CHAPTER 1: Hormonal Empress.

"As I ordered," said the Emperor, switching her focus to the Space Marine in heavily adorned unpainted Terminator Armor, atop his helmet sat a golden crown, sober yet kingly. " do you know why I've summoned Kaldor Draigo ?"

The Emperor, reincarnated in a little girl's body, had called for the Supreme Grand Master of the Grey Knight. But. Lord Kaldor Draigo was still lost in the Warp, battling daemons, battling evil gods. One of his brethren had answered instead. The Homo Astartes took off his helm. He had long hair rendered silver by old age and a long silky beard, granting him a dignified aura, and furry brows accenting the majestic gaze of his serene dark eyes. In his right hand shone brightly a long Nemesis Force sword, bane of the daemon-kin; and on the other hand a psycanon. His being radiated a golden holy halo… was it his Grey Knight's purity of Soul manifesting, or was it due to the « Icon of the Just » installed in his holy armour of silver and gold platted ?

« Ave, Imperator », the Grey Knight said. « Majestas' desire is to report about the Imperium's situation regarding the Enemy Beyond. This one hath taken the opportunity of his current station upon Titan to fulfil the Imperial wish. » There was no nervousness here.

Maybe the Emperor of 10 thousand years ago could have been taken aback by this reply. But. It was not nearly enough to quench her anger and bitterness, brought by 10 thousand years of hellish suffering atop the Golden Throne, contemplating the Imperium rotting. It was like returning to one's house and discovering the horrid your trusted care-taker had left it in.

"No. I don't care about your battle reports. It's because you've failed in your mission."

Now the Grand Master's eyes widened and he gasped softly, stunned by this rebuke. « The Imperial judgment, humbly we do await. »

"DO NOT THINK TO INTERRUPT ME AGAIN," intoned the Emperor, adding the dreadful weight of her psychic might to her words. "IF YOU DO, YOU WILL DIE." Everyone present blanched at her words. Everyone, but the Grey Knight. Only 1 thought went through his grey head… he was « happy » that Kaldor Draigo was not here, that neither his lordship nor Grand Master Leorac were able to come. The Grey Knight Grand Master who had come in their stead was not shaken in the least by the Emperor's rebuttal. No. He was not shaken. Yet, he calmly drew his sword. Instantly, all the Custodes Companions in the room clinched their fists around their spears, ready to intervene if the Terminator Grey Knight attempted anything more than that. But instead of striking down the overpowered little girl, he turned the tip of his Nemesis sword toward the ground and easily pierced the marble soil of the Imperial Palace, while bending the knee, his right hand resting atop the sword's cross guard. His left hand and it's powerful psycanon, carrying the Crowned Helm that he wore, rested it upon the ground.

From this humbled position, the Grand Master would heed his Holy Emperor's rebuke. Just as he was not shaken by it, she was not moved in the least by which she thought as mere theatrical, something he would have thought, in his primitive brain, to ease her wrath. She snapped at him.

"You have failed – the Grey Knights have failed! – since the very beginning. Do you think the existence of Daemons could be so easily hidden? Do you think the truth of Horus' betrayal could be buried? What arrogance! Look at the founder of your Chapter!" Most eyes followed her gesture towards the Sigillite, except those of the Grey Knight, for a look of surprise had appeared on his face as he simply followed the gaze of everybody else. "His last orders came before the final battle ten thousand years ago. Your Knights sat out the Battle of Terra, hidden in the Warp, yet you assumed circumstances had not changed? Malcador was dead. I was dead – or close enough. Roboute had changed so much – yet you thought to follow your original orders? Every guardsman who survives an attack by daemons and lives to retire brings knowledge you kill whole worlds for with them. Do you think they forget the horrors they've seen? Do you think every soul privileged enough to know of daemons before-hand never lets anything slip? Much of the Imperium knows the secrets you think to keep from them. And yet you continue to murder innocents to protect this secret."

She paused.

"Not only the Imperium has gone to shit while I wasn't there, but worse, it's the Inquisition's fault! YOUR FAULT! And to topple of that, I reincarnated trapped in a yucky female body…!"

She paused again, nearly quaking in anger.

"Speak! Explain!"

The stern Grey Knight Grand Master's facial expression had not changed. He was both frightening and irritating to her, like a machine.

