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Post by The Master on May 22, 2011 14:34:30 GMT -5
IT IS THE 41st millennium. For more than a hundred centuries the Emperor has sat immobile on the Golden Throne of Earth. He is the master of mankind by the will of the gods and master of the Third Great and Bountiful Human Empire by the might of his inexhaustible armies. He is a rotting carcass writhing invisibly with power from the Dark Age of Technology. He is the Carrion Lord of the Imperium for whom a thousand souls are sacrificed every day, so that he may never truly die.
YET EVEN IN his deathless state, the Emperor continues his eternal vigilance. Mighty battlefleets cross the daemon-infested miasma of the warp, the only route between distant stars, their way lit by the Astronomican, the psychic manifestation of the Emperor's will. Vast armies give battle in his name on uncounted worlds. Greatest amongst His soldiers are the Adeptus Astartes, the Space Marines, bio-engineered super-warriors. Their comrades in arms are legion: the Imperial Guard and countless planetary defense forces, the ever-vigilant Inquisition and the tech-priests of the Adeptus Mechanicus to name only a few. But for all their multitudes, they are barely enough to hold off the ever-present threat from aliens, heretics, mutants - and worse.
TO BE A man in such times is to be one amongst untold billions. It is to live in the cruelest and most bloody regime imaginable. These are the tales of these times. Forget the power of technology and science, for so much has been forgotten, never to be re-learned. Forget the promise of progress and understanding, for in the grim dark future there is only war. There is no peace amongst the stars, only an eternity of carnage and slaughter, and the laughter of the Lonely Gods.
Doctor Who
The Harrowing |
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Post by The Bookkeeper on May 22, 2011 15:16:46 GMT -5
((That is exactly Warhammer 40k))
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Post by The Master on May 22, 2011 15:17:09 GMT -5
(OOC: Almost exactly. And I'm going somewhere with this...)
Magos Polymagestus Heinrich Kruller sat in his windowless cell, staring at the featureless slab of adamant that comprised the door. In truth, there was little else he could do. Simply stare. And brood.
It had been a good attempt, he knew that.
As a child, on the nearly forgotten world that had birthed him, it was apparent to all that the Omnissiah had favored him. He had been inducted into the ranks of the Adeptus Mechanicus, taught the mysteries of the machine-spirits, the rituals of propitiation and of maintenance. He had risen through the priesthood and received the mysteries of faith as his weak flesh was augmented and replaced with sacred augmetics.
And then, one night, pondering the words of Technomagos Garba Mojaro - A man may die yet still endure if his work enters the greater work, for time is carried upon a current of forgotten deeds, and events of great moment are but the culmination of a single carefully placed thought. As all men must thank progenitors obscured by the past, so we must endure the present so that those who follow may continue the endeavour - the visions came. And with the visions came clarity, insight, understanding. The mind of the Omnissiah was made known to him, and the secrets of the machine-spirits were an open book. The rhythmic pulse of the Omnissiah's great machinery filled his mind, and he commenced the Great Work.
The petty tyrants of the Cult accused him of the greatest heresies - the fabrication of silicae animus, the creation of the Men of Iron, the melding of the energies of the Immaterium with the machines of the material universe, of waging war against the Cultus Mechanicus and against the Imperium.
The fools. He had brought order, and progress, to a thousand worlds. Ten thousand more would have followed in geometric progression, had not the Master and the Lord High Admiral of the Ultima Segmentum declared a Crusade against him.
Twenty years the Crusade lasted, and it nearly failed. He had unleashed weapons unseen since the Dark Ages of Technology, and had nearly broken the might of a million worlds on the adamant fortresses of his forge worlds. Had it not been for a daring raid by the Angels of Iron Space Marines, smashing through his defenses and capturing him before he could complete his masterwork...
Ah, and what a work that would have been. A machine he had seen in his dreams, the culmination of all his arts. A living machine, existing within the warp and capable of manifesting itself in the material universe, powered by a black hole and able to traverse all of time and space...
But his dream was ash, now. His augmetics disabled, his power broken, he was a prisoner on a great barge, making its way back to Holy Terra to parade him for the pleasure of the High Lords before executing him.
And the beat, the rhythm of the Omnissiah's Great Work, continued to thunder in his mind.
Louder.
Ever louder.
Heinrich Kruller screamed in agony as the beat reached a fever pitch. And then he stopped. Suddenly.
And a mind that was not Heinrich Kruller stared out through augmetic eyes. And a malevolent smile creased what remained of the face that had belonged to Heinrich Kruller for more than 140 years.
