Triangulum

[Icarus Athrasuriel]

Chapter 1

998.M44

Tyranid

The Lord Inquisitor

His eyes opened, and he was instantly overwhelmed by the sudden influx of light. He shut them hurriedly, then opened them again. His pupils adjusted, but still all he could see was pure white light, though it slowly faded. As he became conscious proper, he was hit by a sheer wall of pain. Entire muscle groups felt like they were on fire, and his head could have almost exploded if the agony he was experiencing was to be believed. As the pain gradually dulled, he turned his head to the left, trying to catch a glimpse of a shadow in the blinding light that still streamed into his eyes. He groaned as his neck muscles strained against his will.

+++Ah, you're awake+++, a mechanical, emotionless voice droned. A cold limb lifted him up onto his feet with unnatural ease. He managed to stand, though swaying. The pain had resided, though he felt unbearably stiff. +++I've been sustaining you+++, the voice said again.

“Wha-what?” he stammered, surprised he could speak coherently.

+++You have been in a coma for four weeks+++

“Fabricator...” he realised, looking into the Fabricator General's augmetic eyes, “What happened?” He was suddenly aware of what was going on, his eyes finally adjusting. There were some fifteen other bodies scattered across the deck of the shuttle. Each had tubes and wires attached to various areas of their body. He began to pull out his own.

+++The Navigator was killed, I do not know how or by whom. We drifted into a warp storm, or very powerful current. The ship sustained structural damage and all organic occupants were killed or knocked unconscious+++, the Fabricator General explained in his monotonous voice.

“How...how long?” he asked, stumbling over to a view port, looking as his chronometer: 233.998.M41

He noticed that he was wearing his armour and that his bolt pistol was amongst some weapons piled on top of a ruined console. Combat, possibly?

+++As I said--+++ the Fabricator said before being cut off.

“Wait... sorry... four weeks you said? Why am I in combat gear?” he asked.

+++I found you like that, next to Brother-Marine Hector+++ the mechanicus lord said, attempting to open the view port.

“Where is he?” he asked.

+++Dead, a bolt round to the head+++ the Fabricator General answered. The man almost baulked at the lack of emotion or regret in the mechanical voice, but quickly remembered that the denizens of Mars could rarely express emotion due to their mechanical augmentations. The man wondered if any of the Fabricator General was organic anymore.

“Damn...”

+++Indeed+++ The Fabricator General continued his struggle against the ship's uncooperative command consoles in silence. It was only broken by the occasional groan and creak of the ship's hull, and the whirring of the Fabricator's aumetics. He continued for a while, then the man spoke.

“Do you need any help?” he asked.

+++I am infinitely quicker without an organic+++

“I'll take that as a no.” The man hobbled across the bridge, leaning on consoles and pipes. He stopped just in front of the line of survivors. Each looked dead, silent and still, like a corpse. The man knew not many would make it out of the coma. He was lucky himself, to have survived so long...and in the warp as well. It almost made him think that there was some motive behind all this. He glanced at the Fabricator General. He was the only one who had not been unconscious when the man had woken. Nor had he claimed to ever have been.

+++What are you thinking about?+++ The man jumped, slightly startled. It was as if the machine lord had sensed his thoughts, or just seen his gaze, somehow.

“Tell me, why were you not knocked unconscious?” he asked, slowly walking towards the Fabricator, lifting his bolt pistol from the weapons pile.

+++I am not flesh+++

“That is not a good answer, Fabricator, ” the man pressed. He was checking the clip. It was full.

+++I am not flesh, so my cranium is not affected by blunt force as your organic one is+++

“That only begs further questions,” he hissed, taking aim, “Why did the force not destroy you outright?”

+++Because I am made of the sturdiest material known to the Mechanicus. Simple force cannot even damage me+++

“Very well.” He quickly holstered his weapon before the Fabricator turned round, knowing that he wouldn't divulge any more of his sects many secrets. Their eyes met, and the Fabricator locked his gaze with the man's. The man's was penetrating, fiery, powerful. The eyes of the Fabricator General were disturbingly emotionless. “Tell, me,” the man said, “Who killed Hector?”

+++I do not know. I suspect the Navigator's killer+++ They continued to look at each other. The man began to read the Fabricator's surface thoughts. Suddenly, as he withdrew from the Machine Lord's mind, he noticed the quickly fading psionic ice crystallising on the view port.

“It is open?” he asked.

+++Yes+++ They looked out. All they could see was the warp.

The ship rocked, and the warp dissolved. Slowly it was replaced by light green, gleaming as light from within the room reflected off of it. “We have dropped out of the warp?”

