The Long Night Part One: Embers in the Dusk: A Planetary Governor Quest (43k) Complete Sequel Up

@Durin Okay, here is my contribution to the Nurgle Situation. Likely some canon conflicts hidden around, I'm sure someone will point things out. Really my goal was to try and give an idea of what Isha might be thinking and also what little thing she could do to help Ridcully. So I probably took some creative liberties, but hopefully it'll work out.

Maybe I'll even get a canon on this omake.

Trying Times

It is difficult to imagine it, but Isha still believed there was hope. Hope for the galaxy, for the mortals, and even for herself. In a way, it was her way of defiance against Chaos. They had not broken her, not yet. So she held onto that hope.

Mind you, it was a very tempered and reserved hope, but it remained in her heart after everything that had happened. The humiliation and suffering under Kaine, the torment and misery brought upon by Slaanesh, and finally the egregious and toxic captivity she faced as Nurgles "wife". All of these events tested her commitment…but still she stayed strong.

In some ways, the long and horrid torture she faced for so long only embolden her, strengthen her will and grit, and was a testament to her steadfast refusal to give up. Such was her love of all life, she would hold on to any little ember of hope that would see her through the indignities she faced.

But it was not those indignities that weighed heavily on her. While her sense and reach in the galaxy had waned, she still had a grasp of the myriad of situations the galaxy was facing. So much misery, so much death, and the sorrow from untold millennia's of bloodshed. Not since the Fall of the Eldar or the humans civil war had she felt the galaxy torn by war.

Even in the dank and dark cell inside Nurgles Palace…Isha felt waves of sorrow, sadness, and grief at the slaughter taking place across entire star systems. It was these feelings that weighed heavy upon her very being. Still, she did what she could in such trying times.

There were those that were still fighting, she could sense them. The Eldar, Krork, Humanity, Tau, and so many others that did not know her name…but she knew theirs and the struggles they faced. In her waking moments she could sometimes hear the calls for help, like silent whispers just barely being made out.

Her dreams…well, she didn't like to dream anymore. Her dreams weren't safe from the darker thoughts in her mind. Sometimes they told her she had failed, that this was all for nothing, and that hope was a foolhardy thing to harbor in such desperate times. But still she held fast, just as the mortals did in the materium.

So she did what she could to help. She whispered the secrets to creating cures and vaccines, even the locations of rare planets which held lifesaving plants and minerals. She was limited in scope, but she tried every time to send one glimmer of hope to some beleaguered individual or group in their most desperate of times.

In other instances, she listened and gather information from Nurgle. The old and disgusting creature that called himself husband to her seem to jabber and speak of events transpiring out in the galaxy. This gave her clarity, even directions to whom she needed to whisper her secrets too. Sometimes he even took the time to show directly the worlds he was attacking and the nightmarish plagues that soon festered on them.

It had only gotten worse since the death of the humans God-Emperor. The collapse of the Imperium left Nurgle and his minions plenty of worlds to attack. So many lost and in such ways that trumped the last 13,000 years of chaotic slaughter the galaxy had faced. But the mortal races fought on, towards some sort of salvation.

Again, she performed what meager acts of kindness and aid that were possible from her prison. Try as she might, it felt like she was trying to save a dying person with naught but kind and soothing words before their death.

Sometimes she was successful…and sometimes she failed with only the smallest error being made. It was difficult to get the words and instructions across to the mortals. Sometimes, in the agony and torment she faced, she too failed to properly explain or instruct. Those were the moments that truly ate at Isha's perseverance. She was a goddess of life and healing, and she failed in trying to do both.

There were some instances where those failures caused her to break down, sometimes even worse when Nurgle lovingly showed her the results. However she always steeled her soul and promised herself that she would do better next time. In a way this all helped to fuel her determination and drive, which kept her hope still burning.

So it had been this way for almost a thousand years now. Sadly as the mortals and their civilizations fell and died in insignificant ways…others continued to safeguard their little embers of hope. But now, now she simply waited and watched. She would learn of some events through Nurgle and he would even show her the multiple apocalyptic events taking place across the galaxy. If there was one thing her captive was useful for, it was getting information on the bigger picture.

Isha was patient, she simply had to wait for whatever comes next. And so the centuries passed like months for her until she finally felt something stir within the outside the Lord of Rots realm.

