I, Esdra
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| [//Plenipotentiary+] [//@dylandaybell+] |
Myrea. Shuttle.
The request – request – for my presence at the briefing had come late in the evening; just early enough to ensure that I could not concentrate on my duties, nor find escape in sleep. As the early shuttle translated and we rounded the curve of Myrea Prime, the gathered fleet stood before me, stark in the sunlight.
Absently, I set my flask of recaff on the bench.
There were hundreds of them.
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| [//Star Warden+] [//@thrones_arcane+] |
I gazed, rapt, at the armada. At a glance, I could see a half-dozen of the liveries that I had grown up idolising: the clean colours of the Red Fish; the heavy, threatening bulk of the Void Barons' and Riven Lords' vessels; the surprising elegance of the Iron Guard's. More besides. Pledged-Mechanicus; Partisan Imperial Guard and Naval vessels. More. Reformed Ecclesiarchy; the hulks of the Arbites.
I looked about for the Argent Heralds or Jade Talons – those Chapters which had inspired me to join the Navy in my youth. I saw none, but the fleet included some very strange craft indeed, all bearing the skull-headed sigil of the Imperium Viridis.
***
Dozens of shuttles flocked around each of the capital ships; bearing staff like myself from briefing to briefing. The great majority of the fleet, of course, bore turquoise and coral and white. I had taken them for Jovian design at first, but the timings and structure weren't quite right; as though they had been created from second-hand accounts – or perhaps, I suppose, the other way round. Shallow, bulbous domes dotted the sides, like ritual scarification.
***
Aboard the Nostoi
Despite Volnoscere's supposed preference of the Tithonus for such gatherings, we gathered on the Nostoi. A professional eye – if you'll excuse some professional pride; mine – could tell you that both his favoured vessel and the flagship were non-standard craft, though clearly manufactured along Imperial lines.
The route was long, the corridors oddly sinous. Nusk-Nimgir commented upon it – 'A defensive measure' – I had little point of reference. Whether functional or ornamental, the way curved and dipped, and was never clear. The Silver Star simply marched onwards, helm fixed, and we followed.
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| [//Unshrouded+] [//@death_of_a_rubricist+] |
... and then, Diaeta Aemulo. The chamber's name, in old High Gothic, was incised into the surface of the ship. Wood? Stone? Ceramic? I longed to reach out and touch the walls and satisfy my curiosity, but propriety and no little shred of apprehensiveness meant I held them clasped at my waist. We paused, and the Silver Star removed his helm and tucked it beneath one arm. A warm smile broke across a star-tanned face as he gestured with his free hand..
'E ʻoluʻolu, e hoʻomau.'
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| [//Neridius Macallan of Battlefleet Macharius; Lord Captain Gallant Endeavour+] [//@orcus_dis+] |
They were gathered there; his Kapihe. A motley mix of Partisan Chapter Masters and officers and sundry others: officers of the fleet and Imperial Guard, Navigators, Priests and the like. Not all of them, of course – but some of the most influential figures in the Imperium. The chamber suits their station. Grand, but not pompous. Practical, but not unlovely. A great deal of what looks like tin and antimony in the decoration, I murmur to Nusk-Nimgir. He merely nods. Abashed, I keep my thoughts to myself. Gold also is frequent, I think, and silver is present, but reserved. Neither stark, nor opulent. How suited, I thought, to the assemblage.
I saw Ljunge Blégos; Dordji Baskoro; Hektor Tiberius. Bharga Vos, Captain of the Void Barons' First was there, too; and Mother Glotha. Tall and handsome Inuksuk of the Inheritors, his new rank becoming him. I saw a Red Fish that I didn't recognise; and shivered as I caught the eye of that sadist, Polemarch Adan Volker. Canticle was there, of course, and Ambassador Feng, and others besides, from every wing and corner of the Imperium. Magos Hun. Quæsitor Maka'ala.
They were a rich mix of the best and brightest, and the most fell and terrifying, of the Partisan cause. It reminded me of why we – why I – fought. A renewed Imperium; clear-eyed singular leadership; an end to the corruption of the Senatorum Imperialis.
It was easy to forget that, sometimes.
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| [//Foreman Jaast VII-II+] [//@dark_isles+] |
Behind the Inquisitorial Representative – a Kapihe himself – were a dozen men and women, presumably other Inquisitors. The room was crammed, but only two short a score were within reach of the chart table, the others sitting or standing or kneeling on the tiered benches around. The chamber was lit, neither brightly nor dimly, the smooth, curved walls warm. Nusk-Nimgir beside me, we found a space on the tiered seats. A stout, fusty-looking man sat to my other side, a bearded and battered Void Baron with him, his pauldron stating boldly 'Baskoro'.
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| [//Cassar Illiaturi+] [//@tangential_contrivances+] |
It might have been a theatre, or given the shimmering light, a firelit cave. There was a low murmuring, and what I took to be serfs were circulating with refreshments.
And then...
The lighting brightens. The pool, I realise, is water. It shifts hypnotically with the micro-movements of the Nostoi; every footstep and voice aboard adding its own nuance. Passed through the water, the fresh light paints the walls; gives the scene a shifting feel.
For a second, I think I hear a giggle. Teehee.