+++No. We have fallen out of it...+++ How was that possible? One did not just fall out of the warp without warning.

“Oh my...” the man gasped. The Fabricator General through a rare sign of body language, taking a slow step back.

+++In the name of the Omnissiah...+++ It seemed to mean nothing on that mechanical frequency, but the man knew exactly what he meant. This certainly hadn't been encountered before. Just infront of the view port, there was a massive light green hull. A ship. It eclipsed the stars it was so close.

“What is it Cagarner?” the man asked, using the Machine Lord's proper name for the first time.

+++I do not know, Inquisitor. It is something I have never encountered+++ Inquisitor Rosenadel stared blank-eyed at the ship, almost with admiration, mostly with instinctive fear. He stumbled as their own ship shook, and suddenly the hum of the engines was cut out. Rosenadel turned, worried by the Fabricator. If he did not know what the ship was, then it was obviously alien, and, ergo, not friendly. He hobbled off of the bridge and into a corridor, taking note of the date. He almost fell as he read it: 233.998.M44

The ship they were on only had three decks and one airlock. It was a transport shuttle for the Senatorium and guards, often members of various Chambers Militants groups or Custodes.

Rosenadel reached the airlock, with Cagarner coming shoulder to shoulder with him a few seconds later. There was a pneumatic hiss as the door slid open, controlled from the outside. What stepped through took Rosenadel's breath away. And he was quite sure that if Cagarner could have, he would have gasped too.

What stood there was 3 metres tall. It had angular, almost human like features, but it's jaw was lined with round, scalpel sharp teeth. Instead of hair it had the beginning of a chitinous armour plating that extended down it's back. It had no clothing, but a rather strange, armour like chest. It's four arms were likewise covered in some sort of natural armour, with clawed hands. It's legs bent backwards at the knee, rather than forwards, and it stood on a pair of hoof-like feet. It's eyes were black, but not malicious. Rosenadel could read it's surface thoughts, so it was clearly sentient.

Any other day, with any other recognisable xenos, Rosenadel would have drawn his bolt pistol and blown it open. Today, though, was not any other day. He was weak, slow, disturbed and most of all out of sync with his surroundings. The Machine Lord Cagarner was similarly paralysed.

“What...what are you?” asked Rosenadel, suddenly snapping back into reality. He was about to kill the creature when he heard it's reply.

“I welcome you in peace, human. We do not get many of your kind here, we were surprised. And your ship, it is such an...old, model,” it said, sounding just like a man, albeit with a hiss. Not evil or fair, but trustworthy.

“You have not answered my question, Xenos,” Rosenadel replied, hesitating to attack, looking at the creature now with hateful eyes.

“Ah, yes. You humans always have been stubborn. I am Arkot, Captain of this vessel. Welcome to our Galaxy, M33, the Triangulum Galaxy,” it smiled, and Rosenadel was quite taken aback at the answer. They were in another galaxy? Another Emperor-damned Galaxy?

Though he stammered for a second, Rosenadel managed, “Answer me... what are you?!”

The alien's answer was the killing blow to Rosenadel's mind, and he froze when he heard it, his mind denying it.

“We are the Tyranid”

+++

[Icarus Athrasuriel]

For the second time in a day, Lord Inquisitor Ignatius Rosenadel woke in a daze. He looked around him, finding himself to be in a sterile, white, spotless room. A medicae facility, he reasoned, seeing his companions on the adjacent beds, plugged into all sorts of monitors and support machines. He found that he wasn't, but he wasn't injured either. His last memory was drawing his bolt pistol. He strained to remember what had happened next.

He had fired, but the bolt hadn't even hit his target, the alien. What was his name, he struggled to think, the word failing to penetrate a splitting headache. Arkot.

His blood began to boil as his fury at the xenos filth resurfaced, but then calmed himself as his educated and wise mind jumped into a frantic storm of thought. Tyranids?, he wondered. It was impossible, but the thing, which claimed to be one of the wretched filth Kryptman had named after the first world they devoured, claimed to be a member of the damned species. But, he reasoned, Tyranids are not sentient.

This one was, though. No matter how much his own logic tried to convince him otherwise, he knew the truth. He had recognised the physical features of a Tyranid, the breath, the stench of it's skin oils. Memories of Ichar IV flooded back, but Rosenadel blocked them out instinctively. That had been a horrible moment of his life. The psychic resonance of the near-death event had almost killed him during a séance. When he came out of it, the attending Astropath's brain had been turned into a wall decoration.

He had also sensed it's thoughts. There he had found rock hard evidence. It knew it was a Tyranid, knew it's history, it's ancestry. These creatures were independent, sentient beings. No longer part of the Hive Mind, though how, Rosenadel did not care to think of.

