the Fleet. Motioning away Eshek, who went off to oversee the nearby sacrifice of several planetary defencemen who had just surrendered moments before, Sabaoth rose a bloody hand to a small golden icon situated upon his chest-plate. Depressing the icon activated the communications gear in his helmet, and Sabaoth could hear several whips of static lash about as his equipment began automatically adjusting itself to pick up Siccarus' distant signal. "Lord Tubal-Kahn, long-range sensors indicate that the warhost come to dispatch us has dropped out of Warp." Sabaoth felt the icy hand of fate upon his neck; the enemy was not to arrive at Gothenburg for another twenty cycles, or roughly four local days. Now, he may not come at all. Quickly organizing his thoughts, Sabaoth bade Siccarus to continue with his report. "My Lord, sensors indicate that the enemy has been out-warp now for nearly a full cycle. Turn of the Screw and her escorts, our nearest patrol, are reporting that the enemy has seized upon Warnesheth." Sabaoth's mind fell into the watery depths of time at the mention of the fabled planet. When the Emperor still walked amongst Man as a god, and the kin of Lorgar still fell prostrate at his feet, the hosts of the Word Bearers had known a homeland, the planet of Colchis. It was now a dream enchained by the ages, a world long since lost since the Great Heresy, when the hated loyalists took to Colchis in vengeance, and had her destroyed. The velvet homeland of the Word Bearers had been cast adrift upon the currents of eternity from which there had been no hope of retrieval. But then! Then came rumours and rumours of rumours, and the seeds of whispers that brought forth the doomed name of their homeland. Colchis, it was said, still existed, a ghost-planet set like a pearl amidst the raw flesh of the Warp, a haunting of matter that kept reappearing in the realm of materium as a drowning man continually breaks the surface. Sabaoth longed for his homeland, the world of his brethren, the Word Bearers, and knew that they would pay any price for its resurrection. Sabaoth also knew of the Eldritch tale of Warnesheth, the Silent Planet, who crept amidst the galaxy like a vengeful god bent on restoration. The details were sparse, but all echoed the dim memories Sabaoth held of his beloved Colchis. And now, had the fabled Silent Planet been birthed back into hideous material form once again, but now within his grasp? Sabaoth had learned not to give his longs over to hope, for it was a fell betrayer of men's hearts. But within him he heard the war-cries of antiquity, and felt the pulse of carnal and bloodfull drums as they beat out the ancient hymns and prayers of his legion. "Siccarus, band together the fleet, and call forth my hosts, so that they all may know of our immediate departure. Tell our patrols to lock their eyes upon this planet of fable, so that it may be known if the Dark Gods have showered us with favor." "Yes, Lord Tubal-Kahn." ************ Phares looked over his shoulder at the silent Admiral. Back aboard the bridge after retiring to his personal quarters for his daily vid-log entry, the Inquisitor held the commanding view of the mysterious planet they were headed for, with the assorted ship's crew keeping their distance behind him. To Phares, the planet looked like a perfectly round sheet of luminous ice. The planet, which floated alone through the void with no companion star to give it light, still shined with a glow both visually strong yet unexplainably indistinct. It was as if the planet leached the light of the nearby stars, only to recast it from within so that it shimmered through a thin skin of stellar dust. Down below, the marines of the Crusaders Militant chapter prepared for battle. Weapons were blessed, armour purified, warriors given the prepatory final rites. All sought the Emperor's redemption and grace through glorious combat, for the chapter was in its 100th year of penance for its betrayal of the Blood Angels chapter on Salganus IV. How many Sons of Sanguinius died as their battle-brethren made retreat was unknown. The warriors of Baal never forgave this falter, and since that time the Crusaders Militant purged themselves by ceaseless war. Inquisitor Phares had been assigned to them during their 74th year of penance, and had found them worthy of this most secret mission. The Crusaders Militant were unimpressed by many of their brother marines, and scorned the noncomformity of such honoured chapters as the Space Wolves and Dark Angels, who in the eyes of the Crusaders were nothing short of full-blown heretics. Phares did not know the reasons for such animosity, but he cared not enough to bother finding out. The Crusaders had proved zealous in their quest to smite the Emperor's thrice-accursed foes, and their mistrust of the Dark Angels made them suitable allies in the Inquisitor's search for the Unforgiven's shadowy past. As the mysterious planet began to swell across the forward viewport, the Admiral began issuing the proper orders to begin the final sequence of events before the marines were dispatched to the surface. Against the Admiral's wishes, the Inquisitor had all the assault boats and all but one bomber squadron and two fighter squadrons removed from the battleship and replaced with Space Marine drop pods and two Thunderhawks to help ferry the small detachment of marine armour, consisting of two Whirlwinds and a Predator Annihilator, accompanying the main force of the Crusaders Militant, which consisted mainly of several Assault squads and mobile Tactical squads backed with bike and land speeder squadrons. In command was Dhadhikras Rhadamanthys, Chapter Master, with his command squad and their Land Raider, and an Elite squad under