« Your Imperial Majesty's decree, this one – Arcturus Manilius Augustus Victor Regis Uranus, Magister Magistralis of the 666th chapter « Grey Knight » – shall heed in an orderly fashion. »

The Empress crossed her arms with an angered expression. What the heck with this super long Latin name? Were Grey Knights the kind of people that used the length of their names to impress women or something?!

« The Daemon's existence is effectively hidden, or at least shrouded, of that I most humbly dare assure Your Imperial Majesty. For most of the Imperium's subjects, the daemons are mere devilish fairy tales found in preaches against the evil of chaotic temptation and are essentially perceived as mere metaphorical parts of History of Religion, and sometimes reduced to the lot of conspiracy theories. Over 90% of the Adeptus Astartes are brainwashed through advance psycho-therapy, after contact with the Daemons, the remaining 10% are either authorized personnel – such as Chaplains or Chief Librarians and oathsworn Epistolaries – or members of secretive chapters, especially those of the First and Second Founding, such as the Dark Angels or the Black Templars, whose chapter doctrines and history are prone to either benefit from Inquisitorial tolerance or warrant initiation in the Ordo Malleus. Some amongst the latter includes highly faithful Chapters such as the Dark Exorcists, the Red Hunters and the Astartes Praeses, who have all been inducted by the Ordo Malleus and therefore allowed to retain scientific knowledge regarding the daemonic threat. As such, they are no threat to the secrecy surrounding the Daemon's actual existence and nature, and the details linked with it. While Majestas may rebuke our lack of trust towards our fellow Space Marines, the fact is that very few Chapters have joined the side of Chaos during the past Ten Thousand Years. Most causes of desertion are known to be being cut off from the sweet guidance of the Chaplains and encouragement from their battle-brothers. As for mass desertion, it happened nearly only because of Space Marine officers or Librarians being exposed to Chaotic artefacts, especially weaponry possessed by daemons. As for Grey Knight's desertion from Your Majesty's light… there has never been any. While I, of course, accept Your Imperial Majesty's blame, some of the less zealous members of the Ordo Malleus could have failed to believe in the underlying distinguished reasons. As such, I beg of Your Imperial Majesty to bestow some time upon me so that I can instruct them properly, before any further blame regarding this matter. »

The Empress started to feel… uncomfortable. Because her incorporeal time of 10 Thousand Years of pain and suffering had toll her mind heavily, and she had trouble reading him. Was he being a jerk by indirectly blaming her, by insinuating she was blaming them for other people's fault? She did not knew it yet, but the truth was that yon man's Olympic calm had once brought a huge humiliation upon the Space Wolves and the Inquisition alike, as he abstained to unleash his kingly wrath by publicly shaming and dishonouring the Space Wolves.

"I… ! I didn't said that !

- Say what, Sire ?

- My intent was not to blame you for… for having held your post !"

Aye, if lord Draigo had been the one to report, surely he would have started to stutter dumbly in confusion, he might have even cried. But instead, it was "the Grey King" who was doing the speaking, and his mix of snobbery and polite cockiness was getting to her. In a flash of lightning, the Emperor's original personal emblem, she had laid a trap for him… to his fake humbleness… he just had to say it… "I am sorry for misunderstanding Your Majesty's orders" and BLAM ! She would pounce on him once more.

"Understood."

But he parried her cunning scheme with just one word. No… sobriety parried the stroke.

"I shall proceed then. As for the Warmaster Horus' Heresy…

- Why Heresy ?

- Because, Sire, historians have decided to call it like this.

- I don't care. I don't like this… religious flavour.

- Why not ?

- I have already told you. The tenets of the Imperial Truth.

- The Imperial Truth… I am afraid to admit that I know not of such thing."

She face-palmed.

"I bet it's the Ministorum's fault… But you, Grey Knights, should know about it; do you not ?

- I am sorry to admit to Your Imperial Majesty that I am amidst the most literary amongst my brethren, and pass several hours of each Solar days in readings and studies.

- … Fine. Then, learn something now ! There is no god. And I, the Emperor, as I already said to Lorgar thousands of years before, am not one either. Gods do not exist. Since I am not a god, therefore, are unworthy of worship those warp entities that are called as such, and who mess everything up for their own people.

- The existence known as "gods" are the product of ritual efficacy and Myths and Archetypes that are parts of the Homo Religiosus. As such, it is even truer for "gods" of the Empyrean, be they single-minded psychic construct or not.

- Again, I am not a god. Just the mightiest psyker in existence.