He climbed out of the bed, leaning on a table at it's foot. He was still getting his balance back, randomly attacked by spells of dizziness. Studying the bodies, he raised an eyebrow. On-board the ship, there had been 15 men on the bridge. There were 18 here...

He looked at the faces of the original 15, all of whom he recognised. The 4 Custodes and 3 Grey Knights were dressed in robes rather than their armour. The robes were fresh. It made him think, why would the Tyranids have human robes?

Now, the other three. To Rosenadel, they looked, and smelt...tainted.

He turned to look at the next room. It had a table in it, with a chair on either side. He walked over to the door, which was electronically protected by a code, and tried to open it. Surprisingly, it slid open after a few attempts. He had thought this was a Tyranid ship, but the coding was in Low Gothic, and it was a name he'd heard before back in the Scholam on Cadia.

Now he was in another Galaxy. So far from home, that having been so long ago. He wasn't at all disturbed by the fact he was finding it difficult to come to terms with it. Quite the reverse, as one would expect such an adjustment difficult.

He slid quietly into the room. It's walls and the door were plasteel, transparent. The table and the armless chairs were made of the same substance, though they were barely translucent. He was used to the smog and pig iron of the Imperial Hive Cities, and the ugly steel subterranean factories that played home to criminal underworlds. The interrogation room, much like the medicae unit and, now he thought, the hangar, made him uneasy. It was the unnatural sterility. Like someone had allowed a sea of disinfectant to flow through the entire ship. He had seen this before, and the implications were not lost on him.

Even though the code had been in Low Gothic, with a human alphabet, and the xenos had talked in the very same tongue, he could not shake the thought that this was most definitely a xenos ship, making him uncomfortable in it. Logic, however, once more argued against his instincts, telling him that it could not be Tyranid, because it was not biological, nor even a miracle of biotechnology.

Rosenadel sat in the chair facing the medicae entrance and lay back. He fished around in his armour with one hand, and pulled out his Inquisitorial Rosette. He sat, staring at it for a moment. It shone in the white light of the room, even after he had been wearing it for centuries.

Rosenadel jumped to his feet as he heard a pneumatic hiss and the door opposite him opened. A Tyranid walked in, stood to the side, and Arkot followed. The Tyranid guard left and Arkot sat opposite Rosenadel, who had quickly shoved his Rosette down his armour.

“Human,” Arkot acknowledged, inclining his head. Rosenadel did likewise.

“Xenos,” he replied, his tone venomous. He locked eyes with Arkot for a moment, hiding his hate as best he could. The two sat, motionless, then Arkot opened a folder with his two lower arms.

“I would like to ask you some questions, human,” Arkot said, looking sidelong at Rosenadel while taking a pen from inside the folder.

“Why?” Rosenadel asked, his voice almost a growl. He could not believe he was being interrogated by xenos filth.

“To gauge your psychological health,” Arkot replied, looking up from a file he had pulled out. That answer surprised Rosenadel. Not only were these Tyranid sentient, but they had an advanced understanding of science also. He was slowly beginning to suspect outside involvement.

“Very well,” he sighed, examining his hands. His nails had been cut from long, dirt covered claws to manicured fingernails, more fitting of a remembrancer than a warrior. Though he now appeared calm, his fingers were twitching as thoughts of killing Arkot flooded into his head.

“What date is it?” Arkot asked.

“Day two-hundred-and-thirty-three of year nine-hundred-and-ninety-eight, millennium 41,” Rosenadel answered, glaring. Arkot cocked the bony ridge over his right eye.

“What galaxy are you in?” the Tyranid asked.

“The Milky Way galaxy.”

“What race of creature are you?”

“Human.”

“Scientific designation?”

“**** Sapiens Sapiens.”

“What race am I?”

“That is debatable,” Rosenadel answered, smirking slightly as the answer caused Arkot to tilt his head in confusion. “You claim to be Tyranid, but you are sentient and you have no link to the hive mind. In addition, you do not have weapons grafted onto you, but clawed hands. So, logic reasons, you are no Tyranid, Arkot. You are lying.”

“Am I? You claim to be in the Milky Way. You are not. You are in the Triangulum Galaxy, NGC 598. Also, you claim it is the year nine-hundred-and-ninety-eight, millennium 41. This is also incorrect, it is the year nine-hundred-and-ninety-eight, millennium 44.” Arkot let it sink in, noting the slight difference in Rosenadel's temperament, then added, “Tell me, why are you're answers incorrect?”

“They are not, you are lying.” Arkot sighed.

“You call me xenos. That is a term once used by the Imperium of Man. Why?”