"Interesting," said the voice of Heinrich Kruller as he examined his hands - one flesh, one augmetic - as if he were seeing them for the first time. "A new body at last." He paused, and felt his face. "Not what I would have chosen, but needs must. And this body remains... useful, at least."
He looked around the cell. "First things first. I've an escape to attend to and, no doubt, several deaths to arrange."
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Post by The Master on May 22, 2011 15:29:21 GMT -5
The great void between the stars, somewhere in the Ultima Segmentum...
The blackness rippled and split, illuminated by a chaotic howling torrent of light in colors not known to the material universe. A vast, crenelated form eclipsed the tear for a moment, and then the wound in space healed itself.
The ship was enormous - kilometers in length - and resembled nothing less than a great gothic cathedral. Buttresses and crenelations crusted the hull. Gun emplacements were watched over by gargoyles. A great golden two-headed eagle with wings spread covered the 200-meter wide blunt prow.
It drifted, aimlessly.
Telepathic signals radiated from the hulk on all bands the astropaths could cover. It was the same message, over and over again.
"This is Sigmund Chandrathar, Lord-Captain of the Imperial Prison Ship Righteous Vengeance of the Throne. Our Gellar field has been disabled, and we have been forced to make an emergency translation from the warp. There is a riot aboard ship. Somehow, the prisoners have escaped their cells, and they are attempting to seize control."
"Be advised that there are a dozen prisoners rated as galaxy-class threats. If no aid is forthcoming, and if the prisoners are near to succeeding, I will scuttle the ship rather than allow it to fall into their hands."
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Post by The Master on May 25, 2011 22:53:36 GMT -5
Lucian Vamothrar - also known as Lucien the Forsaken, Lucien the Damned, The Butcher of Syncreta Majoris, and by many other epithets - tensed in his cell. He could feel the unstable rhythms through the hull, feel the pitch of the Gellar fields changing.
Something was wrong. It was far too early for them to have reached even their first waypoint. Was it possible...?
On his homeworld - the only world he'd known, at his birth - he had ridden the conqueror's road. The road of blood and slaughter, of rape and pillage, that had led to first a crown and a throne. With the might of his daemon blade (a psychic blade, the star-men called it) and the ancient armor of kings (Mark III powered armor, the star-men called it) and his patron god (a daemon lord, the star-men called it) he had unified the lands around him, then unified the lands beyond, until all the world knelt before Lucian I, Emperor.
And then the star-men came. Emissaries of the Golden Throne of Holy Terra, they had said, come to return his world to the arms of the God-Emperor.
Golden Throne. God-Emperor. That sounded good to Lucian I. He feasted the missionaries and the king of the star-men, then imprisoned them while they slept. He forced their pilots to carry his soldiers back to the flying cities of the star-men, and captured them. He tortured their secrets from them and set forth once more on the conquerer's road.
Perhaps, he mused as he sat in his cell, perhaps if he had understood the scale of his ambition...
No. He would have still pressed ahead, conquering and pillaging worlds, enslaving entire populaces and pressing them to work in captured ships. The Battlefleet Ultima Segmentum would have still shattered his fledgling empire, scattering his fleet and capturing him in a contest that the skalds would sing of for generations upon generations.
Now, all he had to look forward to was spitting in the eye of this God-Emperor before he was slowly killed for the entertainment of His court.
The ship rumbled, and lurched, and twisted in the impossible way ships did when they left the daemon world behind.
The cell door opened. Framed in it was a black-robed figure, one of the half-man half-metal priests of the God-Emperor's technology. He smiled with half a face.
"Lucian Vamothrar? I intend to escape this ship, and I believe that I will need to have a number of people killed to make that happen. Would you care to have your freedom, in exchange for the opportunity to revenge yourself upon your captors?"
Lucian's scarred face grinned. "Aye, machine-priest. Set me free, and I'll drench the decks of this vessel in the blood of my foes."
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Post by The Bookkeeper on May 26, 2011 9:18:33 GMT -5
The Bookkeeper fell to the ground, appearing to fall from thin air. I can never get the landing right. He opened his eyes, letting out a breath he didn't know he was holding. Metal. He slammed his palm on the floor. A quiet thud. The Bookkeeper lifted his head up.
Ow!
He rubbed his head. There was a metal pipe above him... There wasn't one, there was many. A labyrinth of pipes. The only light was his Vortex Manipulator. He got onto his knees, making sure not to knock anymore pipes. He decided he needed some more light. Glancing down at his Vortex Manipulator, he pressed a few buttons.
