The boy did not remember his name. It no longer mattered. What mattered was getting up this accursed mountain. He was naked, exposed to the freezing cold. Blood ran from hundreds of cuts and tears on his body. In his hands he carried a crude spear. The Angels had told him to go to the mountain, that there was something waiting for him there.
He didn't know how long it had been since he began walking towards the mountain. A few hours? A few days? He knew he was hungry, his stomach hurt so much he could barely stand. He had not slept, and the world swirled around him, making him stagger as if drunk.
But he had to keep going. He had seen what would happen if he were to stop.
Gritting his teeth, the boy began to climb, his fingers cut open against the sharp rocks. The boy kept going. The wind lashed his body, trying to knock the boy from his precarious perch. The boy kept going. A small ledge provided a brief respite for the boy. But from there, the climb grew more difficult. The boy would have to lose his spear. He broke off the stone tip, and left the staff, holding the stone in his teeth. He began to climb again.
As he went higher, the way became harder. Ice formed on the rocks, making the boy's hands slip and leave the boy hanging by one hand, hundreds of feet above the ground. The boy kept climbing.
He came to the summit, covered in his own blood, his limbs shaking violently from exhaustion. A snow covered path lead away from the cliff's edge, winding through walls of rock. The boy walked forwards, leaving red foot prints in the snow.
He came to a cave. A deep rhythmic rumbling breathing echoed from the cave. There was something inside. Gripping his sharp stone, the boy edged forwards, clinging to the cave walls.
The cave was pitch black, darker even than the night outside the cave. Moonlight shone in from the cave mouth, casting a single white light onto a shaggy something deeper in the cave.
The boy edged closer. The something sniffed loudly. It knew the boy was there. Glowing red eyes appeared in the darkness, glaring angrily. A deep growl shook the cave. The boy tensed, back against the cold hard stone. Hundreds of slavering teeth glittered in the moonlight. The thing leapt forwards, claws reaching. The boy leapt forwards, away from the claws. He landed awkwardly on the floor of the cave, setting off at a dead sprint towards a small chink of light at the end of the cave. The thing gave chase, heavy paws thundering against the stone floor. The chink of light grew brighter. It grew into a hole, then a wide arch. An escape. The boy ran faster.
The thing was close, the boy could feel it's breath on his heels, smell it's foul breath. He wasn't fast enough. It would catch him. The boy leapt desperately towards the gate of moonlight and snow, turning onto his back in the air as the massive Snow Beast, all fur and teeth and glaring eyes leapt for him.
The boy thrust his stone forwards, turning away as the claws and teeth reached for him. Together, boy and beast tumbled into the snow beyond the cave. The boy stabbed blindly, sharp stone hacking at the white fur. The beast roared angrily, slashing at the naked boy with razor sharp claws. The boy screamed, the claws tearing four red lines across his chest. The beast roared, the small stone tearing a great bleeding gash into its throat as the boy lashed out. It staggered away, howling in fury. It collapsed, rose, and collapsed again. The boy scrambled to his feet, backing away from the injured beast. It was still breathing, still dangerous. Murderous red eyes followed the boy as he circled the beast.
Then the light faded, and the beast sagged, its lifeblood draining out into the snow. The boy moved forwards slowly. He gave the beast a nudge. It didn't move.
"You have done well boy." One of the dark giants rose out of the dark, black armor nearly invisible in the inky black night.
The boy didn't respond. He wasn't sure how to. It had been so long since he'd spoken.
"Few survive the final trial." The dark giant rumbled, looming over the naked boy. A thick white fur cloak hung from the giant's shoulders, a leering skull helm stared down at the boy, eye slits glowing red like the eyes of the beast.
More dark giants rose from the night, moving silently in their black armor and white cloaks.
"Take the pelt." A long knife was given to the boy. "Join us."
The boy did, cutting away the beast's hide, wrapping himself in the bloody pelt. For the first time, the boy was warm.
"You were born into darkness boy." The skull faced giant rumbled. "You were born into the cold. You fought in the darkness, you fought in the cold. You have suffered there, and struggled there. You have learned to survive and to endure." The giant motioned to another, this one's armor covered by a white habit, a strange needle like device over his left hand. "Now you will become the darkness. Now you will become the cold." Two giants gripped the boy tightly, cold black gauntleted hands wrapping over shivering arms.
"The darkness calls out to you. Will you answer the darkness?" The skull faced giant rumbled.
The boy nodded once.
"The cold calls out to you. Will you go to the cold?"
The boy nodded again.
"Will you become brother to the dark, and brother to the cold?"
The boy nodded a third time.
"Then join your Brothers. Become one of us."
The robed giant stabbed downwards with the needle, pressing the device into the boy's neck. The boy screamed in agony, searing fire spreading through his body.
The pain went on for what felt like an age. His body grew, bones and muscles tearing themselves apart as they grew to many times their original size. His wounds sealed into scars, thick ropy red lines. The small things the giants had put into him before we went to the mountain grew and came alive. Two hearts beat violently in his chest, four lungs sucked in air. His bones hardened into plates as thick as steel. His eyes blackened, becoming inky obsidian orbs. Armored hands pressed him down into the snow. Needles tattooed strange symbols onto him, inscribing ancient symbols and words onto his rapidly toughening skin. Red hot brands were pressed onto his back, marking him with two ravens flying over a scythe and skull.
