The ship moves
The Ship is the Imperium.
The Imperium is the Ship.
The Ship is the Emperor.
The Emperor is the Ship.
All is the Ship.
The Ship is All.
The Ship Moves.
Yet another variation on the future of Warhammer 40K created by the Anons of /tg/.
In the not too distant future of 40K, the Imperium's borders have shrunk, devastated by wars, disease and famine. For a brief, shining moment, the Emperor awakes upon His Golden Throne and orders the construction of a massive ship, its keel 1AU in length. What remains of the Imperium is stripped to build The Ship, with Holy Terra itself hollowed out and fitted with massive cogitators and command system, the Imperial Palace itself becoming the bridge. All that is left of humanity is brought aboard this ark of civilization. Here humankind lives and dies in the bowels of its massive holds, whole world's worth of people living in single compartments. The combined psychic presence of humanity lies under the aegis of the God-Emperor's power, thwarting Chaos. Only the God-Emperor, now the God-Captain, knows where The Ship is going.
In other words, it's just battlestar galactica reworked for the Warhammer 40k setting.
Notes
In a recent thread (Part 6) Some new lore was added to the fray.
1.) Mankind IS working with Xenos scum, under direct orders from the God-Captain. (Eldar, Tau and Necron and a small fraction of Dark Eldar)
2.) After much, much, debate it was decided that Human-Xeno inter-personal relationships would be officially decriminalized. However it is greatly frowned upon and only encountered deep into the Grey Areas of The Ship.
3.) All Space Marine Gene-seeds have been slightly modified so that the God-Captains Angels of Death might produce human offspring in the more traditional sense. They are also given sanction to start families as a means of keeping them psychologically grounded given the relative rarity of large scale wars. They still have other duties to attend to. (Example: The Blood Ravens chapter now works as the Guardians for the Vault of Mankind, where all Holy Relics are stored for safekeeping until Journey's End.)
4.) EVERYTHING must be recycled.
5.) Xenos we are NOT allied with are on the Ship and still pose a threat, those being mostly Orks and Tyranids.
6.) Those left behind will be forever remembered as the Captain's finest.
Components and Location of note within The Ship
The Big Bang Bottles
A construction of a strange alien science. First envisioned by their creator as a source of inexhaustible, clean and efficient agony that could revolutionize the Dark City. A universe would be created in a contained environment, sped up until life inside was advanced enough to feel pain and then they could just live off of the collective suffering without the need for all that messy slave raiding. Sadly by the time the project started bearing fruit the denizens of the Dark City had decided that they quite like all that slave raiding. To make matters worse it seemed that none of the universes created were complex enough to allow life to develop. The only thing they were good for was the high energy output once they got started. Sadly they were expensive to build and start, took up a lot of space and the Dark City already had more reliable sources of energy.
Rehabilitated Dark Eldar wishing to start again in another galaxy bartered passage on The Ship in exchange for building a few of them to power The Ship. Each required a small star to warm up but once started worked perfectly.
Big Bang Bottle is almost certainly not their real name but nobody really cares.
The Dyson Spheres
A vast series of colossal and arcane pillars that seem to suddenly cease to exist at a certain height. Observers state that they feel the columns continue on, as their eyes tell them they cease. In reality, these pillars do continue on much further, extending through stabilised warp rifts, into the warp itself. At the peak of every Pillar sits a captive star, encased within a Dyson sphere. These are used alongside the Big Bang Bottles to supply the unfathomable demand for power that the ship ever requires.
Infinity Circuit
The largest single component of The Ship and the most massive single piece of psyco-plastic ever made in the history of the galaxy. It stretches from one end of The Ship to the other in a great web. The nodes where strands merge and mingle were often former Craftworlds that were incorporated into The Ships construction. The Infinity Circuit houses the collective dead of the eldar, their sleeping God of Death and also acts as a deamon deterrent as it did for the Craftworld. It is also used as the ships inter-com although use is restricted to the God-Captain, the Captain's Council and occasionally the Inquisition unless there is some sort of emergency that threatens The Ship as a whole.
Warp Proofing
Billions of Gellar Field generators, the Infinity Circuit, masses of Cadian Pylons and the presence of the Never-dying God-Captain. Further more the ship only skims the surface of the warp in the manner of the Tau ships of yesteryear and the wake it creates tends to mutilate and deflect all but the most terrible of daemons.
Matter Forges
The vast musical workshops of the Bone Singers. They sing into existence raw material from pure nothingness. It offsets the lost material in the not 100% efficient recycling. The fresh matter is then handed over to the Forge-shrines of the mechanicus to be consecrated and purified before being made into spare parts.
Ark Vaults
The sovereign domain of the Adeptus Biologis. It is their sacred duty to preserve the seeds of the Old Galaxy so that once they arrive at Journey's End they may terraform dead worlds and have the Imperium live again as it should have been.
The Helmsman's Throne
The throne upon which the God-Captain sits as he guides The Ship through the inky black. Was once known as the Golden Throne in an age long since past.
The Space Hulk Cloud
As The Ship travels through the warp, the massive amount of turbulence it generates sweeps up thousands upon thousands of space hulks, forming what looks like a cloud of dust around The Ship.
