It is the 41st Millennium. For more than a hundred centuries the Emperor has sat immobile on the golden throne on Earth. He is the Master of Mankind by the will of the gods, and master of a million worlds by the might of His inexhaustible armies. He is a rotting carcass writhing invisibly with the 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 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 defence forces, the ever vigilant inquisition and the tech-priest 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 much worse.
To be a man in such times is to be one amongst untold billions. It is to live in the cruelest and bloody regime imaginable. These are tales of those times. Forget the power of technology and science, for so much has been forgotten, never to be relearned. Forgot 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 thirsting gods.
M40,375
Golden Hinde
Planet: Luetin III
Lord Captain Aurelia of the Luna class cruiser Golden Hinde was drifting slowly in geosynchronous orbit above the planet Luetin III. The planet wasn't a back water nor was it a major centre of activity like Macragge or for this segmentum Krieg. No it was fairly boring, but for a rogue trader it was full of opportunity.
To ferry goods from one system to the next, to smuggle in hardened narcotics, for the populace. It was gold mind for the right man or woman in this case to simply take advantage of the situation. As long as one doesn't get caught that is.
"Golden Hinde this is planetary control. You are ordered to stay in system, by Planetary Governo" The vox transmission cut off, with a hiss of static as Aurelia shut off the Vox system.
"Helm, I've grown rather bored of this planet, plot a new course. Take me to the Kronos expanse." The Kronos expanse was as backwater as backwater as systems got in the Imperium, but when a planetary governor sent out complaints it was best to lay low for the immediate future until the Imperium up and forget there was even a problem.
"Yes Lord Captain."
Aurelia felt the tremor beneath her feet as the cruisers powerful plasma engines roared to life and began to pull away from the planet of Luetin. Aurelia casually put one of her feet up on her arm rests on her throne chair, and began slicing away at the tropical fruit that grew on the planet below. Besides the Throne Gelt the exquisite fruit would be one of the few things she'd miss about the planet.
-X-
"Captain we are approaching the jump point." Aurelia gave a nod as she tapped a button on her throne signalling down to the navigator.
"Yes Lord Captain."
"We approaching a jump point navigator are we ready to travel to the Kronos Expanse?" Aurelia wasn't the biggest fan of the navigator on her ship. Hell she wasn't a fan of any navigator if she was being honest with herself. It wasn't because they were mutant scum. No it was far more simple actually.
She hated he fact that any navigator felt like they were more in control of a ship then the actual Captain of it. Of course any Captain could simply order a navigators death with an utterance of a word. But to do so would bring the wrath of the other houses.
Although navigators seemed to have the own politics and bickering, they all seemed to rally together when it came to teaching a ship captain or the Imperium itself at truly rare times, just how powerful they could be.
A ship needing a navigator would have 'delay's' getting to the preordained destination, they would be 'missing paperwork', or 'incorrect paperwork.'
Humph. Aurelia knew, hell the whole damn Imperium knew it was just the navigators flexing their political muscles and sending a very simple message. 'We are above you.' And for Aurelia it truly rubbed her the wrong way.
"Of course we are captain." Aurelia pressed the mute button on her throne perhaps a bit to hard as she heard the audible 'crunch' as the button got stuck. The sound of turning gears and slightly whirling servo could be heard and Aurelia knew her ships tech-priest was less then impressed with her display. The smell of strong oil drew closer, a large red-robed figure approached and began to hum in what Aurelia could only describe as static and white noise.
The quick but thorough process of getting a ship warp ready had been practiced ten thousand times by Aurelia, she had lived and breathed a ship recycled oxygen since her first memories.
First came the warp drive checks. If the warp drive needed to be charged that was done last considering how grizzly that could be, but thankfully Aurelia drives had another dozen jumps in them before that had to be redone.
Next came the gellar field. The bound psyker in the bowels of the ships was dreaming a never ending drew. Electrical stimuli was shot through their brain causing the psyker to shield the ship, whilst it travelled through the immaterium.
Next came the blast shields, those came down across the breadth of the ship, before they just entered warp. During her many years of travel the most common occurrence of something going wrong was a malfunctioning blast shield, you'd think it wanted be the most easily missable step. Those who thought that where fools of the heights order. The most tamest memory Aurelia had of a failed blast door failing to close was a crew member tearing his out his own eyes and then started to scribbling insane madness on the bulk heads with his own blood.
