Controller
Chapter 4
The Empty Prophecy
The Lord of Change had a duty; he was the gatekeeper of Tzeentch's maze. As such, he was subject to Tzeentch's wrath, should anything get out of hand for no reason. He didn't destroy all who came to the gates. Frankly, so long as he sensed not even the slightest hint of a threat, he typically let them inside. Thus far, few have made it through the maze. The few that did were individuals that Tzeentch wanted to see, for whatever purpose they had in his grand schemes.
This man, however, registered a much higher threat for him. Never had someone been able to block his future sight. Even now, his mind's eye saw a future of just standing at the gate...alone, yet this armored man clearly existed and had no intention of leaving. Was it the will of Tzeentch that the Lord of Change's time had come? Was this the moment of his death? Had Tzeentch altered the visions of the future?
There was no way to answer those questions, so the daemon proceeded as he thought he should.
With a mere flex of his daemonic mind, the air imploded on itself, squeezing down to the size of a pea anything inside...but the figure was no longer there!
"How depressingly stupid."
That was the last thing the daemon heard before the world went black.
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A lone armored figure looked over the prone, birdlike body of a Lord of Change. The five small, deep, smoking wounds in its back matched the man's clawed hand, which dripped with black daemon blood, quickly boiling away from the strange, arcane power channeling through the claws.
"You can't say I didn't warn you," he said to the dead body. Then he turned to the Impossible Gate, the entrance to the Maze of Tzeentch.
The powerful man raised his sword, pointing it at the golden doors. Immediately, the gate's many knots began to unwind. The gold, silver, platinum, and diamond of which it was made began to resemble a more mundane door.
Without a sound, the gate ceased its shifting and opened, showing the way into the maze.
"Interesting," the man said calmly, looking at a structure capable of driving men mad by just a glance at it. The two machines on his left and right panned back and forth, their picters zooming in and out, giving the man a better view.
Not that he needed it. His psychic sense worked perfectly well. He would be at nary a disadvantage if he had no eyes at all.
The man took a deep, relaxed breath, the sound warped strangely by his helmet, producing a sound unlike even a Space Marine's voice.
"Now the fun begins," he said, the smile in his voice nearly palpable.
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Mortals assumed that most daemons, as creatures of the Immaterium, had no genders. Ironic, that such was only true of Slaaneshi daemons; often mistakenly thought to be beings of carnal pleasure, rather than horrific anti-souls of sadism.
In truth, a Lord of Change's gender only differed physically because it was rather impractical for the Great Serpent to design them neutrally. Such would take more time from his scheming than could be allowed.
The crane-necked, ruffled, vulture Lords ruled the outer domain of the Impossible Fortress, their unquenchable thirst for violence and plotting made them the perfect couriers of Tzeentch's will.
But then there was the Priestess Lords; the few (truly) female daemons that existed within the Warp. The Priestess Lords were masters of the Impossible Fortress. They were its caretakers, its custodians. It was they who supervised the wild and naturally distracted Horrors as they tended to the Infinite Library of Tzeentch, and they who stood over the vast arcane couldrons, muttering spells, curses, and enchantments as they weaved the powerful Warp into potions and powers unknown to any mortal. Their vast, many colored feathers were clean and glistened with a golden color. Their eagle-like heads and sharp eyes watched for those unwelcome in the House of Tzeentch, and their staffs held orbs of cataclysmic power, ready to be unleashed on the unwelcome traveler or worthless Horror.
Vane the Bearer was one such daemon Priestess. She stood guard at the gates of the Impossible Fortress.
Yet her attention was focused on a single figure within the outer fringes of the Maze. A man, his form barely visible between his movements, navigated the fast structure with ease. He entered ripples in the fabric of time, emerging whole and unchanged on the other end. He anticipated every trap, followed the ever-changing path with perfection, and eluded every Lord of Change that traveled the halls of the maze. It was as though he could see into the very future!
Vane's smooth beak curved into a grin. The Master would want to see this one. Perhaps his arrival was a part of the Great Serpent's plans? Undoubtedly he was part of the Scheme. Nothing happened unless Tzeentch planned it.
For uncounted hours, the daemon observed the man, her curiosity officially piqued. She had no doubts that this was Tzeentch's will, but could not help being curious how it fit into the Master's plans. With a slightly irritated sigh, she supposed that she would find out, perhaps in the next thousand years if she was lucky.
