Editing Nobledark Imperium Writing (section)

== The Dead Walking ==

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I visited [[Nobledark_Imperium_Notable_Planets#Iyanden|Iyanden]] in my youth, the first visit is a memory that stands out more than most and I still remember it vividly despite the many years and strange things seen since in service to Her Majesties Inquisition. My life up until that point had been a small one; I was young, only having past the age of majority a year prior and having spent most of that time in the Eldar Enclaves of Corvus Majoris hives. The journey was my first interstellar voyage, indeed my first trip out of a gravity well and despite my initial excitement the three month voyage in the “economy deck” proved to be less than pleasant. My dear father told me that under ideal circumstances we would have travelled via the webway but for the scarcity of guides, it would be many years later I would understand the events that were taking up their attention at that time.

But that is another and someone else’s story.

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I walked in a daze from the space port, my parents unconcerned with my safety in this place, and found myself leaning on a rail overlooking what I assumed would be some sort of sports arena or parkland only to find myself above a gaping void miles deep and a city made tiny by distance. It was then that I realized the bustling metropolis I had been wandering through was a balcony of tourist shops selling trinkets to backwater rubes with stars in their eyes and pockets full of rare earths, myself very much counted among that number.

I couldn’t grasp the scale of it, the grandeur of it. Sounds of billions of my kind going about their business at once a deafening roar and a persistent gentle whisper. The hive of Awauwell Principa I had spent my life and thought massive beyond compare was but a foothill to this mountain. I couldn’t guess what the population would be. And then I remembered the view from the ship on approach and looked up into the apex of the dome where a veritable fleet of ships hung against the fathomless speckled black. This was just one dome. I had seen many. A tear ran down my cheek as I gazed in awe and the legacy of my people truly, for the first time, sank in. And the knowledge of old history lessons sank in. This would be the least of our accomplishments compared to the great and terrible things before The Fall. How like gods we must have been, how my people must have fallen.

But there were more than just my people here. There were throngs of humans, many wearing garb of navy men, Void Born tall as eldar and pale as ghosts, clusters of tau scurrying hastily from one undoubtedly important task to another, a glittering demiurg accompanied by what looked like a large clockwork spider and other thing, other people, I had seen only in curiosity books and some utterly alien.

I walked in a daze from the space port, my parents unconcerned with my safety in this place, and found myself leaning on a rail overlooking what I assumed would be some sort of sports arena or parkland only to find myself above a gaping void miles deep and a city made tiny by distance. It was then that I realized the bustling metropolis I had been wandering through was a balcony of tourist shops selling trinkets to backwater rubes with stars in their eyes and pockets full of rare earths, myself very much counted among that number.

I couldn’t grasp the scale of it, the grandeur of it. Sounds of billions of my kind going about their business at once a deafening roar and a persistent gentle whisper. The hive of Awauwell Principa I had spent my life and thought massive beyond compare was but a foothill to this mountain. I couldn’t guess what the population would be. And then I remembered the view from the ship on approach and looked up into the apex of the dome where a veritable fleet of ships hung against the fathomless speckled black. This was just one dome. I had seen many. A tear ran down my cheek as I gazed in awe and the legacy of my people truly, for the first time, sank in. And the knowledge of old history lessons sank in. This would be the least of our accomplishments compared to the great and terrible things before The Fall. How like gods we must have been, how my people must have fallen.

But there were more than just my people here. There were throngs of humans, many wearing garb of navy men, Void Born tall as eldar and pale as ghosts, clusters of tau scurrying hastily from one undoubtedly important task to another, a glittering demiurg accompanied by what looked like a large clockwork spider and other thing, other people, I had seen only in curiosity books and some utterly alien.

And then I saw them. The Dead Walking, the Wraithguard. They stood head and shoulders above the crowd like icebergs in a careless sea, each holding with casual and well-practiced ease a weapon that could cripple a tank and there were so many of them. How serene they looked, how timeless and wise beyond mortal years. In death they still served and were glad to serve, on Iyanden the dead lived among the living and would suffer no harm to them. On Iyanden the dead walked and offered their hard won wisdom freely to all who would listen, Death was the ultimate leveller and none in it’s embrace was high and mighty but also none were low and unloved.

I was young in those days, young and brash and not particularly wise. There were other things I wanted to do on this visit more than listen to the wisest of our elders. I wanted to see the great shipyards where the fleets were built and maintained, I wanted to watch the Aspect Warriors hone their skills, I wanted to witness a Harlequin performance and relive a day from legend and, being very young, I wanted to visit a Temple of Isha and partake in a ritual with a Disciple of the All-Mother. In time my blood would cool with age and I would become less of an idiot, despite what several of my colleagues will claim to the contrary. In time I again visited fair and grand Iyanden and often I would talk to the dead. They were, for the most part, happy to share their stories and their wisdom and I have in the many years since those carefree days profited greatly from their experiences. Certainly were it not for their advice I would probably have been killed several times in my duties by now.

When I die, and if I may, I would like to have my soul taken to wondrous Iyanden that I might walk again in death and share what I have learned with young fools that they might live to grow into less foolish ways.

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