"Captain the ship has passed all parameters, we are ready to enter the Warp." Aurelia nodded her head as the information came in. She closed her eyes and muttered to the Emperor in prayer with a few words before she let out a flurry of orders.
"Lower void shields." Aurelia spoke out to her bridge, waiting for the tech-priest to finish. "Void shields lowered captain."
"Close blast doors." Came the next order. The loud screeching rumbled through the bridge before the blast doors sealed shut and locked into place. "Confirmed reports of blast doors sealed throughout the ship Captain."
"Raise gellar field." Aurelia waited a heartbeat, two before the reply came back. "Gellar field raised Captain."
Aurelia nodded before turning to the ships tech-priest. "Tech-priest estimated time of travel to destination." It would be more prudent to ask the ships navigator this question. But Aurelia tried to keep conversation with the navigator to a minimum.
The tech-priest turned and looked at the ships astro-navigational cogitator, typing in a few commands before turning to answer. "Travel time is estimated to be thirty five weeks Captain."
"Navigator void shields are lowered and the ships gellar fields are at hundred percent functionality, the ships is yours." Aurelia simply stated before cutting the line, not waiting for the reply. This time Aurelia was far more gentle with her controls as the tech-priest still hovered overhead.
Several long minutes passed before the confirmation came in. "We are within the immaterium Captain."
"Good, I'm going to my quarters wake me if you need me." She was met with a chorus 'yes Captain' as she made her way to her quarters. It was not far from the bridge just a few minutes walk and and short elevator ride later and Aurelia was met with the two adamantium doors to her quarters.
Her quarters were by far and away the largest and best decorated on the ship, with only the Navigator coming a close second. There was a large Emperor sized bed. A desk made from a strong wood that grew on the planet of Catachan. A decent sized wardrobe, a jewellery box, a book shelf littered with journals from Aurelia's own family and many other works including some from the primarchs themselves, her floor had marble tiles and exquisite stone work carvings, statues made of various materials littered around the room, most were of her family's line of rogue traders, her father had an entire Ruby statue carved of his likeness. A tapestry of her family crest hung from the walls, the materials was of silk and gold filagree.
On the desk itself was a haphazard mess of star maps, trade routes, planets and much more. Aurelia took of her long jacket and tricorn hat with its long black feather. That hat also had a stylised symbol of her house symbol pressed into the leather.
Aurelia then took of her dozen or so rings that adorned her fingers beside one. A digi-weapon that adorned her left middle finger. Aurelia also left a simple but blocky aquila necklace on, as it was a refractor shield. Both pieces had been a pain to acquire. Aurelia could only sigh in frustration in dealing with the Jokaero to get her digi-weapon created.
Aurelia shook her head and let the memories fade as she put down the last piece of her equipment, a hot-shot laspistol. Aurelia could feel the heft in the weapon as soon as she picked it up out of its holster. It was a sturdy and dangerous firearm. The weapon was little customised barring the engraving of her name on the grip.
Aurelia put the pistol on the table and took her seat, a simple wooden chair with a leathering backing for comfort. She began unrolling maps. Grabbing her auto quill, Aurelia settled in for a long night drawing out plans.
The initial thirteen weeks of warp travel had been dull and boring. Aurelia had kept herself busy with her star maps and history of the calixis sector, political information of ruling families, trade routes in and out of the sector, merchant guilds that operated in the area, and a plethora of other information that was dull to read but incredibly vital none the less, those without a plan are destined to die by the unknown after all.
A violent shake ripped through Aurelia's quarters. An not to uncommon thing when traveling through the warp but that had been the third time during the last three hours. Aurelia was lucky if she suffered two during an entire trip.
Aurelia stood and walked over to her own personal vox communicator that connected to any parts of the ship. She connected to the bridge getting the distinct voice of her communication officer. Aurelia cut him off before he could get two words out.
"Get the ships Magos on the vox, I want to know by all of Terra what the hell is happening to my ship." Aurelia did not have to wait long before the mechanical voice of the Magos responded.
"Lord Captain." The distinct mechanical twang of her ships Magos came through the vox. "There seems to be some trouble with the ships gellar field lord Captain, it has become thin at certain points of the ship, although this is nothing to be concerned of lord Captain. Everything shall return to nominal operational standards within the next three hours and fourteen minutes."