“Because that is what you are, xenos filth. I am tasked by the Holy God-Emperor to destroy your kind.” Arkot's eyes widened a fraction, barely noticeable , and he looked at Rosenadel's chest. He reached over, and Rosenadel moved to stop him, but the two lower arms shot out and restrained him. Arkot slid out Rosenadel's Rosette, and sighed.

“What is your name?” Arkot asked, leaning back and letting Rosenadel relax again, withdrawing his long arms.

“Lord Inquisitor Ignatius Rosenadel, Ordo Xenos,” Rosenadel answered, scowling.

“Damn...” Arkot sighed, rubbing his forehead. Somehow he managed not to slice his skull open with his razor sharp claws, but Rosenadel didn't bother figuring out how.

“What, xenos?”

“It is as I feared. Inquisitor...I'm not sure how to put this to you...” Arkot said before trailing off.

“Say it, filth!” Rosenadel pushed, a look of anger replacing his scowl.

“The Milky Way, nor this galaxy, belong to the Imperium of Man...anymore.” Rosenadel looked like he was about to lunge, but he restrained himself.

“What do you mean? More lies!? What is all of this based on?!” he growled.

“They are not lies. You see, the Imperium of Man no longer exists.”

+++

“No!” Rosenadel roared as he leaped to his feet. He threw himself at Arkot, crashing into the Tyranid with enough force to pick him up off his chair and slam him into the wall. The door hissed open, but Rosenadel ignored it, screaming profanities at his struggling captive. It took three of the Tyranid guards, each one easily 20-times stronger than Rosenadel, to drag him off the slowly recovering Arkot. They pinned him to a wall, one of them holding a serrated claw at his throat.

“I apologise,” Arkot said, a tinge of regret entering his voice. “Perhaps Gregor would have put it gentler.” Rosenadel's head shot up at the mention of the name. He stared coldly at Arkot, his piercing gaze causing the xenos to shiver slightly.

“Gregor?” he hissed, his eyes darting from each of the Tyranids holding him to another.

“Yes. He is an Inquisitor, like you, but he is the Lord Inquisitor of the Ordos Triangulum,” Arkot mentioned off-handedly. “Perhaps you would like to meet him?”

“Eh,” Rosenadel stuttered for a moment, still looking rather venomous. Eventually he decided to comply. Perhaps he could gain an advantage. “Ah, of course,” he said.

“Very good,” Arkot smiled. He looked at the Tyranid guards, who swiftly withdrew to the far wall. Rosenadel hadn't noticed he had been so far off the ground till he slid down, then realised it was foolish of him. He wasn't as sharp as of late. He had been looking Arkot in the eye from the alien's eye level.

“Well then?” he asked, levelling his tone but tapping the wall with his fingertips, his anger still raging

“Nache, tor girdak nof Ekc,” Arkot told the guards. Rosenadel shot him a look, and Arkot looked down at him considerately. “I am telling them to...ah...take good care of you.”

“Of course,” Rosenadel said sarcastically as he followed Arkot towards the door, sounding only slightly reassured. The door slid open cleanly and Arkot strode out, being careful to move slowly, and allowing the limping Inquisitor to keep beside him. “What happened?” Rosenadel asked as he examined the ship's interior. It was shining, unblemished white, much like the medicae, but with black, blank control panels integrated into the wall. He ran his fingertips over one, feeling it's impossibly smooth surface, refusing to give his hand purchase.

“What do you mean?” Arkot replied, sounding genuinely confused by Rosenadel's query.

“The Imperium. You said it was gone, yet you speak Low Gothic. Why?” Rosenadel replied, stopping to lean against a wall, rubbing his painful right thigh delicately.

“Well, I guess that is rather more a question that you should ask Gregor when you meet him,” Arkot replied, “It is not my place. I will gladly tell you of my own race's history, though, if you will.”

“Of course. I am very interested in your advancement to sentience in...how long?” Rosenadel feigned, keeping the xenos occupied while he examined the ship's internal defences.

“I'm sure you would be, considering your background,” Arkot agreed, turning sharply into an adjoining corridor. “Well, you see. My race and I are descended from a very large brood of Tyranid Warriors your Imperium called Tyranicii Preafectea.”

“A Tyranid Warrior brood,” Rosenadel half-mumbled to himself, though Arkot heard him.

