Editing The Tales of the Emperasque: Part Two (section)

==4-011-001-M42==
It’s mighty hard to keep a secret on a planet with a population of seventeen trillion. Try as you might, words pass around, and as the old adage goes, NOTHING travels faster than bad news.

And somehow, the Captain-General of the Adeptus Custodes throwing open the Eternity Gate and ordering two Titans to kill whatever’s inside draws attention.

11/1000s of the year had passed, and even the most adroit Administratum Adept had given up trying to contain the damage. Hundreds of pilgrims had noticed the commotion as they traveled the Path of the Sacred Pilgrimage to the Gate, and even the Custodes quietly imprisoning or liquefying the witnesses hadn’t contained the information fully. The entire planet was abuzz with the knowledge that something had gone UTTERLY wrong in the Hall of the Golden Throne. The Captain-General himself had already committed suicide by disembowelment, much to the horror of the rest of the High Lords. Now, they gathered to try and contain the situation before the entire Imperium Collapsed.


TRANSCRIPT APPENDED: SESSION OF THE HIGH LORDS, EMERGENCY GATHERING
DATE EXPUNGED BY ARBITES REPRESENTATIVE

ATTENDING (all representatives referred to by title):

Administratum Master

Lord High Inquisitor

Ecclesiarch

Fabricator-General

Grand Provost Marshal

Astronomican Master

Parternoval Envoy

Grand Master Assassinorum

Grand Master Telepath

Lord Commander Militant, Guard

Lord High Admiral, Navy

SUBSTITUTION: CHARTIST CAPTAIN for CAPTAIN-GENERAL


Ecclesiarch: Were the news not delivered by one of our own, and confirmed by his colleague, I would not believe it. Our Emperor is taken from us.

Grand Master Telepath: Master [of the Astronomican], is the holy light disturbed?

Master of the Astronomican: No. We are guided by His hand even in His absence. He must persist elsewhere.

Paternoval Envoy: Agreed. I am told my fellow Navigators can still see and hear the Astronomican.

Grand Master Telepath: One of my astropaths has informed me that he sensed an impossibly powerful Warp presence streaming for Cadia mere hours after the beast appeared in the Hall of the Throne. Mere hours after that, in turn, I am informed by a panicked astropath on Cadia itself that a massive Warp beast appeared in the parade ground of the kasr where the Lord Castellan was holding an emergency meeting. Then, less than a day later, a Force Recon sergeant sights Abbadon being crushed by an angry beast, who then spoke to the Sergeant as the Emperor.

Lord Commander Militant: I received an identical report. The Sergeant is in custody, while one of Creed’s sanctionites watches him for Warp contamination.

Fabricator-General: And this…beast. Did it fit the description of the one that appeared before the Custodes?

Grand Master Telepath: Perfectly.

<nowiki>*Mass consternation*</nowiki>

Inquisitor *faintly*: Why should it be true?

Chartist Captain: Pardon?

Inquisitor: Why should it be true? Why would our Holy Emperor bind himself to that…thing? 

<nowiki>*Silence for several seconds*</nowiki>

Grand Master Assassinorum: How does it matter? The more important question is not yet answered. Where is he?