Aurelia reply was instant and brokered no argument.
"Get us out of warp now." With that Aurelia disconnected the vox and began to reapply her uniform before heading to the bridge.
By the time Aurelia arrived the blast doors were raised and the darkness of interstellar space greeted Aurelia eyes.
"How long until the gellar field can be checked and any anomalies can be found and fixed." Aurelia asked the tech-priest on the bridge. The Magos dwelt deeper in the bowels of the ship, dealing with the ships more complex systems personally.
"The Magos has informed me that a full system check shall take one Terran week, but such a procedure would be unnecessary."
"Do it, you shall have more then enough time as the crew performs a full decontamination procedure." The decontamination procedure was a simple check off all ship personal, making sure that no 'strange' behaviour was spotted. Strange was a broad term and could mean different things to a different person. Aurelia only cared that her ship remained at operational efficiency. But it was up to the ships on board commissar what that term meant, and that woman had a far more stricter meaning. As a rogue trader Aurelia had the ability to remove any non desirables from her ship with little complaint. But the commissar did good work, so Aurelia let them stay. It also greatly decreased the time Aurelia had to spend around figures of authority such as the inquisition, who poked around her ship whenever they felt like doing so.
"CAPTAIN. Strange readings on the ships auspex, I think you should come see this." Aurelia blinked before moving over to the sensor officer. It was uncommon that something was found on the auspex in the middle of deep space.
Aurelia didn't even need to ask what the man had found as the runes flashed across the screen. It was strangest and most baffling reading she had ever read.
"Interesting." Came the low, mechanical speech of the bridges tech-priest.
"Tech-priest I almost certain of what where seeing but just to confirm."
"Indeed Captain it seems by the grace of the Omnissiah you have discovered a spacial anomaly." Or put another way Aurelia by complete chance had found a wormhole. It was a one in quadrillion chance, Aurelia as well traveled as she was had never in her life heard of an existing wormhole inside Imperial space, even though they were thought to be theoretically possible. Aurelia had heard an off shot rumour once during a stay at port. She was so drunk she couldn't remember the port itself, but Aurelia remembered hearing that during the dark age of technology that all spatial anomalies had been closed or removed by ancient humanity. The reasons for why was never said. Aurelia considered it just that though, a rumour. Nothing more.
"I congratulate you on your find Captain. A truly rare and wondrous item to be discovered, I can almost guarantee you that which ever forge-world you bring this discovery to, will reward you handsomely for it." Wether the tech-priest was hinting at something or simply informing Aurelia of the possibilities that now awaited her, she paid it no mind as she was only half listening.
Aurelia mind was running at ten thousand miles an hours. Thoughts and plans were made and discarded as she stared at the new opportunity in-front of her. If Aurelia had been within the Kronos Expanse and found this discovery, she would of easily quarantined the area and had her own house hold discover the secrets it possessed. By she couldn't do this here.
"Tech-priest where are we specifically." Aurelia asked as she left the auspex sensor and turned and walked to the ships strategium. A quick tap of a few buttons brought up the galaxy map with only Holy Terra highlighted on it.
The galaxy flashed before Aurelia, the Van Holm house symbol flashed on the map, showing her current coordinates. "We are approximately on the border between Segmentum Solar and Segmentum Pacificus. We are also roughly halfway to Segmentum Obscurus."
Aurelia couldn't help but snort at the use of the word approximately, the reason it was used was because several
Sectors within the area would debate what tax was currently owed due to their location within the galaxy. Aurelia banished the thoughts and refocused on the potential goldmine in front of her.
If Aurelia cashed in old favourers that her house owed she could bring a formidable fleet to the area, but being so close to Holy Terra, made that an impossibility. The sheer amount of watch stations, navy patrols, astartes patrols along with a lot more made doing such a thing, foolish. It would be passed up the chain of command and within a few Terran weeks if not a month at most, the area would be under inquisitorial control. Aurelia would be damned if she was going to the let this opportunity pass through her fingers.
"Comms. Pass a message to Commander Striker, tell him to send out one of the Chiropteran scout vessels also tell him to send along disposable crew members." With the orders passed along and ships bridge under a calm sense of control. Aurelia sat upon her throne chair and simply waited.