“Yes, most basic of all the so called 'synapse creatures'. The most important detail of this is that Tyranicii Preafectea could reproduce, much like Preafectea Ceralobitus, the Termagauntus Termagauntii, Hormagauntii, and Gargoylisii. During a battle with the now extinct denizens of this galaxy, consumed by the Tyranid hordes, the brood was cut off from Tyranid forces retreating from the world in the face of an overwhelming counter-attack. The Tyranid's enemies, however, left the planet to pursue the Tyranid, leaving the brood behind. They adapted to the terrain, and took five millennia to develop sentience, while the Hive Mind's influence on them had grown weak. This was around the time of the Horus Heresy.” Rosenadel shuddered at the mention of the fallen Primarch's name.

“That long ago?” he commented, composing himself.

“Oh yes. They did, however, still fight amongst themselves almost continuously, still weakly under the Hive Mind's aggressive influence. We developed, slowly but surely, technology akin to that which humanity created during the Dark Age of Technology, though it was all geared towards war.”

“Big surprise...”

“Please, Inquisitor, do not joke about this.”

“Oh, no, please go on.”

“Thank you. As I was saying, all of our technology was geared towards waging war on other broods, we were slowly killing each other off...”

“And..?

“And it stopped,” Arkot finished, turning at a door and typing in a code. His dexterous fingers flow across the keys, the tips of his claws gently tapping in letters, not leaving so much as a scrape.

“Just, like that?” Rosenadel wondered, snapping his fingers as he said it. He raised and eyebrow.

“Indeed, Inquisitor. I know, it was very sudden.”

“How long ago?”

“Around five hundred years ago. The Alliance came, and made peace between the broods. It was surprisingly easy.”

“And who are the alliance?”

Arkot smiled wickedly, “You will see. Gregor will show you. They united the broods, and integrated us into their society.”

“What role do you fulfil?”

“I am of the Imperial Navy, a Captain. This, as I have told you before, is my ship, Wrath of Erek. Erek was the first and only Tyranid Admiral, well known amongst the Navy for his exploits in the subjugation of the minor races located in the aptly named Erek Cluster.”

“I thought the Imperium was gone.”

“Yes, the Imperial Navy is part of the Imperial Alliance.” Rosenadel moved to counter him with another query, but Arkot told him to be silent as, at long last, the door opened. They stepped inside, and Rosenadel stood in awe. He was in an auditorium, in the middle of which was a schematic of a cluster of stars, a hundred at first count, but obviously more. “The Erek Cluster,” Arkot hissed, “Each star represents a system, red represents enemy held systems, green is Alliance controlled and blue is uninhabitable.”

Rosenadel nodded. He scowled as Cagarner turned round and nodded at him, but his attention was drawn away from the Mechanicus Lord and to another, human figure in the middle of the auditorium. He was sitting in an anti-gravity chair, with several wires entering his body from the back of the chair, a particularly thick one connected to his brain stem. “What is that?”

“A life support system, built by the Eldar to sustain the ageing military geniuses of the Alliance, in order to continue our crusade into the Universe,” Arkot replied in a whisper. He walked up towards the chair, and bent down, talking to the figure in the chair in an impossibly low voice to avoid the words being carried across the room.

The chair spun round, and the man in it scowled. It was like he wore a mask of flesh. “Welcome to the Triangulum Galaxy, Ignatius. I was following your progress with great interest before you... disappeared. Valdor was quite distressed by the loss of one of his Centurions. Icarus is with you, I hope... anyway, we were all worried. Several key men had went missing in one go! Oh, the uproar you caused, quite a nuisance. Anyway, I greet you, Ignatius.”

“Heretic!” Rosenadel spat. “How dare you consort with these Xenos breeds! Osma was right, all those millennia ago! You are a heretic!” The man was quite taken aback by Rosenadel's outrage, and looked to Arkot for support.

“Are you even aware of who this is, ignorant Inquisitor?” Arkot asked in an angry tone. Rosenadel nodded slowly, his face contorted by rage.

Of course he knew who the man was. Every Inquisitor who had lived during Rosenadel's day knew.

Eisenhorn.

[Icarus Athrasuriel]

Chapter 2

Abbadon's War

Escape

The Master

“Do you wish to know what happened to the Imperium?” Eisenhorn asked. He was impossibly old, over 3500 years. It was unnatural. No man could survive so long, even with the most rigorous regime of drugs and medication. Eventually, everyone died.

“The hell I do!” Rosenadel spat, “I know that humanity has lost it's way if it Allies itself with Emperor damned Xenos!”

“Calm down, Inquisitor. There is a reason...please, listen to me...” Eisenhorn continued, through Rosenadel's ramblings.

“A reason?” Rosenadel hissed, walking forward and putting one foot on the lowest step of the rapidly tapering dais in the middle of the room. “This...this abominable practise simply shows a loss of reason, Eisenhorn.”