At last he came to the final obstacle. Three paths that twisted themselves into unending knots. At some points they became so narrow that only atoms could pass, before widening into honeycomb tunnels with treacherous, crumbling footing.
Curious about how he planned to navigate this last obstacle, Vane peeked into her visions of the future...and immediately froze.
In her future...she saw nothing...nothing at all! It was black, empty...there was nothing...Surely it couldn't be, but yet it had to be! Was it her time? Was it her time to die?
For the first time in her eons-long life, the Priestess felt fear.
"Step aside," a smoothly accented, unnervingly calm voice commanded.
Nearly jumping out of her skin, feathers, and wings, Vane flew backwards a pace or two and held her staff outwards, towards the figure that had appeared so suddenly in front of her.
Impossible! It was the very same man that she had seen only a moment before in the maze! How could he have navigated the obstacle so easily?
"Quite simple, really," the figure said, absentmindedly picking at one of his clawed fingers. "I teleported. It's a bit hard to believe that no one else thought of it, actually."
The daemon blinked several times in confusion. How could he read her mind? She did not feel a presence in her head, and her mental armor had increased a hundredfold (far beyond what a mortal could hope for) from being startled.
She should destroy him, blot him from the Warp!
No, a voice within her said. He is a part of His plan. You know this!
But how can you know? another voice said. Your visions have stopped. You can see nothing.
The black ichor running through the Priestess' veins grew cold, and a chill crept over her. There was only one reason Tzeentch would stop sending visions of the future...
"Actually, there are two," the being interrupted, beginning to step closer. Vane did not move back, but did not fire a blast from her staff either. She realized how crippled she was without her future sight. She did not know what to do.
"First," he continued. "Is that Tzeentch has decided that now is the hour of your death."
He continued to creep closer. Soon, Vane could no longer keep her staff pointed at him.
"Second...is because...I don't want you to have visions of the future."
His voice changed at the last sentence. His words rang painfully in her avian ears. It seemed familiar...and terrifying.
"It can't be..."
That was all she could say as her eyes widened with horrified recognition. She had heard that voice before!
The picters at the center of the machines on either side of the man began to glow a fearsome red. The cross on his helm matched them. The flame atop the helmet began to crackle and roar higher, burning a bright, blinding white.
"It is," the new voice said. Each syllable echoed with terrible power, attracting the attention of those who tended the Maze of Tzeentch. But they did not investigate the source, for they to recognized the voice. The crooked, avian forms tumbled to their knees, crying out.
The staff dropped to the ground even as the man returned to his former appearance, the threatening presence that came from him fading as quickly as it had come.
A claw latched onto Vane's chest armor, pulling her from her knees. She suddenly felt very small.
"Now then," the being continued in an almost cheerful manner. "Take me to your leader."
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The gates were just short of a mile high. They were made of all kinds of heavy metals, from gold and silver to a lining of pure lead. Yet they flew open with such force that a Space Marine could apply to a block of wood.
From his his gilded throne, merely a few hundred yards from the gate, the Great Serpent stood, a palpable wave of indignation exuding from him that drove several nearby Horrors mad, splitting them into madly babbling Blue Horrors.
Then a form slid to his feet. It was a Priestess Lord, unhurt but unconscious. Tzeentch frankly did not care for her health, but the fact that she had been subdued, and that many of his other Lords of Change must have been either subdued or avoided without notice was certainly worth noting.
Another figure entered, walking in under his own power. He patted dust and debris from his armor and jet black cape. The two automatons on either side of him shook themselves violently, clouds of dust coming off of them.
For a moment, the two stared at each other. Then a rumble was emitted from Tzeentch's chest. It quickly grew in volume, becoming a roar of laughter. The two simply dressed Priestess Lords on either side of him looked startled.
It was the first time they had ever heard the Master laugh.
"You are amusing mortal," the Serpent said in a voice dripping with condescension, looking down to the Priestess at his feet. "I will give you that much. More than that, you are evidently powerful as well."
As he sat back on his throne, the Chaos God clapped his clawed hands once. Immediately, five pink Horrors scuttled before him, and a Lord of Change flew down from the skyscraper-like bookshelves of the Infinite Library. The Horrors unfolded the vast book they carried on their backs, and the Lord of Change, wearing a monacle and holding a quill pen in his hand, waited for Tzeentch to continue.
"This is indeed a momentous day," the god boomed, the vulture daemon in front of him dutifully recording every word. "A mortal, below even the least of daemonkind, has come into My Library of his own will!"
