Ghost Ship
The Herald of Krieg, the very mention of the name sent a chill up crewman Larkin's spine. He thought the ship didn't exist, or ceased to for hundreds of years. But here it was, casting a colossal shadow over his ship The Eternal Star. The sheer size of the ship amazed him; he was surprised it didn't run into something sooner or later. "How can something so huge be lost for so long?" he thought.
The floor of the transport vibrated as they flew towards the silent giant. The light of illumination orbs dimly faded in and out of intensity, struggling to light up the forms of the men inside. Four boarding ships were dispatched and Larkin, being a veteran 'wreck walker', was one of the first men chosen. This wasn't his first salvage mission but this mission was different. Since it's discovery their ship had been quiet. The usual rabble of starving crew and overworked laborers had ceased. The ship's Tech-Priest Majoris and the ship's Ecclesiarchy representative, the Confessor, joined him on his transport. It felt odd considering that the two beliefs were constantly clashing onboard the vessel but there they were, both smiling as they had walked shoulder to shoulder onto the transport. There were twenty Armsmen, including Larkin, packed tightly together sitting and squirming on the benches flanking the length of the transport, a crammed fit with all twenty in vacuum suits. The suits were bulky to say the least, a large helmet that bolted onto the breastplate and suit by a metal collar and weighted boots to keep users grounded in places with less gravity. The design hadn't changed in millennia, bearing more resemblance to what divers would wear in the depths of an ocean than space salvage. The two priests sat near the front of the craft, with about a meter's worth of space separating them from the rest of the passengers. Larkin gripped his shotgun and leaned forward to gaze out the front viewport at the oncoming shape in front of him. It looked like flying into nothing, just a vast dark form, blending into the expanse of endless space. The corroded guns, thousands of them, aimed outward into the void of space, waiting at the ready. The shuttle shuddered and rattled as it flew alongside the hulk, looking for an airlock. All commotion in the compartment ended as the craft jolted to a stop and prepared for boarding.
He lifted his heavy boots off the inside of the transport and onto the floor of the hulk, creating a dull thud that echoed for minutes. He turned and signaled to his men, "Lamps on"; twenty beams of light scanned the walls of the vessel. The priests silently yet eagerly examined the room with a mixture of joy, awe, and fear. They had docked in a corridor that seemed to stretch on to infinity. The priests gave the order to split up into smaller groups of five and to keep in constant vox communication, they stressed that nothing should go unreported. Larkin felt they knew something he didn't.
The innards of the ship went on forever. They passed through large clusters of corridors with several intersections; Larkin straggled at the end of the line, covering the rear of the procession. Warped panels stuck out from the walls and thousands upon thousands of perfectly clear icicles descended from the ceiling, perpetually frozen water vapor. He gazed up and down the halls, not letting any detail escape him through the thick glass of his helmet. Then he froze. "There was no way. It was impossible." He couldn't get the image out of his head. A head, he had seen it. Not just a head, but the whole upper torso too. He had seen the dark figure take a few steps then immediately turn into another hall before his eyes could focus. "No one can survive in here, there's thousands of breaches, the whole ship had lost pressurization thousands of years ago" he thought. He focused his lamp down the corridor, and then cautiously left to catch up with the rest of the team. He had no intention of telling either priest what he had seen; he was in no mood for a field execution, or leaving his body on the rusting hulk, left to drift in space forever. They made their way past the broadside guns, large and numerous enough to mount on hundreds of titans. They passed the recreational center, or what was intended to be. The Krieg soldiers had no need for recreation, and instead outfitted the chamber as an additional training facility, the targets and instruments well worn from frequent use. Then they turned into the chapel, the religious center of the ship. More like a cathedral with rich red drapes which hung from a vaulting dome above their heads. Imperial Aquila's glittered in the rays of the lamps, and gilded skulls lined the walls. Unlike the rest of the chambers, the chapel was entirely intact, not a spot of rust, wear, or ruin anywhere.