“Listen, please. You'll need all the knowledge you can get, in the future,” Eisenhorn said, his voice still level. Rosenadel's grimace did not leave his face and he sighed through gritted teeth.

“Very well, heretic. Tell me what happened...”

“You will not like it. And I'd appreciate it if you didn't call me heretic”

“Hurry up, heretic,” said Rosenadel sarcastically, “I don't have much patience for your kind.”

“Okay.” Eisenhorn replied bitterly. He nodded to Arkot, who walked over to a panel and began giving the auditorium's computer commands. The Erek Cluster disappeared and was instantaneously replaced with an area of space Rosenadel was all too familiar with.

“The Cadian Gate..?”

“Yes. The Eye of Terror, particularly. In the end,” Eisenhorn sighed, “all of this was caused by the Eldar.”

“The Eldar?”

“Indeed. The fact that they existed. Did you know that when the Prince of Pleasure, Slaanesh, was created, the psychic resonance caused the Eye of Terror to explode into existence. A huge, ugly gash along the thin veil that separates material from immaterial...” Eisenhorn trailed off as the computer magnified the holographic image till the Eye took up the entire left hand side. Eisenhorn floated slightly to the right, just infront of the Eye's image. “Come up, Rosenadel.” Rosenadel, captivated by the image, obeyed Eisenhorn. He stood at the ancient Inquisitor's side. “You know, we never saw it coming...”

“What?” Rosenadel asked, snapping back to conciousness.

“Abbadon's last invasion. The 15th Black Crusade. Humanity's downfall,” Eisenhorn started. Rosenadel looked at him, studying the fleshy mask Gorgon Locke had left him with on Gudrun, long ago. “It was only in hindsight that we realised that the immensely successful 13th Black Crusade was only Abbadon testing yet more tactics. You see, we now know that he had been only testing various strategies and choosing the most successful. On the 15th occasion, he utilised them to their fullest extent.” Eisenhorn stopped, and holographic ships, thousands of them, poured out the Eye, breaking off and heading in separate directions. “We were, of course, prepared.” Now Imperial fleets emerged and began to engage the traitor ships. The image froze. “It was just a decoy. Abbadon had held out bait, and we had taken it without a second thought.”

“You cannot blame yourself,” Rosenadel smirked.

“Of course we can, Inquisitor,” Eisenhorn replied, ignoring Rosenadel's tone. “We walked right into the Arch-Enemy's trap. We engaged the traitor fleets, and it looked like we would reach a swift resolution, but their numbers quadrupled overnight.” The holo-image was suddenly filled with heretic ships. “Cadia became quickly isolated, battles raging on the edge of the system as Imperial Battlefleets rushed to assist. Of course, Abbadon advanced beyond her. Belis Corona was savagely attacked and overrun by the World Eaters, giving the traitors a significant naval advantage. It was only when we got reports that one of Cadia's Forge Worlds had fallen did we realise just how powerful the attack was.” Eisenhorn paused as Belis Corona changed from green to red.

“Did we recapture her?” Rosenadel asked, now taking proper interest, his anger have boiled away, leaving the cold, calculating mind that had made him such a successful Inquisitor.

“Yes, of course.”

“When?”

“Last year.” There was an uncomfortable silence, and Rosenadel began to sub-consciously bite his lower lip. “The 15th Black Crusade lasted a hundred years.”

“When did it begin?”

“666.M42. It is the reason why, around 343 years later, humanity Allied with the Tau and Eldar. During those hundred years Abbadon conquered the entire Segmentum Obscurus. Within fifty years, Cadia was the only bastion of human resistance left in the Ocularis Terribus region.”

“Agripinaa?” Cagarner asked, referring to a Mechanicum world. Rosenadel turned to looked at the Fabricator General as the holo-image zoomed out of the Eye and once more encompassed the whole of Scarus Sector. He had forgotten him.

“Yes, even she fell,” Eisenhorn answered. “The 15th Black Crusade conquered up to and including Voss, and Abbadon's new dominion covered from Avignor to Ornsworld, Hydraphur and Dimmamar. This was 766.M42, and Abbadon had ceased his rampage. As far as we know, even now Cadia battles on. It is the Cadian War, which we wage just now, that will decide the fate of the Galaxy.”

“You said the crusade lasted a hundred years, but it is now almost the 45th millennium.”

“Yes, it is. Abbadon regrouped, and we had enough time to counter-attack and contest Voss long enough to reinforce defences on what is now called the Terran Wall.”

“Which is?”

