Editing Nobledark Imperium Xenos (section)

=== Rak'gol ===

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The Rak’Gol are a horrifying xeno-breed thought native to the Koronus Expanse out beyond the Halo Stars. The source of their animosity towards the Imperium and it’s peoples is as of yet unknown, there might not even be a reason. It could just be that they are universally hostile to anything that they see as competition. Attempts at opening up a dialogue have yet not been responded to with anything other than violence and even Rak’Gol language/s are utterly unknown despite the many centuries of encounters and listening. It is assumed that they have a language as they make sound and have ear analogues and their ships transmit and receive radio waves. Written language as observed by the boarding teams seems to consist of raised bumps similar superficially to Braille, as with the spoken language no sense has yet been made of it.
 
If they have distinct sexes it is not evident with greater differences in bodily structure seeming to exist through role. Technicians aboard their brutally designed ships tending to be noticeably smaller and more nimble of limb than the warrior-breeds. Exactly how this distinction is maintained as no form yet encounter has had reproductive organs is unknown. Theories range from cloning and manipulation at early stages of development to each type maintain a breeding population on some distant undiscovered homeworld.
 
Whatever the reason their actions like the orks before them have put their kind on the Imperium’s black list.
 
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In appearance a basic warrior-form of the Rak’Gol is a little over two and a half meters tall with a hide thick enough to shrug off small stubber gun fire. Cybernetics are appointed seemingly based upon skill and age, with age being a result of skill as in such an inhumanly aggressive society a lack of skill prevents age. The natural upper life expectancy of their kind is unknown although Adeptus Biologicus assume it could be anything up to two and a half centuries based on experiments done on tissue samples from recovered corpses. The individuals of the Rak’Gol are not aggressive towards each other and are seemingly extremely cohesive as a group with everyone knowing their place and performing their duties in a manner reminiscent of the Vespid. Unlike the Vespid the Rak’Gol also have seemingly no real love for each other as individuals and have been observed killing and cannibalising the injured and crippled without hesitation or distress. Most chilling of all is the way that the targeted individual does not try to flee or plead or even flinch, they just stand there as they are carved up.
 
It is not unreasonable to assume that the Rak’Gol operate on a psychic hive mind similar to that of the Tyranids but this does not seem to be the case as they do have to speak to each other to relay information. Exchanges of speech have been observed that could be requests for clarification or even offered alternative suggestions to given orders. There have even been aggressive body language with accompanying changes of body language that would indicate heated argument and even one observed instance of dispute and violence, the loser submitting to being carved up for food. They would seem to be individuals united in hate, a common cause and an extremely effective method of instilling discipline and obedience although it’s not unreasonable to assume that such behaviour comes very naturally to them.
 
Rak’Gol technology is on par with Imperial Standard in many regards but seemingly lagging in others. It is unknown at this time if that is because higher technology is present in their fleets but has not been observed, if they have the ability to make more sophisticated mechanisms but consider it uneconomical in some way or that it is a hole in their knowledge. Their cybernetics for example are, depending on the device, anywhere between extremely crude and on par with what the Mechanicus can produce but show consistency in this discrepancy between individuals. One of the ways that their devices lack sophistication is in comfort toward the host. From dissected captures and retrieved corpses it is evident that they are capable of feeling pain but at the same time give no observable indication that they can. An explanation put forth by the Biologicus is that they just don’t care.
 
The ships follow a similar brutal design philosophy, constructed with no though of elegance or crew comfort, no ornamentation or anything that is not strictly necessary for a war ship. All ships encountered to date have been some form of war ship or are at least capable of acting as such. Radiation from both space and the workings of the ship are not shielded as much as they would be on even an ork ship and this does not seem to impeded, concern or sicken the crew. As it is unknown how many ships there are or from where they are coming and so it is difficult to judge how fast they travel although it is suspected that they are not as fast as many Imperial ships of their size. This is speculated to be because they have no Navigator analogue although this is unconfirmed speculation. In most offensive and defensive means the Rak’Gol ships are comparable to Imperial vessels of similar size if not slightly superior although it has been observed that their sensors are not as effective as those on equivalent Imperial ships.
 
The eldar do not have any surviving records of the Old Empire that speak of things much like the Rak’Gol and Nemesor Zahndrekh does not remember anything that looked like them from his youth.
 
Exactly what has made them as they are, seemingly so full of hate, is unknown and the source of much baseless speculation. There are no clues to culture or history found on their ships or on their bodies and any hope of finding some sort of answer can probably only be found on their homeworld, should they have one.
 
The leading theory among the eldar and human scholars is that their homeworld once orbited a quite vibrant star or orbited on an elliptical orbit, often bringing it closer to the star than most life forms would deem at all comfortable. Their hardy body structure, ability to survive scarcity and seeming immunity to radiation poisoning would seem to indicate as much although there are many such worlds in the galaxy that this could apply to.
 
There are, sometimes at least, creatures that are similar to their description mentioned in some of the less popular Harlequin performances. Strange and unpleasant beings that did something foolish and angered the lords and ladies of the Old Empire and in retaliation the eldar laid waste to their cities, slew their armies and stole their sun away and left them in their ruins to freeze to death under the uncaring stars. The story is a sorrowful one that showed the monstrous and graceless nature of the old aristocracy, as the insult of the “twilight people” was slight and unintended. The last words of the last king of the twilight people, as his crown fell apart in frozen pieces, was to show no pity for the eldar though he had seen a time when they would consume themselves and that he and his people would be there still to see it.
 
If the twilight people were the Rak’Gol then they have changed. How long the Harlequins have been performing this play is unknown as it potentially could be millions of years. Time enough certainly for the Rak’Gol to adapt to a dying world in a brutal way.
 
One way by which they have adapted is by the adoption of the dreaded Yu'Vath technology. Unlike most creatures that are utterly subsumed by such artefacts and essentially become Yu'Vath the Rak’Gol reach a terrible equilibrium with it. The Yu'Vath wish to bring low all about them and reign terrible and unopposed and the Rak’Gol seemingly wish to kill everything that is not them. To this end the Yu'Vath remnants empower the Rak’Gol but the Rak’Gol can’t be consumed and their seeming compliance with the will of the Yu'Vath is merely them coincidentally having the same goals in mind for the most part. If exposure to the foreign and invasive technology is responsible for their current state then they themselves are another victim of the Primordial Annihilator and should be pitied as much as hated, though the need for their extinction remains the same.
 
The Imperium’s first known contact with the Rak’Gol came in 935.M37 out on what was then the Azimoth frontier, a prosperous set of predominantly mixed eldar and human settlements that looked at the time promising. At the time the wholesale slaughter of the relatively lightly defended frontiersmen was attributed to a hitherto unknown ork band, the lack of ork bodies believed to be an eccentricity of them eating their dead for preference. The Rak’Gol, at least in the early contact wars, went to great pains to recover their bodies and remove recordings of themselves. This method of warfare could only continue for so long before knowledge of what they were would be revealed accidentally but for that time the Rak’Gol were an unaccountable and unstoppable force from the edge of the map pushing the darkness back across the light of civilization. Even when what they were was revealed due to the unexpected arrival of substantial Imperial Army elements resulted from a poorly calculated warp jump the Imperium was barely the wiser. They had a face and even a name to what they were fighting but little else. Information that could lead to the discovery of the Rak’Gol homeworld or base of operations is prized extremely highly and rewarded generously.

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