"Incredible" whispered the cleric, "The place is immaculately preserved."
"Yes, hopefully the ancient tech here shares the same fate," replied the tech-priest, pocketing small, sealed vial containing what looked like a fragment of bone from a pedestal.
"Surely you can't be serious?" asked the cleric as he turned just slow enough for the priest to conceal his trinket, "This ship is thousands of years old, it's a relic of the Great Crusade and the Krieg Civil War, and all you can think about is finding an old piece of scrap for your collection."
"How dare you accuse me of such selfishness, and we do not collect scrap, we rediscover ancient artifacts of unfathomable importance." Snapped the priest, mindful not to let the vial fall out.
"I'm sure you've heard stories about the Herald?" asked the cleric as he examined some of the religious instruments.
"Stories? You mean myths? Things that don't exist? Please enlighten me."
The cleric, calm and ignoring the priests ridiculing continued,
"Through my years as a ship's confessor, I've heard things. Stories told by concerned crew whenever a ship is salvaged. I've heard rumors, detailed rumors, about vessels that disappeared along with their crew; no one ever knew where they went or what happened to them. Even worse are were the legends concerning the Herald, myths of the ship suddenly appearing to heroically destroy a xenos fleet then vanishing without a trace, or mercilessly annihilating mutinous ships along with their rebellious crews. Some say it's sent by the Emperor's Spirit to discipline His fleets through the unbreakable will of the men of Krieg. Other's claim it's a sign of impending death."
The priest paused for a second, recalling how he had heard lore of these kinds of "haunted tech" on manufactorum worlds, but he collected his thoughts and tried to push the thought out of his head,
"Rumors? You're basing your superstitions on what some drunken crewman told you? You'll have to try harder if you want to scare me!"
"Believe what you will tech-priest but there are facts aboard this ship. Over 750,000 servants of The Emperor were lost when this ship first disappeared shortly after the triumph of loyalist forces. Men who had survived hundreds of years of relentless nuclear purging, whose fathers had sacrificed entire families in His name, whose will was that of The Emperor and whose determination rivals that of the Astartes. Where others fled in fear the men of Krieg charged forward. The Imperium lost two things that day, an ancient battleship and thousands of loyal souls. The ship has been found, but the men will never be found, nor will they ever be replaced."
Larkin had blocked out the incessant bickering of the two priests and studied the golden cloister high above the ceremonial floor when he saw it again. In between the intervals of decorative skulls stood one that did not belong. A masked face with a skull motif stared out of partial darkness. Larkin turned to see what it was looking at and when he turned back it was gone. That's when he noticed; one of the relics was missing.
The orbs of the chandelier surged with energy and exploded, a tremendous roar of warping metal echoed throughout the whole of the ship, and the deck began to vibrate at regular intervals. The sounds of men, marching in the thousands thundered in the corridors, and the screams of countless tormented souls rang in their helmets. The tech priest immediately ran into one of the passages, terrified. Several of the Armsmen dropped their weapons and knelt down next to the cleric, who had taken up position at the altar dispensing blessings to The Emperor to save them from the unknown force. Larkin followed the tech-priest, protecting him was his main priority. His boots clunked on the deck as he sprinted down the halls, trying to catch up to the priest. The vox channels were bombarded with panicked crewmen wanting answers and reporting similar occurrences all over the ship. He stumbled down a corridor and was stopped by a dented blast door blocking his path. The deafening rumble grew faster and faster behind him. He turned to face his incoming fears as they turned the corner and silence filled the hall. Panting, he frantically moved his lamp back and forth, scanning the walls for whatever had been chasing him. Calming down he turned back to the door. Hundreds of faces were staring at him. The door had vanished behind the gruesome forms of masked soldiers; their uniforms tattered with bullet wounds and soaked in blood where entire chunks of flesh had gone missing. They grasped in their withered hands, rusted lasguns and shotguns with dripping bayonets equipped, and pointed at him. Larkin dropped his gun and ran as fast as his legs could go. The thunderous sound of marching picked up again and followed him through the gloomy passageways. He made multiple twists and maneuvers in an attempt to lose them but they pursued him with incredible persistence and agility. The icicles on in this sector of the ship had grown so long that they reached the deck, forming pillars and bars of thick ice. Larkin desperately crawled through and around them as the marching roared on. The corridor shook in rhythm with what seemed to be one monstrous step after another. He heard a faint banging up ahead, and against his better judgment he headed straight for it. He wanted to face them head on. He ran full speed into the tech-priest who was urgently trying to knock down a blast door with a piece of piping, and paid him no mind. They turned into the corridor charging with their bayonets trained on them. The priest dropped the pipe, his face frozen in fear. Larkin's skull vibrated in his head as his world shook around him. He wished he hadn't dropped his gun.