Matthew Kane was a sorry excuse for a member of the Emperors vaunted Navis Imperialis, the bloat around his gut showed the lack of exercise and the redness around his cheeks confirmed his fondness for drink. Kane would argue that as he wasn't a ground pounder and spent most of his time in craft, the need for ludicrous hard exercise was a waste of time.
When Matthew Kane saw the Lieutenant Commander (better known as fuckface) enter the rec room he'd been slightly surprised, it was only on truly rare days that the Commander graced the crew with his presence. Kane hadn't practically cared. He'd had been having a pleasant day all things considered. Kane had gone through the crew stores of food and drink and found a bottle amasec tucked away. The stench of alcohol was thick on Kanes breath when the Commander had marched over. The look of disgust of the Commanders face had made Kanes day even better.
Then fuckface had issued out his orders as Kane stared at him blankly, not truly processing what he had just said.
"What!?"
Now it was the Commanders turn to have a slightly smug look on his face for his petty victory, he hid it well with a puzzled expression on his face, as if not understanding what the confusion was about.
"This comes straight from the very top Voidsman Kane. The captain wants a spacial anomaly scouting and you have been picked due to your… skills." The Commander finished.
The next sentence left Kanes lips before he even had a chance to process a response.
"Are you fuckin' mad!?"
The mirth on the Commanders face died and he became stone faced within the space of a single breath. "Are you refusing my order Voidsman."
The rec room died, the constant hum of machines the never seemed to cease even in the crews own dreams abruptly stopped for a fraction of a second as the air of the room seemed to be sucked out. No one in the entire imperium from a lowly manifactorium worker to a sector governor refused an order from a superior. Kane answered as soon as the last syllable left the Commanders lips.
"No."
"Good." The Commander cut off any other response the Voidsman may have had. "That order was to be carried out immediately Voidsman."
Kane just sat there blinking for a few seconds, before grabbing the bottle of amasec and having a few long swigs before finally getting up, bleary eyed. He began moving to the craft bray.
"By the Throne what a piece of junk." Kane muttered aloud. The Chiropteran was half way disassembled. Electrical boards sparked with live wires exposed. Several pieces of floor plating had been pulled apart, leaving holes that a man could easily disappear into.
It was a parts vessel nothing more.
Kane bitched and moaned as entered the cockpit of the vessel. Where he was met with two more humans. An Astro-navigator to man the crafts auger array and a communicator to man the vox. Kane could only sigh in defeat. This craft was also meant to have a cog-boy on it aswell. There absence was pretty much confirmed this to be a suicide mission in all but name.
"Pilot K"
"Shut the fuck and sit down!" Kane snapped to the navigator. "Not. A. Damned. Word." Kane stared at the navigator and communicator and when both men nodded both of the heads hard enough to create whiplash Kane turned back to the controls.
Kane went through the routine of starting the plasma drives, only for nothing to happen.
"Emperor. Please, just this once answer my prayers, make this scrap bucket stay dead." Kane muttered under his breath barely even audible to himself. Kane pushed the button again, and with great effort the Chiropteran drives flared to life. Although they struggled to keep themselves alit. Kane could only mutter curses to the Emperor and his own misfortune.
"Golden Hinde this is Chiropteran one. We are proceeding to spacial anomaly, are we cleared for take off. Cunts." Kane muttered towards the end of his vox message. Earning him wide eyed stares from his passengers.
"You are cleared for take off Chiroteran one. May the Emperor guide you.
"May the Emperor guide you." Kane finished as he pushed the throttle.
The Chiropteran was a VTOL craft. As Kane powered the engine. The scout craft began violently shaking, as the engine began to be powered, Kanes two passengers had to grab on the machinery dotted around or they would have been thrown from their seats.
Kane floored the accelerator and scout craft flew out of the Golden Hinde hanger bay into the void of space, almost immediately alarms began to blare.
"We've lost oxygen and pressure to every cabin but the cockpit."
There was a tense silence as crew members looked at Kane.
"Erm, Voidsman Kane shouldn't we put on rebreathers?"
"If you want to prolong your death be my guest, I'd rather die quickly." Kane grunted in frustration as he tried to accelerate the Chiropteran, the craft couldn't accelerate faster then 200 miles an hour, a measly pace compared to the craft true top speed of over fifteen thousand miles an hour. It would take them 17 hours to get within auger array range, that had been specified by Captain Aurelia.