Then the pain stopped.
"Rise Astartes." The skull faced giant called.
"Rise." The giants echoed.
"Join your brothers."
"Rise."
"Take your name."
"Rise."
The Astartes rose. He now stood as tall as the others, the white pelt no longer wrapping around him, but falling over his shoulders like a cloak.
"You are Gideon." The skull faced Astartes told him. "You have been reborn into the Brothers of the Scions of Judgment. From this day forward you shall forever be an Adeptus Astartes, one of the defenders of Man. I am Theseus, a Patriarch of the Brotherhood."
Gideon nodded.
"The first trial is over, now the second begins." A small leaf was offered to Gideon. "Eat." He did. He was dressed in a simple wool habit, stripped of the pelt.
"You must leave the mountain, and go to a great pit, beyond those hills." The sun was rising now, the golden glow outlining a small ridge of hills far in the distance.
"Do you understand Brother Gideon?"
"I understand." Gideon muttered. He felt strange. His vision was swimming in and out of focus.
"Then go."
Onwards Gideon went.
The leaf had been a poison. Gideon's whole body ached as the strange toxin flowed through it. He walked through a world of grey mist, beyond the cold, the pain of the sharp rocks digging into his new body, beyond all his worldly senses. In this twilight world of fog, Gideon staggered onwards. Shadows chased after him. He lashed out at one, his hand battering at what he thought was the shadow's head. He felt a crunch, and the shadow sank to the ground. More shadows came, leaping for him, chasing after him, laughing and screaming. He didn't know how many leapt for him, or how many he struck, but when the twilight faded, he found himself alone on a barren hill, surrounded by corpses. His knuckles were cracked, his elbows bloody. His knees were covered in gore. Behind him rose the mountain, several miles away. Sweat ran down his body. He had run here, faster than he had ever thought any man could run. He could see his path from the mountain to the hill very clearly. A trail of bodies marked the way. Then a high pitched wailing filled the air and he was once more in a world of grey. Gideon ran on, lashing out at shadows.
He came to the pit just as the sun reached its noon zenith. Grass brushed gently against his bare feet. Carefully, he clambered down into the pit.
He entered a cavern, a large circular floor covered in sand in its center. Another man was waiting there for him, a thin wiry man clad in a white robe.
"So you are the giant." The man laughed. "They said I had to kill you. If I kill you I go free."
More white robed men came from the edges of the cavern, encircling Gideon.
"Kill the giant, go free." The men chanted. "Kill the giant, go free." Then they fell on him, dozens of small daggers springing from the sleeves of the white robes.
Gideon roared angrily, slapping one of the men across the face, striking another with a closed fist. Both fell dead. One man grabbed Gideon by the neck, only to be hurled into the cavern wall, which he slid down in a bloody heap. Two more died as Gideon broke their necks as one would kill a chicken. The last two died, their heads smashed together.
A door opened at the end of the cavern, and Gideon walked on.
Green monsters waited in the next room, massive beasts of muscle and sinew. They held crude blades and axes, and thick tusks jutted from their mouths.
"WAAAGH!" The beasts rushed forwards, towards the blood stained Gideon. The Astartes punched one in the throat, crushing its wind pipe and leaving it to suffocate. Grasping it's blade, Gideon waded into the green mob, hacking and slashing away at the roaring green beasts.
A second door opened. Still gripping the blade, Gideon walked on.
Two figures waited in the third room, long ears and impossibly thin faces glaring hatefully at Gideon.
"You come to your end, Mon Keigh." One hissed. Armed with sharpened metal staves, the pair circled Gideon, jabbing at him with the lethal spikes.
When the pair lay dead, pinned together by their staves, a third door opened.
Now unarmed, Gideon walked on.
A suit of black armor sat at the end of last cavernous room. Turquoise pauldrons lined with bone white covered the armor's shoulders. A scythe of white sat over the left pauldron, an ornate number one on the right. A leering black helm rested between the pauldrons, framed by the white pelt of the Snow Beast.
"Come to get the armor?" A thin, reedy voice came from the shadows. A man as big as Gideon lurched from the dark. His body was mangled, strange claws instead of hands, a horn protruding from the side of his head.
"They took me. From the warband." The man mumbled distractedly. "I don't know how."
The man dragged a clawed hand down his cheek, drawing blood.
"We couldn't be seen. We couldn't be seen. How did they take us?" The man began to circle Gideon. "The Hydra can't be seen. The Hydra can't be seen." The man stopped circling.
"THE HYDRA CAN'T BE SEEN!" he screamed, lunging for Gideon. They crashed together, grappling with each other for position. The man's claws dug into Gideon's arms, drawing blood. Gideon bashed his forehead into the man's nose, making him reel back. A fist connected with the man's gut, then another, and another, and another. Gideon battered the man back, blow after blow raining down on the cackling man.
"Yes, yes, yes!" The man crowed. "Angry, angry, angry!" Then he grabbed Gideon's wrist, twisting him around so that the Astartes fell to the floor.
"Die, die, die!" Now blows rained down on Gideon, heavy punishing blows.
Gideon kicked the man away, rising to his feet and charging forwards.
He punched, he kicked, he bit, he clawed, he tore. Eventually the man stopped laughing and then he stopped moving. Gideon stood alone, soaked in blood, battered and bruised, but victorious.
Brother Gideon of the Scions of Judgment went to claim his armor.