Silently, they gathered.
On the edge of a dead world, purged of life millions of years before, their ships assembled, coming together in a rare show of force.
They did not choose this path. For beings of power, the notion that they had been forced to gather was not novel – it was frightening.
Long dead for millions of years, their culture was now resurgent and rising, as countless Tomb Worlds woke from the Great Sleep and began their conquests anew.
Their people were dead, clad in silvery bodies of metal and necrodermis, but though they appeared emotionless, they were still capable of fear.
But these Necrons were not normal – that is, if a race of sixty million year-old skeletons could ever be called 'normal.'
These particular Necrons were from a thousand different Dynasties stretching across the galaxy, and each was adept in the usage of their highly advanced technology.
Once wary of each other's presence and notoriously reclusive, changing times had altered their fortunes.
For some, those words were merely metaphorical, but for the chronomancers of the Necron, they were quite literal.
The world was dead. It had been for a long time, ever since it had been bombed during the War in the Heavens, leaving its surface cratered and barren.
The great hive spires of the planet's original insectoid inhabitants had been reduced to rubble after a Cryptek had dropped a small moon on the planet to intimidate the inhabitants, and instead succeeded in wiping them out.
In the time since, the ceaseless assault of harsh winds and tectonic movement had reduced the rubble into a fine sand-like powder, which covered the entire planet in dunes.
The chronomancers had been drawn to this nameless planet, seeking the source of a mysterious signal that echoed across the void of time.
At first, the signal had been nothing more than a curiosity, something for the chronomancer to note and then discard. But slowly, the signal had grown from a curiosity to a nuisance.
The first time the signal blocked them, every chronomancer had the same reaction: utter confusion.
They were locked out of the Void of Time; rendered completely unable of activating a time-travel device.
Diagnostics were performed; prophets consulted, but all efforts to remove the overriding signal failed.
Then, after a long terrifying period of powerlessness, the signal broadcast a set of coordinates, and a message.
HURRY UP, NOW, I HAVEN'T GOT ALL DAY.
Ranks of ornamented Necrons gathered on the planets surface, descending alone to the empty sands where the signal awaited them.
They exchanged greetings with terse bursts of the Necrontyr tongue, and stood no closer than necessary. They were not colleagues or friends, they were rivals – each one of them longed to be the only one with the power to manipulate time.
Wind howled between the silver and golden frames, rattling clinking jewelry and jamming sand into the grooves of the skeletons as they slowly stalked forward, marching ever closer to the signal.
"Oh good, you lot finally decided to show up!" a human voice called out, high-pitched yet boldly arrogant. "Took your sweet time arriving, I see."
Hollow eyes scanned the horizon, as the mass of Necrons stopped, searching for the source of the noise. A wide assortment of bladed weaponry rose threateningly, glowing with a sinister shade of green light.
"Behind you, you great big bloody skeletons."
Turning sluggishly in the loose and quickly shifting sand, the assembled chronomancers beheld a lone human man, who was leaning on a large blue box.
Suspicious, many of the chronomancers checked their secure internal memory banks, unsure of how they could have missed the only object in sight.
"Come on now, isn't anyone going to say hello?"
In response, the great astromancer/chronomancer Orikan stepped forward, loosing a blast from his Gauss Flayer directly at the man. A half-moment afterwards, the others followed suit, shooting off enough firepower to annihilate an Imperial Titan.
All of which dissipated harmlessly as it impacted an invisible shield, splashing around the man and his box.
"That was rude," the Man said, adjusting his cylindrical red hat as he glared at the Necrons. "Shoot first, ask questions never? Even the Judoon had more courtesy than that."
"Who are you?" demanded Sukleiman, the chronomancer of the Harsicis Dynasty.
"Well, now that's more like it!" the Man cried out, smiling broadly. "At least one of you has manners."
The Man stepped away from his box, ran his thumbs down the edge of his suspenders, and then straightened his archaic bow tie.
Dimly, high up in the sky, there came a bright light. It stood out, stark despite the midday sun.
And then another bright light, and another, and another, as one by one, the ships that had carried the Necron detonated up in space like fireworks on Christmas.
"Now… do I have your attention?"
The Man took a single step forward, and stuffed his hands in the pockets of his thick wooly pants.
"Who am I? A good question, so I'll give you a good answer – I'm the one who watches Time.
"You lot, you act like you're the only ones in the universe who can touch the raw fabric of the universe; so you use it to kill and maim and slaughter your way across this galaxy.
"Did you think that you were alone? That no one else could figure out basic temporal engineering? There have been dozens, no, hundreds of other species who have figured it out.
"Some of them are kind, peaceful, gentle… so I leave them be.
"Why do you think the first chronomancer forbid travelling too far? Because he was afraid? You're Necrons, you don't feel fear… so why?
"Well, I'll tell you why. Because when that oversized can-opener popped his head forward, he ran right into some particularly angry life forms.
"For their part, I can understand why the Daleks didn't like him. Something that acted like them but looked like a Cyberman – I bet they didn't like that notion. Generally, they don't like imitators – not that they like anyone, that is.
"Still, I never figured out why they sent back his head, though. The Daleks don't give out warnings, and they could have easily popped back in time to eradicate you. My guess is, they had bigger fish to fry.
"So let me just put this all into pro-portion for you.
"Basically, I'm the not happy with the way you're abusing time. You call it the Void of Time, but that's only scratching the surface – Time isn't a Void, it's a Vortex, and you've only managed to touch the calm before the Storm.
"The 'Harbingers of Eternity', you call yourselves. What, just because you've been around for a while, you think you're old?
"It's not the years, it's the mileage.
"You've been asleep for sixty million years, so you've missed quite a bit, sadly. The First, Second, and Third Great and Bountiful Human Empires have all came and gone, and in a few more centuries, we'll be looking at the Fourth.
"Oh, you can put those silly. little. guns. down.
"Do you think, because I'm unarmed, I can't defend myself?
"I don't carry a weapon because I don't like weapons – nasty, horrible things that they are. But after all the sticky situations I've wound up in, I still don't carry one.
"…You want to know why?
"Because I don't need one.
"Take a look around. No, really, look around! Just because it's all sand and dust now doesn't mean it'll always be so gloomy.
"I mean, you don't even know the name of this planet!
"Of course, a place has many names, just like how a man can have many titles, but to the locals – that is, the locals in a couple million years – this place just has one.
"Welcome, oh proud Necrontyr, to Arrakis.
"Say hi to the locals for me!"