"This feat amuses Me greatly," he continued with a chuckle, continuing to put an emphasis on every mention of himself. "You have put Me in a good humor, mortal. Thus, I shall grant you a boon."
Tzeentch indicated to his left, towards an old, decrepit, withered, and two-headed Lord of Change.
"Ask My oracle a question, any question! He will answer you. But beware, only one head speaks the true answer, the other speaks lies that shall lead you to your doom. It is for you to figure out which head tells the truth, and which head spouts the lies."
For a moment, the being merely looked at Tzeentch. For his part, the god merely put his hands together. Surely, the mortal's small mind was churning, searching for a question to ask.
"I have not come to ask a question," the being said smoothly and calmly. "I have come...to get a book."
Tzeentch's amused demeanor disappeared at light speed. His mighty fists pounded the arms of his throne as he leaped to his feet, his wings extending to their full width.
"You dare enter My Library and seek My books!" the Chaos God howled in rage. "You should have taken My offer, fool. Kill him!"
The area for hundreds of feet around the man became suffused with roaring Warp flames, charring, destroying, and corrupting everything they touched.
Tzeentch did not see them, however. Though he looked into the flames, he was seething with anger at what he sensed at his sides. Both Priestess Lords, the Lord of Change, and the pink Horrors all lay dead in pools of their own blood, messily run through with a sword and sliced in half vertically.
The god whirled. His cursed, arcane blade struck another sword; one held by the strange being.
"Die, mortal!"
"I am far beyond mortal."
Though Tzeentch towered above the man, he could not overpower him. Both combatants held their blades with only a single hand, as multicolored spheres of chaotic energy coalesced in their unused hands.
"Just who do you think you are, wretch!" the Serpent roared.
"That's simple," the man said calmly. "I am Lord Moor."
The god's blade began to shake.
"No," the Serpent said, his voice quivering. His face held an expression unreadable to any man, but could be translated as a rough mix of fury, fear, and above all...denial.
"NO!"
Tzeentch began to bring the massive ball of energy he held forward, intending to smash the object of his anger – and his fear – into oblivion. Yet before he could strike it, Lord Moor shot the much smaller sphere he held.
It may have been smaller, but it was far from weak. A blast rocked the Infinite Library, knocking continent-sized bookcases to the ground with seismic crashes. Horrors scattered left and right. Some were crushed by towers of scrolls and books as they sat weeping over centuries of organizing undone before their eyes. Others were trampled underfoot by panicked daemons attempting to flee. Still others were crushed even as they fled, unable to escape in time.
The smoke cleared from the epicenter slowly. Within was Tzeentch, the Changer of Ways, flat upon his back. Battered into submission, but not beaten, he stared mutely at the creature on his chest. Lord Moor simply stood there, pointing his sword towards the god's neck. He held a book in his right hand.
"Do you know what this is?" He asked, waving the book slightly. Tzeentch's eyes widened as he recognized it, but he did nothing. The Serpent did indeed recognize the book. It was without question the most valuable of his collection. Yet, he did not really know what it was. That mere fact had driven him to study it relentlessly. He had attempted for eons to unlock its secrets.
"The Empty Prophecy," Moor stated. The book hovered in the air and opened. Page after page began to turn, revealing empty chapters; non-existent words. Yet the power that emanated from the book was easily felt.
"What use is it to you?" Tzeentch demanded. Despite the situation, one with which he was all to familiar, he knew that Moor would not harm him in any permanent way. All that he hurt so far was the god's pride. "It is called the Empty Prophecy for a reason."
"Ah, but is it really empty?" Lord Moor admonished in an irritatingly condescending manner. Yet lo and behold, as the book flipped to the front pages, High Gothic runes were slowly burning themselves into the page, glowing a bright gold.
Almost as a reflex, the Serpent reached out to the book, only to be stopped by the blade pressing against his neck.
"You shouldn't be worried, though," Moor continued, stepping off of the Chaos god's chest. Now that the fear had faded, despite the visions that haunted him, seething fury began to surface, anger and hatred born of his bruised pride. Oh, how he so wanted to crush his adversary like a bug!
"I've hurt nothing on you...well, perhaps your pride..."
With a final, maddening chuckle, Lord Moor disappeared. With him, so did Tzeentch's most prized possession.