the command of Captain Titus Menelaus, who were being transported aboard a Razorback. Built for speed, the Crusaders Militant detachment was posed to strike hard and to strike fast when the order was finally given by Inquisitor Phares to began launch of the first waves. Since the chapter possessed few Terminator suits (most of which had been claimed by the Blood Angels as blood-debt for the treachery), there were no Terminator squads available for the mission, and the Chapter Master himself, Rhadamanthys, who wore the suit of Terminator armour worn by every Crusaders Master, was the only marine in the detachment so equipped. Prepared for war, the drop pods of the Crusaders Militant plunged into the cold void as the Thunderhawks, engorged with marine armour, with each clutching a Rhino underneath so that one could fully afford the Land Raider's volume in its cargo hold. Within seconds the full detachment was engulfed by the flooding waters of light seeping from the planet beneath. Within minutes, Inquisitor Phares and his bodyguard of Grey Knights followed suit... ************ Rhadamanthys' gaze fell softly upon the surface of the planet. The light reflected from it felt like the warm embrace of a dying candle. As his men crept out into defensive positions, Rhadamanthys realized that no sound emanated from them, or even himself. While the planet was habitable, and men could breathe upon its surface without need for masks or fear of poisons or suffocation, there was no discernable atmosphere surrounding the mysterious planet that he and his men had landed upon. Scanning his gaze upwards, Rhadamanthys could see no separation between the void of space and the mute air of the planet. The Marine Commander opened his mouth as if to speak, but the words escaped from his mouth silently and without restraint. For some reason, unknown even to his vast knowledge, the planet allowed no speech, or sound, to cross upon its surface. Not even the audible silence of one's own body, save a strong heartbeat or choking lung that was heard from deep within, could survive the numbing deadness of the surface. Rhadamanthys clicked his mouthpiece, the only form of communication that worked on the surface of the planet, which signaled the attention of his officers. After telling them to leave their communication gear, as well as those of their men, permanently on and linked, Rhadamanthys returned to observing the natural phenomenon of the planet as he awaited the arrival of the Inquisitor, which would be delayed while the Thunderhawks made a second trip to retrieve the two Land Raiders assigned to Phares and his bodyguard, which numbered nine-strong and was organized into two squads. The location of the marines was set amidst a great plain, or basin, or perhaps even a sea-bed. In the hazy, glimpsed-at distance, the smooth bases of plateaus glistened with light. The plain itself was a long sheet of glassy rock, without a single crack or jagged edge, as if water once flowed upon and polished it. There was no water, at least no longer, and the plain was covered only with fine dust, a thin layer, which itself was also untouched and uncorrupted by any signs of change or life. In the distance, small lights began appearing. Looking like streams of plasma with the same luminosity as the planet, they sped behind the distant plateaus, appearing like flashes of silvery light in between the glowing grey mounts. In them Rhadamanthys sensed a pulsating fear that disturbed the overwhelming sense of isolation that he had previously been feeling, and their unbending remoteness caressed him with a faint dread of the events to come. He was looking at the lights when Inquisitor Phares finally arrived. Trailed by four Grey Knights whose terminator armour looked like dead spots amidst the incandescence of the surface, the Inquisitor was not pleased by the mute stance of the Marine Commander. Switching his communicator to Rhadamanthys' frequency, Phares began to speak in hushed tones to the still silent marine. "Do not burden yourself with concern over those lights. They are most likely natural phenomena, perhaps a form of lightning. Obviously you have seen such myriad forms of weather before, and you are used to such new and perhaps unsettling forms of local conditions, are you not?" Rhadamanthys looked at the Inquisitor, eyes full of wondering thoughts towards the Inquisitor's exact purposes for being here. "Now, the plan is simple Commander. That irregular plateau off in the distance, the one with softly-divided but nonetheless distinct edges; at its base there is said to be an entrance leading to a great chamber beneath. Inside that chamber is the key that I seek, as well as the black secret kept hidden to us by the Unforgiven." Phares' accent on "us" made it clear to Rhadamanthys that he was referring only to the Inquisition and its Ordo Malleus, the Grey Knights. "What do you expect to find...that would require us to accompany you? This seems to be a deserted planet, void of life, abandoned even by its sun and any daughter moons that it once possessed." "You are not aware, then, of the Eldritch tales concerning this planet?" "I speak not to the alien, nor heed any debased word that may slip from its tongue." "You may think then that you are perhaps more pure, more redeemed by the Emperor, than I, but know that the minds of aliens can be our tools, if we know how to decipher what is inscribed upon them." "And what of these degenerate tales that have brought us to this land of desolation?" "You are aware that relics still exist from the time of the Great Heresy, and that those debased fanatics of your traitorous brethren still search for them in hopes of vindication or even for some perverse sense of