Editing Warhammer 60K: Age of Dusk (Continued) (section)

==Additional Notes==

<div class="toccolours mw-collapsible mw-collapsed" style="100%">The door opened with a pneumatic hiss, and the Chapter Master entered to greet the Ambassador.

It was dark in the room. The Astartes often wondered why his guest insisted on having this small chamber instead of the proper quarters any ambassador would have been entitled to. He understood just how his guest differed from humans, but the past few years had turned him into somewhat of a political animal, and the lack of protocol worried him occasionally.

One does not offend the representative of the Magellan Reich easily. Then again, this representative had made it clear on multiple occasions how it only required a dataport and constant energy flow, which was duly provided to him.<div class="mw-collapsible-content">

The Astartes peered into the darkness.

‘Ambassador MUTO-35145?’

Eight separate red dots came alight at the mention of this designation, and a bulky figure rose in one corner of the room.

‘Chapter Master Papadimitriu.’ The voice was flat and devoid of any human intonation.

‘Primarch Vulkan has given the order,’ the Space Marine said quietly. ‘The Pentus fleet is assembling as we speak.’

‘Querry: did we complete our objective?’

Papadimitriu nodded. ‘The Kapellan Marines are to be split into two main battlegroups. One half accompanies the fleet, the other was given permission to move towards the Dragon Tide’s Dead Zone. We are to locate and deal with Doombreed and its horde.’

‘It is done, then,’ the other answered. ‘The Machina will provide you with the forces stipulated in our agreement.’

The Chapter Master sighed. ‘Fourteen millennia. This is how long it took us to get this far. How does the weight of so much time feels, Ambassador?’

The Machina did not answer for a few seconds. ‘Time is objective,’ it finally said. ‘Although some of that time period was active almost outside my tolerance level.’

‘This is a way to put it,’ Papadimitriu agreed. ‘I myself look back at the long line of my predecessors and the thought that all this will happen in my lifetime is staggering.’

The Machina moved closer. ‘You will bear this burden. You are a Maker of Fate.’

Papadimitriu sighed. This conversation had been played out between them countless times before.

‘The Fatemakers are no more.’

‘You share their genetic legacy,’ the other pointed out.

‘Only fractionally. After all these years, we have more in common with Angron than with Malistrum. You of all should know that.’

‘You also share their manifest destiny.’

Papadimitriu raised a finger. ‘Out of necessity, not of choice. The stakes were a little too high.’

‘They are still as high as they used to be,’ MUTO-35145 warned him. ‘We will not win the war for Primarch Vulkan at the Dead Zone, but we can lose it there.’

‘I know that.’ Papadimitriu said. ‘We will use all our reserves there. I have contacted Avicenno too. We will throw at them everything we have got. If we fail, there is no future for the Chapter anyway.’

The Machina agreed. ‘Agreed.’

‘The strategic meeting begins at sixteen hundred hours. Will you attend?’

‘I will.’

Papadimitriu nodded to it, and turned to leave for the door. The Kapellan Marines were going to make fate once more – for the world, and this time, for themselves as well.


Vulkan sat alone in the darkness of his private chambers, the darkness ensconcing him like a womb of night. The war had begun at Corbellus and would only end with the death of his brothers. He once more opened the ancient tome, compiled by Kryptmann of the Order of Recollectors. The Shape of the Nightmare to Come. that was the name of the tome. How apt a title for such a record.

"Save us Primarch.Save us Vulkan."

The final words of Kryptmann,they echoed now through eternity. He had his brothers beside him, the Brethren of the Willing fighting the good fight in the shadow. Yet all around him lurked enemies. His father...nay. The Star Father may have come from the Emperor but it was an abomination, a perversion of all the good that Adam Kadmon had worked for. And the...remnant that lay within the Webway was both perplexing and worrying. An unknown factor in the fight against the Dissolution. But more troubling than any was the presence of the Reich. 

Their enigmatic ruler, the hidden Khanda, his brother Primarch...he was changed. Far more than what their father had intended. Far greater in scope. And his offer of power, of subordination beneath Vulkan, was more troubling than any offer he had ever been granted, even during his millennium of torment within the Maze of Tzeentch. And yet his own silence, his enigma... It troubled him.

The voices came to him then. Of brothers Long dead, of the new power that called itself Radunrah, born of a gestalt of humanity, Eldar and Ork in a galaxy far away, clad in necrodermis and stalking the paths of Materium and the Webway, biding its time. Khanda fought for humanity, against the Dissolution. But the fragment of speech remained with him, for the Machina entity within Kapellan had granted him that fragment of information alone, classified for his hearing only.