Xenos of The Ship
Tau
- They, and their vassal peoples, were given passage upon The Ship for their technical expertise. Without them it is doubtful that the millions of warp-drives upon The Ship would have been synchronized through the Infinity Circuit successfully. For this, as well as the services of their repair and maintenance teams, they are tolerated.
- Their numbers even when combined with their vassal peoples is, when compared to the teeming masses of humanity, very low.
Eldar
- Early on in the ships design it became abundantly clear that even if the entire Imperium was stripped down and used in the construction of The Ship it would not be enough. They needed a means of generating building material on site. Sadly the only people that the Imperium knew of who could do this were the Eldar. For this reason, and their continued supply of fresh repair material, the Eldar are tolerated.
Dark Eldar
- Early on in The Ships construction a band of Dark Eldar brought forth the designs for the Big Bang Bottles. After these were incorporated into the design they were, reluctantly, granted a place aboard The Ship. Thankfully most Imperial Citizens can't tell the difference between them and the Craftworlders. Sadly the Craftworlders can and the two do not like each other at all. It is unsure how many of them are on board as they keep to their Enclaves around the Bottles and do not suffer visitors gladly.
Necrons
- Unlike the Tau and Eldar their existence has not been made known to the general public. When it became abundantly clear to them that their Empire was never going to arise from the ashes in a galaxy desolated by all out war between Orks, Chaos and Tyranids many of them bartered passage in exchange for inertia and momentum manipulation technology. These technological marvels allowed The Ship a much more rapid acceleration and departure. They are also responsible for the Cadian Pylons scattered about The Ship. Many of them, to pass the time, perform maintenance duties in places where the living can not go.
- Their dwelling places, although not off limits to the public, tend to be in the irradiated areas of the ships as they like their privacy.
- When asked about them the Mechanicus maintain that they are just highly upgraded tech-adepts.
Orks
- Managed to infiltrate The Ship almost certainly as spores. Tend to be found in the many vast uninhabited areas of The Ship. They range from undernourished sickly things barely better than weedy feral grots to fully fledged, battle ready orks with looted weapons or weapons built from scrap stolen from The Ship. Although no WAAAAAAGH!!! has ever threatened the integrity of the colossal vessel, they have proved difficult to remove entierly.
Tyranids
- Gene-Stealer cultists got on board along with many other refugees. In the fraught time of departure there was not enough time to gene-scan everyone and within a few hundred years pure-strains were spawning in the Unmarked Regions. Thankfully their psychic beacon can't penetrate the interference of warp wake. The task still stands that they must be exterminated before Journey's End lest they draw the Tyranids to the New Galaxy before the Imperium Reborn can have chance to get ready for them
- There are other, more feral, bio-forms on The Ship also. Various variations of Lictors and other stealthy ambush hunters crept aboard possibly during construction. They are feral things that have long since gone native. Whether this is because they can't hear the song of the Hive is unknown. Often found as pets and war-beasts kept by the Gene-Stealers.
Others
- The Hrud are on board. Nobody knows how.
- The Umbra have taken up residence near many of the warp drives. They don't seem to do anything if you leave them alone.
- Lacrymole and Simulacra are, sadly, probably on board somewhere given their ability to disguise themselves as human.
The Primarchs
Several of the Primarchs are on board the Ship.
- Leman Russ, Jaghatai Khan, Corvus Corax, and Vulkan came forth from the Warp during the construction of the Ship to help lead Mankind in its retreat into the Ship. The fours roles are unknown, although it is said that Leman Russ leads his Wolves to defend the civilian populace from all possible threats.
- After Mankind allied it self with the Eldar, they used their Xeno magics to heal the Primarch Roboute Guilliman. Although their magics could only do so much, his body is brittle and worn, leaving him only able to command, never battle. He helps manage life aboard this Ship so it isn't total anarchy.
- Sanguinius, although killed at the hands of Horus, was reborn as The Sanguinor. His position on the ship is unknown at this time. Although it is believed he helps keep the Xenos in line.
- Rogal Dorn, as it turns out, faked his death so that he may take control over the Adeptus Custodes, and now commands the defence of the Hull with the remnants of the Imperial Fists that did not stay behind to defend the Ship as it departed.
- There is a legend among the people of the Cargo bays that two figures came aboard the Ship just before its launch and have remained there ever since. No one has ever gotten a good look at either of them, but accounts all say that one of the two always says 'Hydra Dominatus' before vanishing. In their wake there is always a game of Chess that ended in a stalemate. This is all legend of course, something that is told to new recruits of the Cargo Bay guardsmen to spook them.
- There is also a very interesting legend among the civilians of the Maintenance crews, who work closely with the Iron Hands chapter, that their Primarchs skull was recovered shortly before the launch, and they are now using mysterious Necron, Eldar, and Tau machines to restore him to life... again, this is nothing more then a legend.
- Lastly, there is Lion El'Jonson, who was awoken at the same time as the Emperor to help defend the construction of the Ship. He now leads the Dark Angels to fight any Heretics that might be found on board, what little there are that is.
- Of the Traitor Primarchs, only one's fate is known for certain. Angron sits outside the ship, beating on the hull in a futile display of rage.