A brief description of all named Hopian units.
The Death Seekers: The unit dedicated to the depraved and the damned. In some form, this unit has existed for well over three thousand years. During the war with the drukhari, military service was universal, so anyone who failed their mental assessments went here. Also many warriors would request a transfer, when they realized this was where they belonged.
The Death Seekers are not remotely berserkers, rather, they are ice cold killers who strive for the highest kill counts possible. They specialize in hit and run tactics and guerrilla warfare, but they can easily turn on a dime and function as shock troopers, taking the hard knocks and responding with utter viciousness. This is largely because of the command of Diarmuid, who insists on excellence in all things.
It is worth noting that many new recruits to the Death Seekers don't work out and end up dying by Diarmuid's hand. He does not tolerate less than excellence and the Death Seekers are a final stop… the only place to go after that is the grave.
The Death Seekers get along fairly well with most units, except the Cabbits. And it's not that they don't appreciate what the Cabbits do, it's just that they prefer to laugh at it from a safe distance… the utterly chaotic nature of the Cabbits makes Diarmuid wish he could still drink.
The Lion Hearts: Honor. Nobility. Chivalry. The Lion Hearts embody all of these traits.
The Lion Hearts are traditionally a unit made up mostly by nobility, but that is because the entry requirement is simple: You must be an expert at close combat. During the long war with the drukhari, Hopian noble houses would be desperate to save their male children and so would employ combat tutors from a very young age. Taught to fight as soon as they could walk, they were more likely to make the entry requirement, but commoners were welcome as long as they could pass. Given that wealthy merchants would also hire tutors, and even villages would sometimes pool their funds to hire a group tutor, this was not that uncommon. The only exception to this rule is the field engineers. Because of their expertise, they did not have to take the close combat tests.
The Lion Hearts are shock troopers. Normally tasked to hold the most valuable of targets, in the war with the drukhari, they were utterly fearsome in combat. Very few of the Lion Hearts could hold individually against a drukhari, but together they made many kills. Like the Death Seekers, they were a unit the drukhari could recognize and would sometimes avoid.
Interestingly enough, as they lose older member to true death and get new recruits, they will likely shift to recruiting more mutants. Because of their greater strength, they often specialize in close combat and easily pass the tests. This may result in a change in character for the unit over time, but as the elder members will teach the younger their ideals, it's hard to say.
The Indominable Cabbits: Random insanity given physical form, this is the most eccentric of the units under Manric's command.
The Cabbits are not exceptional at anything except creating chaos but that is something they do very, very well. Because of that they are first choice for oddball missions and excel at various forms of sabotage. Telling them to just do whatever they want, while effective, can sometimes result in truly bizarre outcomes. Overall the Cabbits have far more remarkable successes than failures, but their failures are pretty extreme. They haven't been wiped out yet but it might be a matter of time.
The Commander of the Cabbits looks for soldiers with the knack for creative insanity his unit loves, or who are just willing to go along with it.
The God's Hands: The unit made entirely of older, retired men who decided to come back for the sake of their people. They are continuing this tradition and usually only recruit veterans who settled down to have a family, before taking immortality to fight in the stars.
Because of their background as solid family men, and their great age before biotransference, the God's Hands are the most solid of units. Specializing more in pure defense than any other unit, they can be trusted to hold in the face of the worst offensive imaginable. Less inspired on offense than other units, they are still extremely capable in that area. An elite unit, the God's Hands can be trusted to carry out any order in their calm, solid way.
At this point in time, the God's Hands has been split into smaller units to garrison all the ork infested worlds that need it. This is likely to become their traditional duty, and one they will do well.
Navgran the High Transmuter was deeply enjoying his new life.
That was how he thought of it. Before he'd regained a soul, Navgran had thought of himself as something of a fraud. Not truly deserving to be called a great luminary, he dazzled those around him with dexterity and, as the humans would say, baffled them with bullshit. (one of the pwi-necrons had used that phrase in his hearing and he'd quite liked it) But it had all been to hide the fact that while his skills were very good, he'd lost the spark of creativity that marked a true Luminary. He managed with clever enhancements on existing technology, but nothing new would come.
