Editing End Times (Warhammer 40,000) (section)

==Part 4==
“I think we're in the Gothic sector, my Lords. The stars seem to match what I remember,” said a Space Marine, one of the – what were they called? The Blood Ravens.

“When were you in the Gothic Sector, Sargent Tarkus?” said the young Force Commander who led his small band of penitent crusaders.

“I served briefly alongside the Angels of Redemption chapter there,” said the veteran Sargent.

“And you returned with a squad's worth of heavy bolters, if I recall,” rumbled an ancient Dreadnaught that served alongside them.

“The Angels of Redemption are quite generous with gifts, Captain Thule,” Tarkus replied.

Corax smiled. He knew they weren't a successor chapter from his Legion, but they had attached themselves to him nevertheless. He wondered who's they were – they said they had no idea, although the Dreadnought appeared to know something. “That's all well and good, but how are we going to get off this half-cursed planet?”

His brother, the Khan, raised an armored fist to the sky. “That's how.”

Above them in the void a battle raged. The Imperial Gothic Fleet kept close watch over the Arx Gate – after all, this unreliable entrance into the Eye of Terror was one of the possible launching points for a Black Crusade. As such, when the world they were on had transitioned to the Materium, along with the Chaos Fleet in orbit, the Imperium was ready for them.

Getting to the Arx gate had been no easy task, and had sapped their numbers badly. The Primarchs formed the nucleus of an ever-shifting band of Adeptus Astartes, most of them on some form of penitent crusade, some few captives of Chaos that had not yet been turned. When they learned of the Arx gate, about five hundred years earlier, they had set out to find it. Getting through the traitor legions near Cadia was simply impossible, so they needed another exit.

“I'm picking up their vox signal,” said another Astartes, this one a member of a Dark Angels successor chapter, who had one of the few functioning long range vox units left. “My Lord Primarchs, I can patch you through.”

“I'll take care of it,” said Vulkan. Without him, they all would have run out of equipment and perished long ago. It was he who managed to take what little they could scavenge and recover from within the Eye and make it safe to use again, as well as maintain what precious little they already had. He began conversing with the Admiral in charge of the action above, and after a short while convinced him of their sincerity.

Soon enough, the battle above became a rout, and as the Chaos fleet fled back into the Eye, shuttles descended to recover the long-lost Space Marines.

The Emperor paced in front of the Golden Throne. No one had dared touch his – her? - the Emperor wasn't sure which pronoun to use – previous body, despite it being nothing more than an empty shell. She knew why that was – it was a relic to the people of the 42nd millennium. What she didn't know was what Horus was up to. Why was he not launching a full assault upon the Imperium? He had to some idea of how thin their defenses were – indeed, when the Emperor was informed of precisely how thin they were she – the Emperor decided on she, for simplicities sake and to differentiate this body from the previous – had realized a fast strike could have quickly sealed near certain victory for her traitorous son.

The Emperor knew true fear for the first time in her existence. Horus had done what she long suspected he could do, if he ever returned: Ascend beyond the machinations of the Chaos Gods to become one himself. They had poured too much power into him, distrusting each other as they did, each trying to gain total control and prevent the other three from doing the same. He was a god now, just as the Emperor was forced to acknowledge she was and had always been.

Lorgar. Poor, wise Lorgar. The Emperor had hoped to stamp out belief and thereby stamp out the temptations of Chaos in the Imperium, but Lorgar knew what the Emperor had fooled herself into denying back then: Humanity was a species that needed something to believe in, because without it they would surely fall into despair and Chaos in the grim futility of existence in this age. Humanity believed in her, and she owed it to them to reward their faith.

She could feel the immense weight of Horus' god-hood in the Warp. He required no belief to be a god, just as she did not. They simply were, and to understand what that meant was to understand the magnitude of the struggle ahead.