The flight was torturously slow, the scout craft refused under any circumstance to move any faster, Kane had tried every trick he could think off, over loading the main drives to kick the engine into overdrive. Feathering the throttle to tease it to go a little bit faster, lower the drive power to try and make the craft crave more. Nothing. Kane was fairly certain he'd angered the machine spirit even worse. The cog-boys back on board the Golden Hinde would be unimpressed with his handling of the scout vessel.
In the end Kane had just thrown his hands up cussed out the machines spirits mother and had tried his best to fall asleep.
"KANE! VOIDSMAN KANE!" The shout of one of his crew member snapped Kane from his sleep as saw the two crew members staring at him with fearful eyes.
"The spatial anomaly has increased its gravity well fifty fold, its dragging us in!"
Kane reaction was one of pure instinct. His Imperial navy training kicking in, Kane hammered the throttle and tried to turn away from the anomaly, with the sheer speed and the force the anomaly was dragging them in, it was almost certain the scout vessel would snap in half, thanks to the Emperors mercy, nothing happened. As soon as Kane hammered the throttle the engine cut out and scout vessel was dragged into the wormhole.
The trip was instantaneous. The scout vessel shot out the other side as the cockpit crew just looked around making sure they weren't dead.
"You fuckin drunk dumb grox eating bastard!!" The communicator got up and punched Kane out of his pilot seat onto his ass. The hard metal floor making it's presence felt, likely to leave a bruise.
"We're lucky we weren't killed. By the Emperors teeth what the hell was you thinking! We almost fuckin' died!"
Kane in no mood for anyone's shit, got up and grabbed the comms officer by the throat and pinned him against wall. Snarling into his face.
"You so much as touch me again I make your brain matter a permanent part of this cockpit." What else Kane was going to say was cut off as something cold and metal touched his stomach. He looked down to see a scipio pattern stub gun at his stomach. Kane just looked up and barked a laugh in the mans face.
"What you gonna do with that? You a fire a round off in here and you'll kill yourself, never mind me."
"You already told us we were dead anyways. Especially considering you destroyed our engines. What excatly do I have to lo"
"Guys you have to see this." The navigator said from his cogitator terminal. Complete engrossed in the runes displayed. Neither man paid him any attention. Kane began to squeeze hard as the communication Voidsman cocked back the hammer.
"We are no longer in the same Galaxy!" He all but screeched at them both, turning back and pointing at his terminal. That finally broke both mens attention, making both men grudgingly walk over.
"Your equipments busted." Kane easily dismissed with a wave. Not even bothering to read further. Instead sitting down and massaging his temples as the bottle of amasec began to get its revenge on him, he'd never admit that a punch from a civi hurt him.
"How?" The navigator asked. "You prove to me that readings on that auger array is false." He challenged Kane who wasn't very interested in listening.
"This is a scrap bucket. The array is faulty." Kane explained like he was speaking to a child.
"Not a chance." The navigator shot back. "I checked our position when we were on the Golden Hinde. Our location matched up excatly, it only changed after we went through the anomaly."
"Then we're in an unknown part of the galaxy." The comms officer commentated as he sat back in his own chair, messaging his knuckles that began to turn an ugly colour.
"The imperium controls almost the entire galaxy, there's also the fact the Lord Captains family were part of the Astra Cartographica for close to a millennia, she has star maps for the entire galaxy." The navigator refuted.
"Then we traveled in time." Kane bit out. Kane had heard of such things but never with definitive proof, it mostly sounded like grox shit to Kane, but it was an infinitely better opinion then traveling to a different galaxy.
"We could of travelled fifty million years into the past or future and they would not match the readings I'm seeing in front of me."
Kane truly roused to anger turned his full attention on the man.
"It takes an entire two Terran years to travel the full galaxy are your going to just sit there and say we travelled to an entirely different galaxy in the space of five seconds?" Kane quirked an eyebrow at the man, almost daring him to continue down his path of stupidity.
"It what the array says." The man pointed. Kane just shook his head and turned around, and collapsed fully into his highly uncomfortable chair. Done with the conversation.
"Fine." Kane said. Lifting his hands into the air. "If you want to bring this madness to the Captain, you do it. I'm going to find my bottle of amasec." Kane started the long process of trying to coax the scout vessel to start again.