“All the planets from Thranx to Gathalamor, facing Terra on one side, and the Eye on the other. The next stage of the war lasted till 950.M42. It was called the Blitzkrieg Offensive. Abbadon's forces broke upon the Terran Wall like water upon rocks. All of the worlds were embroiled in war, victories and defeats simultaneous across an area of space larger than the Eye of Terror itself. Not much occurred that is of interest, for the purpose of our discussion, till Abbadon withdrew in 949.M42. Then, in 951.M42, the Solar Wars began. Somehow, without meeting resistance, a Traitor Battlefleet seeped through the Wall, and reached the Sol system. As soon as we reacted, the rest of the enemy forces hit the Wall again. The reserve forces were left to defend Terra...” Eisenhorn mumbled the last sentence.

“And what happened.”

“In 956.M42, she almost fell.”

“Almost? So she didn't?”

“We fought them off, forced them back to the Wall, conducted a counter-offensive...all under a false sense of high moral. We kept it quiet, but it couldn't be held back for ever...”


“What happened?”


“The Emperor's Palace was overrun.”

+++

[Icarus Athrasuriel]

Barak nodded to the medicae officer, who then began the re-awakening process. He looked to his sides, seeing and acknowledging his subordinate guards. Both were ready incase the prisoners proved...difficult.

They had decided to use the awakening procedure on the larger prisoners first, as Arkot had identified the larger humans as Space Marines. Barak had no idea what a Space Marine was like. He had heard only legends from travellers coming to take supplies to Segmentum Obscurus, the primary battlefield of the war against Chaos. There, the Space Marines ruled supreme, having far outnumbered, and eventually learned how to counter their Chaotic counterparts, who now, he heard, skulked in the Eye of Terror, defending their homeworlds against the merciless Allied attacks.

Barak held just about every record for the Triangulum Naval Security Forces, a Tyrannic organisation. He was the most experienced security officer on-board the ship, a combat master. Vicious and merciless, he was a solid 4 metre tall block of bone, muscle and chitinous armour. Courageous beyond comparison, he was held in high regard by friends and foes alike. He had never even been scratched.

He never had a chance.

“What did you say?” Rosenadel asked, his voice almost a whisper. The blood had drained from his face and his jaw had dropped slightly. The auditorium remained eerily silent as he stood, in shock, staring at Eisenhorn liked he'd just been slapped.

Eisenhorn was about to begin to reply, when the auditorium was filled with the echoing sound of klaxons and bathed in red light. Arkot reappeared and ran out the door, and Rosenadel snapped into action as Eisenhorn hummed past him. Cagarner stayed in the auditorium, accessing the ship's data banks in the midst of the confusion.

The trio wound through the maze of corridors. Arkot at the front, taking slow, albeit long strides. Rosenadel came next, sprinting rapidly. Then came Eisenhorn in his chair, easily keeping up with the other two.

As Arkot skidded round the next corner, he stopped so abruptly that Rosenadel had to sidestep to stop himself from colliding with the motionless Tyranid. He leaned against a bulkhead as his injured leg began to ache again. Arkot hissed, and walked forward. He knelt beside what was left of a Tyranid guard, it's armour split and it's body crushed. Blood leaked from the prostrate form onto the floor. Arkot walked on further, stepping over the body, and came to a halt infront of the medicae entrance. The ridges surrounding his eyes slowly moved outwards. He stepped back, his claws seeming to grow in length, gleaming as the white light of the corridor reflected off of their unblemished surface. He hissed, teeth extending until his jaw detached. All of a sudden, the apparently sophisticated Tyranid had turned into the spitting image of one of the Tyranid Warriors of the 41st millennium.

He leaped into the room. Rosenadel moved forward infront of Eisenhorn, both of them cautious, the only sound coming from them being the whirring of the Psycannons that had extended up and over Eisenhorn's shoulders.

Suddenly, so much so that Rosenadel leaped backwards, a white form flew out of the medicae and crashed against the opposite wall. The corpse was unmistakeably Tyranid. Arkot's cadaver twitched as stray electrical signals coursed through his nerves. A giant followed, ducking through the door.

“Icarus?” Rosenadel asked as the giant turned to look at him.

“Ignatius,” Icarus nodded. Icarus, contrary to his appearance, was no Space Marine. He was one of a rare group called the Adeptus Custodes, a Centurion of that order. His combat abilities were beyond those of any adversary he had ever faced, reinforced by thousands of years of experience. Arkot had been no challenge to him.

“The others?” Rosenadel asked.

“They are alive. The Grey Knights are awake, they left for the ship's armoury shortly before you arrived. The Tyranid there,” - he pointed to the Tyranid body infront of the door - ,“Told us that our equipment was there,” Icarus replied. He nodded respectfully to Eisenhorn, commenting that it was good to see him again. “Where are we?”