'BOOP BOOP BOOP, BOOP BA BOOP' The wristwatch-like device played. He must have hit the music player... Electronic Pulse Device... Movie Player.... Joke a day... Ah, there we go, Flashlight!
He could now see that he was in what appeared to be a maintenance tunnel. It turned sharply to his right, and infront of him kept going. He heard yells and shouts, screams of agony. Oh no... Good thing he had his Laser Pistol with him...
The Bookkeeper took that out, putting it on stun and rounding a corner. He pressed a button, and opened the door, revealing a massacre going on.
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Post by The Master on May 28, 2011 13:38:31 GMT -5
Nobody was certain if the occupant of the cell was Deimos or Phobos.
Not even the occupant.
The gaunt, bald figure sat, unnaturally long legs folded beneath her, arms outstretched and fingertips resting on the walls of the cell. Her huge, pink eyes were closed.
The interior of the cell was inlaid with hexagrammatic wards and signs of protection from the powers of the Warp. He fingers, which slowly traced patterns along the metal, avoided them studiously.
Deimos and Phobos. Terror and Fear. Alpha grade psychers. Together, they had twisted the rulers of a sector into the service of Chaos. Slowly, discretely, they had laid the taint of the Ruinous Powers across the face of the sector nobility. Together, they had ruled as puppet masters. Together, they had done more for the glory of the Ruinous Powers than Abbadon and his fleet of a hundred thousand warships.
Even now, the flames of war consumed the Telecharius Sector. Thousands of ships and millions of troops had been dispatched to bring it back under the control of the Imperium. It mattered not if the crusade succeeded or failed. The Empire of the Corpse-God would be disrupted for a century, lacking the flexibility to respond to new threats.
It mattered not that the flesh of Phobos (or Deimos) was soon to be broken for the amusement of the High Lords of Terra. The exquisite agonies would be a welcome gift as she was welcomed into the embrace of Slaanesh.
The door opened. A man with a scarred face, dressed in prison garb spattered with blood stood there, wielding a shock maul like a mace.
"The Magos is freeing your sister, witch. Will you lend us your powers, or will you rot in here?"
Deimos - or was it Phobos - opened her eyes. "I will join you," she whispered.
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Post by The Master on May 28, 2011 13:44:48 GMT -5
There was the sound of heavy boots behind the Bookkeeper. "In the Name of the Emperor, abase yourself!" a voice shouted.
A rifle stock struck between his shoulderblades, driving him to his knees. Rough hands manacled him as a dozen shotgun-wielding men in carapace armor streamed through the door. The distinctive "pum-pum-pum" of automatic fire could be heard.
"Who is he?" asked the same voice.
A second figure waved a humming computer in front of the Bookkeeper's face. It beeped, and the figure waved it again. "Unknown," the second figure said. "He's not crew, and he's not a prisoner."
The first figure dragged the Bookkeeper to his feet and shoved him against a wall. "Who are you?" he barked.
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Post by The Master on May 28, 2011 14:01:10 GMT -5
Magos Kruller checked the dataslate, looked at the engraved characters on the cell door, then checked the dataslate again. He laughed.
"What do you find so amusing?" asked one of the witches - the Magos found he really didn't care which was which, so long as they obeyed."
"I'm just thinking that it's a small universe, that's all."
The other witch lifted a questioning eyebrow, but said nothing.
"The guard is advancing on this position," announced Lucian as he rounded a corner, autoshotgun over one shoulder and gore-drenched shock maul in the other. He reached for the door. "Let's get this one out, and get moving."
The Magos checked him with a gesture. "No. Let me do this."
Lucian looked surprised. "Why?"
The Magos' burning red augmetic eyes met Lucian's blue-grey ones. "Because, if this prisoner really is who I believe him to be, he'll kill any other person that enters that cell."
One of the witches tittered. "But you can handle him, priest?" sneered the other.
The Magos twisted his half-face into a patronizing smile. "He will at least listen to me."
Lucian started to say something else, but the Magos cut him off. "No. Go hold the guard back for a few more minutes."
Nobody moved for a long minute. The Magos' burning eyes swept over them. "I am not in the habit of giving instructions for no reason. Go. Now."
"Pompous a**," Lucian snarled as the three moved away.
"I'm going to kill him," muttered one of the witches.
"Get in line," Lucian responded.
They made no attempt to hide their displeasure, which suited the Magos just fine. They were, at best, useful tools. And he felt no qualms about disposing of tools that were no longer useful.
Taking a deep breath, he opened the door to the cell.