Slowly, not out of pain but out of despondence, the god crept back onto his throne, pinching the bridge of his beak. He paid no heed to the broken, flaming ruins of the Library around him. The Serpent paid the same amount of attention to the madly cleaning, weeping, angry, babbling Horrors and their vulture-headed overlords.
"That is it, then," he said as a whisper. "The Day has come. He is here."
"Fret not, my child."
Immediately, the Great Deceiver stood, his eyes widened. For the second time, something surprising, completely unseen by his visions of the future, had occurred.
This time, however, it was both much more shocking...and much more welcome.
"Deceiver, child of my heart, have peace. You have not read the Prophecy...but I have."
Tzeentch remained still, waiting. Then, something came to him, put directly into his mind. It was a single phrase, but a far from insignificant one. A grin came to his beak. The last vestiges of fear, such an alien emotion, left him. The Great Deceiver was back to his old self.
...And the Chains of Judecca shall be broken...
In his sudden turn of emotions, the Serpent failed to notice that a Priestess Lord, the one flung to his feet when Lord Moor entered...was no longer there...
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"FIGHT ME!"
The Fortress of Khorne was awash in blood and conflict, as he willed it. A neverending tide of Bloodletters skirmished below, seeking to outdo one another with their acts of brutality and cruelty.
"WRETCHED DAEMONS, FACE ME!"
A lone man stood outside the circle of blood and murder. His armor was like a Khornate Marine's, but decorated with a cross on his chestplate. Instead of gory trophies, purity symbols adorned his shoulder pauldrons. A chainsword of diamond and adamantium was gripped in his left hand, its spirit begging for release and the sweet taste of daemonflesh, while a diamond-shaped shield was held in his right gauntlet, a holy cross gleaming at its front. His black armor armor was ridged, almost like it was decorated with bones, but the blood red ridges were instead formed by verse upon verse of holy, sanctified runes.
"DENIZENS OF THE WARP, FILTHY MAGGOTS, WARP-SPAWN, I DEMAND THAT YOU FIGHT ME!"
But the man was not heeded. The Bloodletters were just too engrossed in their bloody sport to notice a lone Space Marine. Then, the man's helm lifted as an idea came to him...
"DEATH TO THE BLOOD GOD! GLORY TO THE GOD-EMPEROR OF MANKIND!"
That certainly got their attention. The daemons halted in mid-cut, mid-hack, and mid-slash, and glared daggers at the source of such a violent heresy against their god. For a moment, their violence-addled minds registered only shock, which inevitably turned to rage unlike any other.
The daemons uttered screams of bloody murder, abandoning their endless battle amongst themselves as they ran to tear apart the lone Space Marine.
The man merely laughed. His vox-enhanced voice echoing across the Formless Wastes.
"COME THEN, DAEMONS!" he bellowed as he revved his holy chainsword. The weapon churned with bloody glee, sensing that its meal of flesh and blood was coming near. "COME TO ME, AND MEET YOUR DEATH!"
With a swipe, a Bloodletter's head left its shoulders.
"Fight me!" he yelled again, somewhat quieter in the middle of the struggle. "Test your strength against the Messenger of Pain, the Angel of Woe. Test yourselves, and die at the hands of Dante!"
Even as he was buried in daemonic bodies, his chainsword was heard above the din of bloodcurdling war yells, even as they turned to screams of horror and pain. The voice of Dante was still heard.
"Death to the Blood God!"
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A/N: Hey ho, readers!
Another chapter, you say? So soon, you say?
I know, Dante and Lord Moor seem like Stu characters right now, don't they? Just remember, as I said before, this isn't the REAL conflict. This is the Controller's allies catching the Chaos gods with their pants down, beating the crap out of their pride (mostly), without too much actual damage, and doing something that will prove most valuable later on in the story.
So, let's recap what happened so far:
Lord Moor bursts into Tzeentch's Library, steals a powerful, but rather useless at the same time, book called the Empty Prophecy, which has started writing itself. And another voice spoke to Tzeentch, saying a passage from the Prophecy (...And the Chains of Judecca shall be broken). He leaves...and so does a Priestess Lord...
How does this fit in? You'll have to stay tuned and find out. You'll learn a little more next chapter, as Dante beats, pummels, hacks, and slashes his way into Khorne's Fortress. ;)
I'll give you a hint. A very familiar DoW2 character, one who is dead, will pop up next chapter (at the very end).
Until my next post: Peace!
(P.S. Don't expect next chapter to come out so soon. I just got lucky with this one. School is gonna start spinning up a crapstorm of work, come next week.)