- As well as the cornerstone around which Mankind was built, therefore a personification of the Axis Mundi archetype. And being worship as a god around the entire Galaxy makes Your Imperial Majesty a god regardless of His – or Her – desires.

- Well… are you not one big con artist ? But Religions feeds the Chaos gods ! You should know that, and therefore admit that it is necessary to eliminate Religion completely.

- Religion does not feed Chaos gods ; it is the same as claiming that "civilization equals domestication". Truth is that the Religion of the Chaos gods feeds the Chaos gods; and it does so not because of worship but because of the laws of gravity and magnetism causing thoughts and emotions of similar nature to attract each other. Period.

- And on what basis do you make such claim ?

- Majestas spoke of Science and Reason, but we, Grey Knights, do know the Warp's natural laws in depth ; and the most basic one is that emotions and thought that are similar are attracted to each other. Sacred Science, Sire.

- I know that.

- Majestas, Religion is not the synonym of belief or superstition; nor of organized clergy dominating peons. A Religion is a Civilization, for both results from cultural and psychological modifications concerning most of all but not exclusively the relationship of Man with the Sacred. As such, contrary to what Majestas' seems to have thought when spreading this dogma of the Imperial Truth, the forbidding of Religion does not means the death of the Chaos gods, as they are nurtured not by mere prayer, but by the various inclinations of the mind : mind-sets, emotions and archetypes in the thinking process and subconscious thought.

- Change it, anyway.

- Sire ?

- The Horus Heresy. I do not like this (religious sounding) name. Change it anyway!

- By Your Imperial Majesty's command. Then, the Horus Humbug…

- …"

She… was shocked out of her wits. After this long deviation of topic, he just responded to her whim in the most outrageous manner… and she nearly laughed. That was because she did not knew yet that this named had been not chosen or invented by Sir Arcturus, but heard many decades ago when he had visited the Imperial Palace as a High Lord, the "Representative of the Inquisition", and the one who had dubbed it as such… was a Custodes. She learned the truth of the matter a long time latter, face-palming herself.

«… is actually barely hidden.

- What…?!"

Something outrageous showed up again. She felt like she was actually talking to a certain dick. This, because of her now female body, was incredibly disturbing.

« It's most problematic parts are indeed hidden from public knowledge. Just like any Secret of State. Beside, for the quasi-entirety of the Imperium, this is no Historical event, but mythological one. Though it is very important in the Emperor's life, I bid Your Majesty to remind himself that close to no one in the countless quadrillions of civilians in the Imperium actually… gives a shit. »

Her jaw became slack.

« Rather than being taught about the historical details of such a mythic event, between two universitarian debates – even admitting the complete archives of those events were opened to them – they would rather better their daily lives, or obtain whatever they imagine deserving their time more than prayer. Which is the Adeptus Administratum's job… which is supposed to be coordinated, as the rest of the government body, by the head of state, namely, Your Imperial Majesty. Indeed, Your Majesty has delegated those state affairs to the High Lords of Terra yet this is already taking the path to an Aristocratic or Oligarchic system. Some Inquisitors, Astartes Chapters and other organisations have tried to take matter in hands, but it was, in almost all the cases, only on local scale. Since they cannot have what they want, the unsatisfied mob will likely turn to different means to achieve what they can't … such as wytchcraft and cults. As such, it is unfair to blame the Chamber Militant of the Ordo Malleus for this situation. »

All resistance from the Empress had been put down for now. But the cinders of her wrath were still dangerously warm.

« As for Malcador the Sigilite… I must admit nor I, nor any member of the Chapter at the present time, even knew that he was the Founder of the Grey Knights. Though a legend exist about Malcador finding some 9 loyalists Space Marines from traitor legions and making them a special team in the Emperor's service the Grey Knights Chapter's origins are shrouded in Myth and forgotten by History. And should stay so. I see Your Imperial Majesty's sudden burst of anger : I shall explain my thoughts on the matter. Inside the Holy Ordos of the Inquisition existeth numerous factions. Among them, overt goal is to try to recover the forgotten secrets of the Inquisition's origins, as well as the Chapter. Those datas, similarly as those concerning the Secret Ordo – the ruling body of the Inquisition – are especially dangerous if falling into the wrong hands, and could greatly disturb the functioning of the Imperium, even more than its' current nightmarish situation. Traitorous marines & daemons can and will travel back in time. According to the Liber Deamonica, slaying a Daemon in the Materium banish him back into the Warp for 1000 years and 1 day. It means both 1000 years and 1 day in the past, and in the future. If such was not the case, nothing would stop them to return to the Materium just some moments before their banishment. This could cause all sort of troubles, including some that would be impossible to solve even for the Grey Knights. Publicizing such knowledge would create way too much unrest and benefit the Chaos forces, not the Imperium.