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Post by The Bookkeeper on May 28, 2011 23:26:36 GMT -5
The Bookkeeper yelled in fear as he was manhandled. He had just gazed upon war. There were some inmate type people shooting and charging some outnumbered armoured people. They armoured people were laying waste to the inmates, but the inmates had shear numbers. They were overwhelming the armoured people and ripping them to pieces.
"Jacob... Jenkins..." The Bookkeeper said, scared to bits. He still had the gun on his hand, but the solider types knew they could blow him to bits with their superior rifles. "What's the year." He said, calming down now. He managed to make a small 'pip' in his voice, as though this was all natural.
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Post by The Master on May 29, 2011 23:05:45 GMT -5
"Jacob Jenkins?" echoed the first figure. "We got a Jacob Jenkins on the list?"
The second figure checked its data slate. "No."
"What's the year?"
"337," responded the second figure automatically. He looked through the open door, watched the rioters drag down one of the Arbites. "Maybe we oughta take him to the Captain. He might know something about what happened to the Gellar fields."
pum-pum-pum-PUM thundered the riot guns. Howls of rage and pain echoed.
The first figure watched the rioting tide surge forward. "Good idea." He gestured at the Bookkeeper. "All right, 'Jacob'. This way. And watch your step."
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Post by The Bookkeeper on May 30, 2011 16:11:36 GMT -5
Jacob followed the group. He had holstered the gun from his had, and was looking around. "337? Since when?" The Bookkeeper ask. He prayed they wouldn't kill him. He didn't want to die. And, when they found out about his race, who knew what they would do. "Also, is there a riot going on?" He asked, looking back. The gunshots were getting ever closer. He heard people yelling in fits of pain, maybe even dying. He didn't like death.
Starting to hum a old Gallifreyan tune. He was trying to not listen to the gunshots and yells. Those made him depressed. And he did not like being depressed. "Also, Gellar fields. Never read about them." he asked
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Post by The Master on Jun 14, 2011 22:26:54 GMT -5
"337? Since when?"
The two men looked at each other. "Since 336?" suggested one.
"Naw," said the other, "I think this is one of those warp things you hear about." Both men made peculiar gestures, placing their hands over their hearts. "It's probably 553 now, or something like that."
"Think it's still M41?"
"Sure hope so."
Both turned their attention to 'Jake'. "But yeah, there's a full ship riot going on. So why don't you come along, so we can let the Lord-Captain sort you out?" They gestured with their shotguns, indicating that the request was not optional.
Magos Kruller's hand paused on the door without opening it. Movement, out of the corner of one eye, had caught his attention. He looked, and saw a glowing cube drifting towards him.
A communication cube.
One of his mechadendrites snaked out and caught it, and he spoke a word in an extinct language.
"This is the Doctor, last living Time Lord of Gallifrey, and if you are hearing this, you owe me a debt. I am amassing an army. For what, you may ask? To attack Demon's Run, and defeat Madame Kovarian and the Clerics. You owe a debt, and I expect it repaid in full. Oh, and if you have a fez, bring it too. Fezzes are cool."
Magos Kruller sneered, as well as his half face would allow. "No. I rather think not, Doctor. I have not returned from death to dance to your tune."
He deactivated the cube with a flick of a mechadendrite and stowed it in his robe. He would consider the possibilities later.
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Post by The Bookkeeper on Jun 18, 2011 7:47:32 GMT -5
"When was it before the year 1?" The Bookkeeper asked, continuing along. "You know, sarcasm isn't gonna get you anywhere. Beside... What are you? Humans?" 'Jacob' ranted on. He looked back at their guns. "Crude wouldn't you say?" He asked them, guessing they could probably blow one of his arms off if they wanted to. The sounds of the riot were lessening as they moved, and the Bookkeeper was glad to be away from all that violence.
Oh. Oh no. Bad, so very bad. "You're the Third Great and Bountiful human empire. You are spoken of in hushed tones. You're feared across time and space. When you come knocking, people run. And they don't stop." Jacob said in a hushed tone, knowing this is exactly what they want to hear.
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Post by The Master on Jun 21, 2011 10:55:49 GMT -5
"'Third Great and Bountiful Human Empire'?" echoed one of the guards. "No idea what you're talking about. We serve the Imperium, and the Golden Throne."
"Human empire?" the other one asked. "Are you saying...? I think he's a xeno."
The first man made quick gesture with his free hand. "Emperor preserve us," he whispered in horror. "Then you'd be the reason this all went ploin-shaped!" Angrily, he brought the riot gun to his shoulder and leveled it at "Jacob's" head. "Alien filth," he spat, finger tightening on the trigger.
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