Adam Kadmon believed it was only great power and duty that could hold Chaos and the excess of humanity in check, but that is not what I have found. I found it is the small everyday deeds of ordinary folk that keep the darkness at bay. Small acts of kindness and love. Compassion and charity that somehow endured. The honor of Astartes. The sacrifice of warrior heroes. The unbowed dignity of the unsung billions of Imperial Guard. The compassion of a single Primarch. You saved me brother. More than any other, I would have fallen to Chaos. Me, Ngaru Astaros and Alpharius...we endured only through loyalty to duty and humanity. But you showed us that temperance and compassion could endure, even in the darkness of our existence. You showed us fraternity and justice were possible. You are the fulcrum of our hopes, the best of all of us. You give us hope. To endure and to struggle. We are with you. The travesty of the Traitors will be laid to ruination and humanity saved. Look for us. At Ultramar, in the Halo Stars. From the darkness and shadow, we shall strike with flame and thunder. 

Expect us. Untrado Vulkan! 


The state of the galaxy in the 61st millennium can be summarized by a single word: dusk. The sun is now setting on the galaxy, and these are the final hours before the long night. The Great Game of Chaos enters its final stages, with reality slowly unraveling like an old rug.

The five brothers of the Pentus meet the five of the Travesty in the war to ultimately decide the fate of humanity. On one side Lorgar leads his corrupted kin to bring about his new Word and with it ultimate annihilation, empowered by a force so perverse it literally cannot be named and aided by unstoppable creatures composed of infinite possibility. On the other hand Vulkan leads a last crusade to finally end the thirty millenia-long battle between primarchs first instigated by Horus, although he is hopelessly outnumbered and fighting a foes capable of consuming causality. But all is not lost, for unexpected allies fly to his aid. The Reach is returning, but can even the two lost primarchs stop the coming storm?

The puppet Huron Blackheart stabs out in one last, desperate attempt to cling to his crude empire, even as it slowly slips away like sand between his fingers. He has brought his full strength to bear against Biel-Tan, the only Craftworld to defy the self-inflicted genocide. It has become a war of opposing extremes, the vile barbarity of the enslaved Tyrant and his Imperium against the impossible elegance of the few Eldar still left. Although the Eldar still fight with all the fury of a cornered beast, they are still one world against many, and inch by inch the last Eldar are forced to give ground. But Huron has not won yet. At the twilight of their species, a simple Bonesinger has taken up the mantle of Avatar, and now the primal fires of creation clash against entropy incarnate for the salvation of Biel-Tan.

Elsewhere, the Eldar God Khaine has risen once more. And with his return, the universe weeps, for he is a god of Murder, and as such demands blood be spilled in his name.

As for the rest of the galaxy, the news is far more dire. The Xenos empires of the galactic east and what petty Imperiums survived the past twenty thousand years have fallen, broken one by one by forces within and without that they could not hope to match. For the Masters of the Materium, the C'tan, have returned in full force, kept only in check by the returned Kork. Even against creatures literally built only for war, it is a conflict where C'tan victory is assured, so great is the strength of the stellar vampires. The only question is how long the Kork lines can hold, for when they break the galaxy will drown under an endless tide of cold steel. Even the Necrons, on the verge of regaining what was lost so very long ago, have been all but annihilated by a foe of their own making. It seems that in this galaxy, even immortals can die.

The millions that remain of these shattered worlds have collected into a massive fleet of the lost and the desperate. Their destination unknown, with only what decrepit ships they can fly and what little rotten food they can forage, the uncounted millions of refugees are led by Iacob, the seemingly last Good Man left in a galaxy of only hate and horror. Something has happened, however. The fleet has disappeared, with the last message sent being little more than a ship captain's strangled scream shrieking about how they found...something while wandering in the void.

But all is not yet lost, for some small sliver of hope still remains. Revelation, a being not yet born, forged of the Emperor's discarded Compassion for mankind, but for now only a mere concept, gathers his host from across the galaxy for some unknown purpose. He alone understands the nature of the Nex, and he alone can stop it. But the question remains: how? 

It is the 61st millennium, the time of new Gods, the end of old Wars, and the beginning of the end of Everything. All we can do is hope we survive, for hope is all we have left, screaming against the storm.
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