redemption, are you not?" "I know that there are those who are dead but have yet to give up their ghost to the Emperor for judgment." "Then know that your 'dead', as you call them, hunger for the life given to us by the Emperor, and they will stop at nothing from obtaining what will give them the feast of the Emperor's forgiveness. And know then that there are those amongst the saints who would deny this vindication." "Why would they deem elsewise? Vengeance cares not for repentance; and only their heart's blood cooled upon our steel shall give us satisfaction." "And that is a most noble belief, Lord Rhadamanthys, but know then that there are those amongst your brethren who are but mirrors to which fasten the images of these...fallen...heretics. While the flesh shows complete obedience, their bones have solidified around a corrupted truth. And it is that truth, stored deep within the Unforgiven, that I seek to uncover." "I shall hold no peace to any alien or enemy of the Emperor, and any such who cross their lives against mine shall find their blood soaking upon this desolate land..." "But?" The Inquisitor did not enjoy the implications of distrust and malevolence that was threaded in Rhadamanthys' words. "But," replied the marine commander, "I am a warrior dedicated to the service of the Emperor, and I trust in His benefaction that my sword is guided upon all who oppose Him, no matter the form that they have chosen to take. Keep in memory the knowledge that heresy begets retribution, no matter its source." ************ It required several hours for the Imperial detachment to cross the Silent Planet's immense plain towards the entrance of the inner chamber nestled within the base of a great plateau whose broad shoulders loomed and seemingly hovered above the flat surface surrounding it, a mass of grey spectral dust held together by the same pervasive glow that encapsulated the entire planet. While their pace was brisk, the journey was taken with much precaution and anticipation. The strange lights on the horizon continued their journey, and their soft beacons communicated an unspeakable alienness to the Marines, who had already begun referring to the mysterious phenomena as "palefires." Many felt they were more than weather or natural occurrences, but the work of some alien race who already held claim to the planet. During the journey, Inquisitor Phares ordered complete silence with regard to all communication devices save himself. Not trusting in the Marines' newfound, and almost occultic, fascination with the "palefires", Phares ordered that only he was to voice any concerns or commands during the trek across the sea-like plain. Outwardly, he hoped that the silence would cool any thinking or interest which would distract the warriors from the task at hand. Inwardly, he feared that the alien lights were eavesdropping on the detachment under his command. The resulting silence that followed, where not even the hum of engines or the groaning of heavy armour was audible to them, felt like a soft and thick blanket that covered them all. ************ Scythes of long-festering heresy glinted in the void of space. From nowhere came the Chaos fleet. The crew of the Rimouski fled to their battle stations, but a lingering taste of doom leached the moisture from their tongues, and their once-boisterous throats felt swollen with paralysis. In the main viewscreen of the Rimouski's bridge, incalculable evil encased in millenia-old adamantium skin pierced the distance between itself and the isolated Imperial Battleship. A fat dagger of corruption and frenzied hatred given solidified form, the Desolator-class Dead Hand of Authority slid through the darkness as it closed in upon its prey. Ensconced by the numerous escorts surrounding it, the Chaos Battleship plunged into the final klicks separating it from its newly acquired victim. As a debased and corrupted Battle Barge dropped into low orbit to deliver its cargo of traitor legionnaires, the Dead Hand of Authority began to pour its venemous firepower into the panicking Imperial warship. With its escorts screaming in for opportunistic torpedo runs, the archaic battleship closed in to launch its assault boats. Engorged with their bloodthirsty cargos, the small craft fell like rain upon the Rimouski's compromised hull. Clinging to the battleship as they drilled entrance tunnels into its rusting hide, the metallic parasites unloaded their cargos quickly as weapons batteries and torpedo waves continued pounding the dying warship. Within minutes, the Traitor Marines fell upon the collapsing bridge of the Rimouski Oceanique. ************ Phares watched in horror as the bleeding warship staggered into view over the vague, shimmering horizon to his right. Soon after, the Rimouski's dying distress signals finally reached the detachment. When they realized what had occurred, it was too late to save the already-lost battleship. Phares, sensing the closeness of that which had drawn him to the Silent Planet, commanded the Crusaders Militant to continue the mission. Ordering the two Thunderhawks to take cover in the nearby mountain ranges and wait for his orders, Chapter Master Rhadamanthys prepared his men to follow the Inquisitor and his Grey Knights into the inky darkness of the entrance. With one collective eye keeping watch over their shoulders, the Imperial detachment delved into what would come to seem to be a bottomless pit leading them deep into the Silent Planet. ************ (to be continued in the future story "That Hideous Strength", coming soon) ************ copyright 1999 by Jeffrey Arp ("Midwest"). no challenge is made or intended against copyrights owned by Games Workshop.
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