Editing Icelus (section)

=Tales and Lore of Icelus=

==The First Men==

Sit down, boy, and listen! My father told me this story, and his father told him, and before that his father's father and his father's father's father, and so on until the very beginning of time. This story has been told for as long as our clan has been riding these rails.

Listen! The people in the hives say that the rails are here for their sake. But my ancestors know otherwise. Before the hives, there were the First Cities, and before the Imperium, there were the First Men. Our ancestors, boy.

Listen! The First Men came from the stars, to this world, Icelus, which means "Paradise" in an ancient tongue. How can anyone call such a place paradise, you ask? Well, a paradise it was, back then! A green and lush world, covered in deep forests and clear blue seas. And so the First Men settled here, and they were pleased.

But then came the Great Calamity, and the Star King decreed that no man should venture out into the stars again, and sealed the Void with tempests of fire and beasts and nightmares that dwell there even today. So the First Men remained on Icelus, surrounded by a terrible storm, and waited for the coming of the Star King. But as they waited, they forgot the old ways, and fell into despair. They wanted to return to the old life, but knew not how. While the last sparks of the old life died out, the Calamity from the stars came to Icelus. It poisoned the water and murdered the trees, it dried up the seas and filled the air with evil dust. And so our ancestors left the great cities to dwell in caves and roam the wilderness, never staying in one place too long, for to remain is to displease the Evening Mother, the Voice of the Star King.

Listen! Then the skies cleared again, and emissaries of the Star King returned. Changed were they, and changed we were also; and so, not understanding each other, we clashed in war. On the grounds where brothers bled in vain, the great hives were built. And the new children of Icelus looked around them, and knew nothing but the dust, and the wasteland, and the hives; and they believed that was all there ever was.

Listen! Don't believe what they do! For we are the children of the First Men, the Star King's chosen. We must remember that which was lost, for if we do not, no one else will. Pass this story on to your son, boy, for if you do not, He will not look kindly upon you.

- Rail nomad legend, recorded by Scrivener Anton Basjid. Investigation by Adeptus Administratum pending.

==The Nightmother's Breath==

An ashstorm blows against the sides of the thick leather yurt, its crevices sealed with a jelly made of chemical byproducts to keep out the fine sand and ash particles. The constant rushing and slithering of the dust against the yurt wraps itself intimately around the old man's story, his arms hugging two small children tight to his sides as they stare at their family's history etched into the cured leather walls.

"Long ago, before the Star King closed the Veil of heaven to us, our people lived in great cities open to the sweet air with the ancestors of the Hive Born. We lived together in peace; trading and farming outside the great walls. 

But the Star King saw fit to draw closed the Veil of Heaven, and our peoples fell into despair. Lamenting our fate, we blamed each other, and after much strife, we, the Children of the Plains, struck out from the great cities, through the withering forests, into the dead plains. The Walldwellers closed themselves in, and became hostile, attacking us when we came close, startled at our lean and ferocious appearance. We skirmished for years unending as our great world died of our sorrow, her lakes and oceans disappearing as the Night Mother cried to the stars.

The Walldwellers became angry with our ways and our fighting, believing it was us who departed from tradition and killed the old ways. They set out to destroy us, and left their walls in our pursuit. Though we were valorous, they were many, and our people suffered greatly. After one and a thousand years, the Night Mother's eyes were dry from weeping, and she looked with clarity upon her Earthbound Children. Seeing us flee into the Ash Plains with only our lives, she breathed deep and in exhaling, brewed great storms all across the surface, obscuring us from our pursuers. Baffled and blinded by the dust stinging their eyes, The Walldwellers retreated to their cities and hid; built themselves in as to shelter themselves from the Nightmother's Breath.

That is why we do not fear the ashstorms, young ones; they are the Nightmother's kind blessing. We thank her for her veil, and for our lives."

The old man lifts a small metal bowl with a close-fitting top. Ornate etchings cover its surface, and a small hole is drilled in the top to allow incense smoke to pour forth. It is much like the one atop their yurt, wafting smoky supplication to the Nightmother.

==Icelus local parlance: a few expressions specific to the planet.==

1. "Flower Child" - a child whose cunning and strength makes him a natural candidate for induction in the Nightmares.

2. "Keep to the rails" - stick to the established plan; don't do anything stupid, don't panic; don't stick out of the crowd. Example: "Just keep to the rails and this heist will go off as planned. Trust me, the guards won't be here for 15 more minutes."

3. "Purple Express" - used for someone having an unfair advantage. Example: "Mashilu must be the supervisor's pet. Now she's riding the Purple Express in Administration while we're stuck on the manufactorum floor with the servitors."