Unwanted Promotion: A Warhammer 40,000 Tale

Chapter 3

He had arrived at the door thirty-six minutes after Paulos had closed his eyes for a rest. Like the rest of the Ten Thousand, Paulos did not need the kind of sleep that normal humans did. His enhanced brain and body were designed to always be on alert for potential threats and he could react appropriately no matter how deeply he chose to slumber. Paulos had smelled the Doomscryer from two floors above and had heard his shuffling footsteps from three.

"Are you certain?" He asked the hunched, hooded man.

"Only as certain as the ever-changing tides of the Warp allow one such as myself to be, my Lord Custodian, but surely you know this. Why ask?" came the reply.

Paulos stroked his beard. "Because Lord Valoris received a very similar prediction from the palatial Theomancers four days ago. To have virtually identical information come from two sources of your type would be enough to warrant action from the Aquilan Shield."

"Whomever your target might be my Lord Custodian, they certainly will never forget your intervention."

The Doomscryer bowed and left Paulos' chambers. They, like most other chambers occupied by the Golden Legion, were sparsely decorated; the only item of note being a trident shaped candelabra that stood an eternal vigil in the west corner, three candles providing sufficient light for the small room for a normal person to see. Paulos had originally wanted to have the candelabra removed, not needing candlelight to find his way about a room whose contents locations had already been memorized and rarely changed, but he had grown accustomed to the company that the three small flames provided. They moved when he moved, provided light and a small amount of warmth. Paulos likened them to the humans he protected when on missions with the Aquilan Shield. They, like the flames, were fragile; able to be snuffed out by too quick a movement or too stiff a breeze, but the potential of even a small flame was sufficient to bring a fortress to its knees if allowed to grow. It was Paulos' purpose to protect those little flames that were deemed, or that appeared necessary to the preservation of the Emperor, the Imperial Palace, Terra, the Solar System, the Segmentae Majoris, and the Imperium in that order.

This latest meeting with the Doomscryer's chosen representative confirmed a suspicion that the cult purging that had been carried out by the Astartes one week prior was part of something greater. The cult had been gathering in the basement of a bakery of all places, three hab blocks north of an Imperial Fist munitions dump. One of the nine cultists had been a vetted worker there and had managed to smuggle out one Godwyn pattern boltgun and nine bolt rounds. There was that number again. Paulos furrowed his brow. Nine cultists, and nine bolt rounds. He scoffed incredulously as another detail surfaced in his memory. The bakery had been called "The Nine Loaves". If the agents of Chaos had a sense of humor, then this was surely their way of showing it.

His meetings over the decades with representatives of the Ordo Malleus, and captains of the Grey Knights chapter of the Adeptus Astartes had seen him learn many things regarding the dark powers of chaos. Despite what the word "Chaos" implied, it was indeed possible to tease out patterns of behavior from the followers of the dark gods of the Warp. There were never any hard and fast rules, but there did tend to be consistencies. In this particular case, the pattern of repeating nines, coupled with each of the cultists having willingly gouged out one of their own eyes, pointed to the cult being Tzeenchian in nature.

The details of what the cult had been planning to do were still unclear as the Imperial Fists had put the property to the torch after one of their own, an Apothecary, had been mortally wounded. Two of the Astartes had dragged their wounded brother to a nearby Operatorium where the Apothecary had succumbed to his wounds after a lengthy surgery. 3rd Company Captain Tor Garadon had personally seen to the recovery and execution of the surgeon that had failed to save the Apothecary…or he would have had Paulos not clearly instructed him to instead take the surgeon, one Sergeant Matthias Galen into custody and bring him aboard the Phalanx, where Paulos would collect him in two days time.

He stood up from his seat and began the journey to the office of the Captain-General. Paulos had sparred and spoken to Captain-General Trajann Valoris on a number of occasions. On each of those occasions Paulos had been humbled by the Captain-General's martial and intellectual prowess. The man possessed every quality that members of the Adeptus Custodes spent their long lives honing to a razor's edge, and he was standing right in front of him.

"Captain-General." Paulos greeted. "I was just coming to deliver some news to you."