« Then again, if blame there is, it is upon Your Imperial Majesty which it might fall upon. The Emperor is well known as one of the mightiest seer in the Galaxy, and one of it's greatest intellectual mind ever, all races confounded. Blaming long dead proto Grey Knights from the time of the Horus Heresy, or their successors and descendants, is vain, if not baseless. As far as we are concern, the Grey Knights are to protect Humanity – not individuals – from the Daemon's threats and taints. »

The Empress clenched her jaw and sat, crossing her arms once more as well as her beautifully shaped legs.

« Blaming the Ordo Malleus is both heretical and redundant. The Inquisition merely judges the weak who succumbed to temptation, and became a parody of human being, under the dominion and sway of single minded, cruel and selfish warp entities. As for the Grey Knights, we are but the Chamber Militant of the Ordo Malleus, and Your Imperial Majesty's latest gift to the Galaxy. »

She could admit that his explanations had makes some sense, until now. But now, his statements were downright dictatorial in their harshness. He rose from his feet, pulling his Nemesis Sword from the ground.

« Finally, Majestas has accused the Ordo Malleus to slaughter innocents. However, Innocence proves nothing, only a lack of carefulness.

- You… how can you dare say that ! Is it not sophistry to judge both the guilty and the innocent alike ? This… such a ridiculous argument ! Besides, if we apply it, then does it not mean that you are guilty, Grand Master Regis, and that I can punish you for any reason whatsoever ? Such spirit in the Law… whatever happened to "innocent 'till proven guilty"?! »

So spoke the Emperor spoke with righteous anger. However…

« To treat me as if I was guilty of the charges Your Majesty imposes on me, is it not what Your Majesty has done all along this conversation ? »

And while saying this, Regis' face stood stern like a statue made of marble stone, and his words sank deeply into the maiden Imperator. She instantly understood what the prick had been doing all along… he had been waiting to use this argument just at the right time in order to make Her feels guilty. The next step of these clever rhetoric's would probably be trying to move Her with some story about the Grey Knights faithful service. But she already had some ideas of what they had been doing all this time, when not busy murdering civilians or Imperial Guards. Daemons were hard to fight, and even harder to counter as great infestations. Many Grey Knights probably perished atrocious death, such as being eaten alive by a Great Unclean One or toyed by Slaaneshi daemons, while never renouncing the fight, continuously pledging their loyalty to the Emperor. But they were not the only one suffering. The Emperor had suffered for 10 Thousand Years, sitting upon the Golden Throne in incredible torments, kept alive only by His sheer will power and the continuous sacrifice of myriads of psykers to power her up in her fight long psychic war against the Dark Gods.

"You… you dick…"

But she couldn't say it. She could not accuse him. Not yet. And now, it was too late. The clever son of a bitch had probably realized that he had been caught, and would use a backup plan. She had the impression that she was actually speaking to a certain eldarly dick. Thus, she was left with nothing to say but another sophistry. She remembered a crtain dickhead that had shot a tachyon bolt in her back, while she was fighting Horus. What a dick.

"You… do you have any idea who I am ?! Of what I have endured !"

« Of course. Your Imperial Majesty is Richardus Numen Augustus Imperator of the Imperium of Man, the cornerstone of its nearly Fifty Thousand Years old Civilisation, the protector of Humanity, and it's Champion over the Real, over the Sane ; the greatest philosopher, scientist, tactician and warlord, the most accomplished Man with golden pecs and fabulous hair ; the alleged Primogenitor of our 666th Chapter "Grey Knights", and the model all Adept Astartes look up to. »

For a moment, she couldn't do anything against this unexpected flattery. She was expecting to see that bearded burly man to come in her back smiling like a sycophant and start massaging her shoulders while softening his iron grip as much as possible. The guy even knew her actual name. Worse; in the past, she would have not be cowed into silence with lightly reddening cheeks.

«… except the Ultrasmurfs who look up to their Spiritual Liege alone. »

And then, she laughed. What a dick.