Chapter 1:
First Captain Cassius Arturo strode through the dimly lit halls of the Shadow of Regret, examining the data slate in his hand. He stopped a moment, listening to the warp drives as they hummed, propelling the cruiser through the immaterium towards its next mission. The Soul Drinkers ship had been in the warp for a week, none but the ship's captain and Captain Arturo knowing where they were headed.
The Captain began walking again, scrolling through the information on the data slate. The Soul Drinkers' Command had intercepted several transmissions between Imperial forces on the planet Jaenesh and the Mechanicum of Mars. Ever since the theft of the Soul Spear by Mechanicum forces, the Soul Drinkers had taken particular interest in disrupting any actions taken by the Tech-Priests of the Machine Cult. Though much of the messages intercepted remained to be deciphered, the shear volume of information exchanged and the continuous use of Carmine-level encryption suggested something big. Whatever it was, the Soul Drinkers code-breakers had managed to make out that an entire Mechanicus battlefleet had been dispatched from Mars not ten days beforehand. Once this had been realized, Soul Drinkers Command had dispatched their own force, consisting of 50 battle-brothers and one small attack cruiser, to make planetfall before the Mechanicus arrived and uncover the reason for this sudden burst of activity.
The planet Jaenesh had been under siege for several years by orks of Waaagh! Ripjaw. It was a relatively small Waaagh!, all things considered, made up of only 100,000 orks and covering only 5 systems. The main reason the Imperium had gotten involved was that in the Waaagh!'s path lay the forgeworld of Termanthia. Termanthia had been a vital supplier of plasma weaponry during campaigns dating back to the Horus Heresy, and remained one of the few prominent manufacturers of the unstable technology. When the Tenth Expedition had rediscovered the planet during the Great Crusade, the local population had been armed with ancient, yet quite advanced, plasma weapons. The Imperials had reverse-engineered the weapons as best they could; yet the new versions were never as stable or reliable as their older counterparts had been. Now the orks were bearing down upon the vital forgeworld, and several divisions of Imperial Guard had been mustered to its defense. The line was currently being held at Jaenesh, and it was clear that either the orks or the Imperials had found something there.
Captain Arturo stepped through the hatch into the arming chambers of the ship. Every one of his handpicked team was standing beside his designated alcove, each already armored in their gleaming purple and bone, steel and ceramite shells.
"Good," The Captain said, "we're all here. I do not have to tell you that this mission will be one unlike what we are used to. This operation will try us not in our skills at arms or lightning warfare, but in stealth. Our primary objective is to discover the reasons for the Mechanicum's sudden interest in the planet Jaenesh. We all know of the grievances done against us by those filthy cyborgs, so once we discover their intentions we are to disrupt them or turn their actions into our gain. Cold and fast, Soul Drinkers! We will be exiting the Warp within the hour. Ready your minds for the coming of the Emperor's call." The Soul Drinkers present saluted, thunderously hailing their Emperor. Captain Arturo returned their salute, and exited the arming chamber, heading for the bridge.
The most unique aspect of the Soul Drinkers Chapter was that they were free. They held no allegiance to the Imperium. In fact, they were officially ranked as Excommunicate Traitoris in the annals of the Administratum. However, neither were they held under the sway of the corrupting winds of Chaos. The Soul Drinkers served none but the will of the Emperor Himself, believing the Imperium to be a corrupt, self-serving monster that devoured and consumed all held under its sway. With no holds barred, the Soul Drinkers used their new place in the universe to serve the Emperor in ways inconceivable to those who operated under Imperial Law. Yet the Soul Drinkers, like any Space Marine chapter, did not forget old grudges. At every opportunity, they slighted and disrupted the Imperial Machine, knowing that they were wreaking havoc not just on the attempts by the Imperium to drag more worlds into its gaping maw, but also on the pencil-pushers in the dark halls of the Administratum.
Captain Arturo passed a porthole, pausing for a brief moment to observe the constant change occurring outside the Warp shields guarding the ship's inhabitants from being consumed by the daemonic minds that ruled the Warp. Though his campaigns numbered many, and his space flight hours were enough for a lifetime, Cassius Arturo never ceased to hold a bit of child-like wonder for the sight of the Warp. It was amazing that a thing of such beauty could hold so much raw malice and evil beyond reckoning. The captain shook himself out of his revere and continued onward to the bridge of the ship.