“Ignatius will fill you in later. Now, you must leave. I will look after the others. Get to the armoury,” Eisenhorn said, coming forth.

“What do you mean?” Rosenadel asked. Icarus simply nodded.

“You must leave here. There are no records of you, and so the Alliance cannot track you. You must do the Emperor's bidding, for nobody else can.”

“Why are you saying this? You fraternise with xenos, yet you claim to know his bidding?”

“I hate the Tyranid as much as you do Ignatius, but we had no choice. Go, now, before more come. Escape, and take this,” Eisenhorn answered cryptically. Rosenadel took the disc Eisenhorn ejected from his chair. “Quick!”

“Where will this take us?” Rosenadel asked, eyebrow raised.

“To him,” Eisenhorn answered. Before Rosenadel could question the Inquisitor any further, Icarus took his arm and spun him round, inclining his head down the corridor. The two set off in the direction of the armoury. They heard Eisenhorn shouting good luck before they left earshot of the medicae.

The escape was simple. They gathered their equipment in the armoury. The Grey Knights had gathered munitions and supplies in cases that were now hanging from their armoured forms. Icarus did likewise, donning his ornate, golden, adamantine power armour.

They slipped through the corridors, the Grey Knights' psychic assaults killing Tyranid guards that got in the way without needing to use valuable ammunition. They took a moderately sized transport, killing the pilots and guards. It was about the size of the shuttle they had been in previously, and had enough living space for the five escapees. Leaving the ship had been relatively easy, the controls all similar to those of an Imperial ship.

The strangest thing was, instead of entering the warp. They stayed in real-space, travelling faster than light. Though Rosenadel knew it was impossible, it was happening and he didn't care how.

His attention quickly turned to the map.

It turned out they were going to a place with an ominous name.

Isstvan.

+++

“Let them go, Ivan.”

It echoed in his head, getting louder and louder, until Admiral Tchaikovsky could no longer scream orders at the men on the deck below. He tried to fight it, but it was impossible to resist. Watching haplessly as the transport accelerated to light speed, he strode out of the control room and into the parallel corridor. Men walked past him, nodding and saluting, but he ignored them all. The Master had summoned him.

He boarded the next shuttle to the Wrath of Erek, silent as he took his seat. Silent as the journey commenced. Silent as they docked. The Master's voice rang through his mind. He knew all, saw all, heard all...felt all. His Master's god had shown Tchaikovsky the glory of the warp, the way it had once been, before the Solar Wars, before the damned Emperor's death. He had to help his Master restore such beauty, such raw, pure power and energy. He felt compelled to.

The bowels of ships in the Tyrannic fleet were virtually uninhabited. The Tyranid had little scientific knowledge, and their ships were run and repaired by the Techpriests of the Mechanicus. As a result it was the perfect place to hide. In the enemy's stronghold's themselves.

“Where is the Inquisitor?” the voice rang out. It was beautiful, and horrible, at the same time. Seducing those who listen, unbearable, yet sublime.

“In the medicae, Master,” Tchaikovsky answered, his voice unemotional and plain.

“Good, good. You have served me well, Admiral. You will most definitely enjoy your prize, it is...a feast for the senses,” the voice told him. Suddenly he felt himself being lifted off the ground, ribs cracking, his spine snapping. Tchaikovsky did not have the chance to smile as he indulged himself in the sensation of death and pain. There was a chuckle, and the Master stepped over Tchaikovsky's corpse.

He left the engine room, and made his way through the winding corridors, up to the deck of the medicae. It was abandoned, all personnel called away to the control decks. The escape of the prisoners had been, though unfortunate, well timed. Now he could locate Eisenhorn, and learn of where the escapees were heading.

Too tall even to ducked into the medicae, the Master smashed through the wall and into the interview area. As Eisenhorn spun round and aimed, the Master broke through the clear wall and threw the Lord Inquisitor into a wall. He took one, large stride to the wall, and knelt before Eisenhorn. He drew a sword, and held it to Eisenhorn's neck.

“Who are you?” Eisenhorn hissed, unexpectedly. The Master stalled, and looked into the Inquisitor's fading pupils.

He was cut off by the sword which swiftly decapitated him. The Master drank some of the blood now pouring from the headless cadaver, a tribute to his God, and stood suddenly as his mind was filled with many thousands of memories. He knew Eisenhorn was ancient, but had not been prepared for such a treasure trove of images. He quickly found what he needed, and snapped back into reality. He turned and walked through into the interview room.

Pausing, he swivelled on his heels, and commented of handedly, almost comically, “By the way, my Inquisitorial friend, I am Erus.”