---

Isha was in her room when she felt them. Nurgle thankfully did not keep her in a cage like some pet animal, he was at least kind enough to give her privacy (she imagined he was too busy over his plague cauldron to really care anyway) but she was generally locked in her room most of the time.

It was a spartan and ugly living space. Like a terrible facsimile of a forest mixed with a bog and swamp. For in the warp, a room could be as normal as one the mortals had or as outrageous as the inside of a star. In this case, Nurgle figured Isha wanted something "familiar". Her living space was infested with all manner of diseased ridden insects, dangerous poisoned fungus, and numerous plagues in every nook and cranny. It would on average kill a mortal creature in a few seconds. For the Goddess of Life and Healing, it was more dealing with a constant itch and swatting at bugs. It might have been charming in some way, but Isha hated it all the same.

Anyway, while she was resting in her room Isha felt the sensations of what she believed to be warp "pings" within proximity of the Garden. This was a tactic that many mortal psykers performed when attempting to divine some type of entrance or fault in the realm of a God. At first she assume it was one of Nurgle minions performing this action, some corrupted mortal trying to gain the attention of their "Grand Father" but she had barely felt the pings. Like someone was trying to not get noticed.

Soon enough, it was joined by several more and then a full dozen and a half pings. She knew soon enough that this part of a coordinated effort, as these individuals were working in tandem in searching for a means to enter into the Garden of Nurgle. A sense of dread washed over her. Perhaps Tzeetch was preparing an attack on his most hated rival?

The last living Goddess concentrated and tried to sense the motives of these potential attackers. While her understanding of the Changer of Ways and his minions escaped her, she couldn't sense the taint of chaos among the pings signatures. These were mortals, not corrupted at that. This was unexpected, even more so as she couldn't feel the Palace go on high alert. Whoever these mortals were, they were experienced and knew what they were doing.

This had to be the work of the Eldar. Perhaps even some of the humans as well. Had the Eldar and Humanity finally started working together? What was their goal? Perhaps they were trying to rescue her? Likely not, but odds are they were trying to look for one of their few remaining Gods and then consider the feasibility of rescuing her from this nightmare.

But she couldn't assume. She had hope, but Isha didn't delude herself into thinking this was some grand attempt to get her out of this hell. That said, she wasn't about to let an opportunity like this slip away. So she did what she could in this situation, which while limited by her powers and her inability to leave her "dungeon", she still had a few tricks left in her dwindling repertoire of abilities.

Her hands went to her hair and she pulled out a decayed looking flower. It was a pathetic looking thing, thousands of years old and wilted like no other…but it was a flower from the Eldar homeworld and a keepsake from her husband, her real one. She had been able to smuggle and keep it safe for so long. The bodies of Gods were peculiar things to say the least, allowing minor objects and baubles to go unknown noticed in what the mortals could call pocket spaces.

It was odd to think, but Nurgle actually loved her hair the most. Where most men would covet her other "assets" and the likes of Slaanesh would toy with Isha…the God of Rot seemed to enjoy this particular physical trait of hers. So while he enjoyed touching it, he did nothing to harm it either. Nurgle never did like harming his most treasured pets.

As Isha looked down at this sad, little flower, she plucked one of the petals. It was the one that still had color too it, even a smell which almost reminded her of her husband. It brought back memories of better times, before Kaine took everything from her and she was forced to begin a dark and terrible journey. But this little petal had power in it still and enough life for the Eldar Goddess of Life to breathe power into it.

She gave enough of it, even putting a little bit of her hope, into turning this petal into something…pure in such an impure realm. Where was once a petal, was now a small winged creature. It looked almost like a bird from ancient Earth, calm and innocent and glowing a light ever so radiant and warm.

Gently she walked over to the sole window that was allowed for her to gaze into the abyss of rot, corruption, and disease that was the palace and the garden. She leaned down to the little creature and whispered her knowledge of the grounds, of what was in the palace, and where they could find her if they so dared. But more importantly, she whispered one last piece of knowledge.

"Do not give up hope in such trying times. You being here, risking the dangers, are a sign that you have not given such things up. That a fire burns in your souls. Never let those fires go out, even in the face of certain defeat."

Isha then willed the small creature to take flight. She watched it go and then disappear into the miasma filled air. She didn't stop looking, even as she felt the psychic pings of the mortals increase in ferocity. She wondered if Nurgle and his forces would learn of the attempted breach. She wondered if any of the mortals would get her message. That they would learn that she was still here, still patiently waiting, and still trying to keep hope alive in her own way.