"It is the Kapihe-e. It is what they're named after, you know." The man beside me tells me, suddenly, breaking my reverie. "Did you know that? I knew that. The sphere of seawater. The Kapihe-e. It's very old, you know." He nods to himself, eyes still fixed on the great door.
I don't know how to respond. Baskoro catches my gaze, his bruised face breaking into a grin as he rolls his eyes. It is an unexpectedly human moment from the Void Baron. He is missing a tooth. I am flustered.
"Why can't they make things like that any more, that's what I want to know," continues the little man., fussily. "The Kapihe-e, that is. Not Volnoscere. Not the Primarch, I mean."
All at once, the hubbub eases, men and women come to their feet. The Primarch. The Primarch!
***
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| [//@death_of_a_rubricist+] |
Spear-bearing Honour guards and the Equerry, Vox Volnoscere, enters beside the Primarch, along with another cloaked figure, tall but slight. All eyes, however, are on the Last True Son as he strides to the chart table to greet his advisors and friends, wearing an uncertain half-smile. As one, the assembly breaks into applause; the Kapihe turn from the Kapihe-e to salute their master, and drink in the cheers. His smile broadens, sincerity painted across his bright-eyed face.
He reaches the circular chart table, and takes a place at one of the three raised areas – now clearly tailor-made for his proportions. The Primarch looks left, then right, his air curious – pleased, obviously, but with a hidden sense of reticence. As the applause rolls around the chamber, he places Monstrance, his great skull-headed mace, on the table beside him. It is a thing of great age and potency, worthy of veneration itself, but beside the Primarch it is a sideshow.
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| [//First Captain Bharga Vos of the Void Barons, flaunting the head of Squad Leader Astiah of the Flesh Eaters' saboteur unit, 'The Bodysnatchers'. A brutal and boisterous veteran, Vos viewed the War as nothing more than an opportunity to further flex his renown and strengthen his company's already bloated fleet.+] [//@theblackshieldhideout+] |
***
As the Primarch raises his hands for silence, and the rooms stills, my eyes drift over to the Astartes-sized figures that entered after the Primarch. Half a dozen or so stand, completely shrouded in decorated cloaks, by the doors. No holes for vision or movement are apparent. Something about them makes me recoil, the embroidered fabric moving oddly. It pools at their feet, seemingly sealed beneath them there, too, like a caul. Their cloth-bound hands clutch great golden spears, the fabric bunching around the shapes of the plate beneath. I shiver.
One of them stands to the right of the slighter figure. On its left is another Space Marine, I think. His armour is plain, unburnished ceramite, a slight white oxide in the recesses. I think I can make out the Silver Stars' symbol on his pauldron, but incised rather than painted. He wears the same embroidered cloth as the others, but as a simple tabard marked with a peculiar symbol, rather than the strange all-over shroud of the others.
The Primarch talks. His voice is rich and compelling, generous and redolent with brotherhood. He greets us all, and we are eager to hear.
***
His hands dance as the briefing goes on. There is risk – but he will share it. There will be pressure – and he vows to help us bear it. His Kapihe chime in here and there on details, intelligently and incisively; or boldly, bombastically as suits their humours. He greets these interruptions and addenda with clear eyes and a nod, or a warm laugh.
The ideas are folded into the strategy, like spices in a recipe. The cultures and war-histories of eleven Chapters Astartes are drawn from and combined. His manner is effortlessly inspiring. His voice is persuasive, compelling. The Primarch holds them rapt.
But there is something else, something nagging at me – and I am frightened that no-one else seems to feel the same. His plan seems to shift, but it is like an ocean. The ripples and waves stir and the appearance alters, but the deeper waters move on unchanged.
There are no recognisable dataslates nor cogitators present; all manual inputs are seemingly made through keyboards more akin to musical instruments than a typewriter. Canticle's fingers move faster than I can follow. The surface and depths of the Kapihe-e are covered with shifting notes and marks and sigils.
I look to my left and right, nervously looking for anyone who appears sceptical. Am I alone?
A smile can turn glassy in a moment. Another word for persuasion is manipulation.
The figure reaches out a hand as it approaches the table. Its gauntlet is a pastel violet. Its fingers are almost, but not quite, human. The suspended pool at the centre of the table shimmers.
Teehee
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| [//Surufesh Silvertongue+] [//@death_of_a_rubricist+] |
***
Punctus
In the silence that follows, Volonoscere's face is creased and black with fury, his body as tense and poised as a dancer.
It takes me a moment to realise the eldar is submerged, struggling, in the kapihe-e, its entire torso hidden in the Primarch's immense gauntlet. How swift he was.
And how thunderous. His words rang out across the astonished group.
'I will not be manipulated. Not again.'
Still none of us react. The entire Kapihe is seemingly shocked into inaction.
His face softens, his eyes crease with that emotion most alien to the Astartes – uncertainty.
Wordlessly, ben Baruch lunges forward, his armour pulling at the thin fabric. Even this is too late. With the slightest of scraping sounds, the Shrouded Esdra is halted by Monstrance, the great war-maul whipping out in the Primarch's free hand and arresting the strange Silver Star warningly.
The Primarch turns to the strange figure, without releasing his grip on the thrashing xenos.
'No onward step.'
***