He felt nothing as they enveloped them.
They had passed straight through him, leaving him unharmed, but quite a bit colder. But the tech-priest had disappeared, silence returned to the ship save for a faint thud behind the door. He struggled with the door's rune panel with no success. So focused was he, that he didn't notice the figure behind him. Larkin nearly passed out from exhaustion and surprise, the spectral soldier looked at him, then the door, then back again. Larkin nervously watched as it calmly walked through the door in total silence. He heard a small collection of ancient gears slowly coming to life as the door opened smoothly. He cautiously walked in and tripped on a metal fixture. His lamp shattered upon impact, leaving him in total darkness. He felt his way in the dark when his hand hit something hard and hollow. It was large, metal, fingers…a gauntlet, like his own, but much larger. As he felt around a dim red light emanated from the far corner of the room. He noticed that the light grew and diminished depending on the positioning of his hand. He moved left, dimmer, he felt higher up, and the light got brighter. As he continued the pattern more lights appeared all around him, he felt a thin tube and grasped it. The room was immediately bathed in red light, shining from what appeared to be hundreds of sources. Larkin shielded his eyes as he stood up with the tube. The light dissipated a little and revealed what he had taken. He clutched a small vial with bits of marrow and cloth sealed within. He looked down at the priest's empty suit of power armor that lay in the middle of the floor. He saw no trace of the priest but made out multiple figures around him as the light subsided. The same grotesque soldiers stood around him, red orbs of light radiating from the hearts of their semi-transparent forms. Suddenly Larkin realized the significance of the vial and was guided back to the chapel by the ethereal army. He found the cleric and his men cowering in the corner at the sight of the monsters. Larkin walked over to the pedestal and carefully placed the vial in its rightful place. A creature approached him, saluted him, and extended its hand to him. Not thinking, Larkin accepted the gesture. Instantly the chamber was lit up with candles and smelt slightly of incense. The gloomy altar gleamed in the light, with a masked cleric presenting the same vial he returned to the congregation. He turned to see what had once been an army of monsters was now a gathering of thousands of tidy, masked, and very much alive men of Krieg. They all bowed their heads in silence at the sight of the relic. Larkin blinked and they were gone. The room returned to its dark, abandoned, state. It didn't take much for Larkin to convince the petrified crew to leave and return to their ship. He called back the rest of the salvage parties and ordered that absolutely nothing was to be taken from the hulk.
Back on the ship Larkin was called to the bridge for the first time in his decade long service aboard The Eternal Star. It was larger than he expected, much larger. A group of fleet officers and navigators crowded around the captain's desk, waiting for him to relay his findings. They questioned him about what he had seen, what he heard, and what the creatures were. He told them about what they showed him and about the tech-priest, and they came to a conclusion. The coordinates were to be destroyed, the priest's death was to be reported as result of an incident in the engine room, and no one was to speak of ever finding the ship to any living soul. While everyone was busy inquiring and getting their stories straight, Larkin looked out the window and smiled. The Herald was gone. Other officers looked out and saw it too, most of them kneeling down and praying while others checked the radar stations in disbelief. Larkin stood there, laughing to himself, knowing that somewhere, an enemy of The Emperor was meeting their fate.