Paulos did not mention the fact that until he had turned the corner and laid eyes on the Captain-General, he did not hear, or even smell him. Indeed there was nothing that had even hinted at the senior Custodian's presence. Paulos would need to ask him how he was capable of concealing himself so effectively another time.

"I have a feeling that I know what the subject of this news is." Valoris replied. "I've received a communication from the Phalanx that they have a surgeon in their custody on your orders. Am I to take it that you believe he is the individual the Theomancers informed us of?"

"Yes Captain-General, I do." Paulos answered. "I have also just received a separate report from the palatial Doomscryers. It is consistent with the Theomancer's reports. I believe that this is sufficient evidence that this surgeon is someone that will be instrumental to ensuring The Emperor's safety in the upcoming days."

Valoris nodded thoughtfully. "Very well. Send me a copy of the Doomscryer's report and take the surgeon into your custody. Will you require any colleagues?"

"I expect so sir." Paulos replied. "I will take Barnabas along. We should be more than sufficient to safeguard the surgeon until he has served his purpose."

"A sound plan." The Captain-General confirmed. "Here, take this along as well. My duties will see me here for nearly a year's time and it may serve the Imperium better in your hands."

He unclasped a small device from his left side. It was a small metal disk with a curved tube protruding from one side. Blue lights pulsed softly on the face of the disk and Paulos thought he could hear a faint ticking emanating from it but he couldn't be sure, even with his superior auditory senses. Paulos knew exactly what it was.

"You are giving me the Moment Shackle?" He asked incredulously.

"Lending. I am lending it to you." Valoris said seriously. "You will return it to me undamaged when your mission is complete."

"Very well, Captain-General." Paulos affirmed. "Without a scratch."

Paulos took the device from Valoris and bade him farewell. After making sure the Moment Shackle was secure with the rest of his wargear, he returned to his chambers. He sat down at the simple desk and placed a fresh sheet of letterhead next to his autoquill.

"For the eyes of the Captain-General," He began, "I have received word from my contact in the Palatial Doomscryers that requires your attention. The following is the message verbatim: I foresee a healer who will walk among and above those in yellow and black. He will be touched by Chaos but will deny its taint. He will be dead to the world. He will take the place of one deemed irreplaceable. He will gain strength enough to destroy his would-be killer. He will be baptized in blue fire, spirits and golden blood and emerge pure and rebuilt. He will become a champion of humanity."

Paulos paused for a moment, rolling the message over on his tongue and in his mind. He could make sense of some of the predictions himself, but others remained a mystery. Yellow and black could mean the Imperial fists, whom the surgeon, Galen, was in the custody of at the moment. It was not completely unheard of to be touched by Chaos and not become corrupted by its influence, though it took a being of astonishing strength of will and character to not go mad from exposure…or a blank. Paulos genuinely had no idea what being dead to the world meant or could look like. Perhaps a comatose state, or perhaps it was just referring to his false execution, though the Doomscryer had specifically used the future tense indicating that this supposed death was yet to come. Strength enough to destroy a would-be killer could mean Galen would obtain the means to kill an Astartes, after all he had nearly died at the hands of one on the night of his failed surgery. Paulos would have to be wary. He was completely sure of his own ability to slay Space Marines, having buried dozens of traitor Astartes in his time, but to fight something that could overcome them as well was a rarity indeed. The talk of blue fire, spirits and golden blood made little sense together. Warpfire could be blue, but it could as easily be seen as white. The warp and by extension Chaos was a realm populated almost entirely by spirits. Golden blood was so vague that it could mean any number of things, ranging from innocuous to cataclysmic in their implications. Finally, the business of becoming a champion of humanity, well…that was something that Paulos would be glad to see indeed.

Author's note:

Thank you for reading the third chapter of my little tale! Being a massive Custodes fan I couldn't NOT include them. I hope you can forgive the departure from Matthias' path, but he'll be back very soon! Promise! A hive-fleet sized thank you to all my readers and a particular thank you to the kind folks that leave reviews on my work. You are the thousand psykers to my golden throne. Stay safe in all your battles and remember to leave the grimdark in the 41st millennium!