It had shocked Navgran more than anyone else when a soul fixed that problem. Creativity came surging back and Navgran was deep in the throes of building a brand new, alchemic engine that would rain down destruction upon the Maynarkh Dynasty! Alas, it wasn't going to be ready for the Pariah Nexus but his work was finicky and took a while. Another piece was already done and presented to Imotekh, with a great deal of fanfare.
Everyone knows I am not a fraud now. It was so pleasing, to get genuine accolades from great minds like Ibianza. But most pleasing of all was the realization that he had always deserved to be the High Transmuter. To know that he'd earned the title, but the brilliance behind it had been ripped away by the C'Tan. So pleasing to finally have it back. He still played the political games, of course, still added a heavy layer of puffery and obfuscation to his work, but now there was a solid core behind it.
What is this, what is this? Navgran let himself be distracted from his work as a little worm program signalled him for attention, then spat a quick data dump in his direction. Part of playing political games was keeping an eye on your competitors and right now, High Psychomancer Zivok was in his sights. Truly impressive to have gained the title so quickly, although remembering the Flesh Times, not unwarranted. With the short lifespans of the necrontyr, those with the ability did tend to advance quickly.
The worm program had picked up a transmission from Hope, flagged as important and had delayed it just long enough to copy it before sending it to the proper destination. Navgran could have used the program for interception, but Zivok would surely notice if messages went missing. He had yet to notice that some of his protections had been penetrated and that was how Navgran liked it. The message unfurled and Navgran examined it with interest.
"Well, well well. This is fascinating," he said, taking it in. The first thing he noticed was that this was coming from a low-level researcher on Hope, bypassing the correct channels. Navgran chuckled drily… someone trying to make sure that an incompetent superior did not take credit for their work? Perhaps. Or perhaps that incompetent superior had decided to suppress it, for some reason. That did happen as well. Or was the superior right and this was errant foolishness? After a quick perusal, Navgran came to the conclusion that this was not foolish at all. In fact, it was rather alarming.
"Zivok will handle this, fortunately," Navgran mused to himself. Zivok would immediately get the DNA code of a Warrior named 'Loki' removed from the general banks. That was critical because every single spontaneous psyker soul produced by the gene banks had a significant amount of his DNA. Semephren's soul was the one with the most, at a solid thirty percent and if Navgran remembered correctly, he was a weak Delta. What would happen if the DNA banks happened to spit out a soul that was eighty percent this DNA strand, the maximum allowed of a single strand? Perhaps they shouldn't find out.
Also concerning was a neat list of Necrons and pwi-Necrons who were not known to be psykers, but had a small amount of this DNA strand. All fairly low, below five percent, but the author of this report suggested they all be checked and evaluated to see if they needed additional blackstone. Given the dangers of Chaos, that might be prudent.
"I almost wish I had taken a psyker soul," Navgran said to himself. At the time, he'd had no appetite for the danger but now he wondered what he was missing. "Well, perhaps it's for the best." Curious, he read over the description of the Warrior and his abilities. Astral walking? He'd never heard of it, that was strange.
Also interesting was the DNA code of a Necron Overlord named Sulkh. His clone DNA had been roughly seventy percent from a certain individual, long dead, who was now thought to be a Blank. Six other names were suggested for evaluation, all containing levels of DNA from this person at over thirty percent. That could be useful, Blanks and Pariahs were so difficult to find, even for the Imperium of Man. It was so much worse in the Sautekh Empire, but now they had at least one confirmed sample.
Navgran tapped his fingers together, wishing he had a way to talk to Zivok about this. Would he be getting neural scans from this Loki? What exactly was 'astral walking' anyway? Yet, he couldn't just go ask without answering some very awkward questions. Navgran decided to wait until someone was gossiping about it, then take his questions to Zivok. Or perhaps the gossip would answer everything and he wouldn't need to. Putting all that aside, he went back to his work on a new transmutation engine.
When it was done, it would be glorious!
Loki wasn't sure about what he was doing and he was really, really worried that he was going to scare Ke'yanakh.
Even thinking that to himself made him feel a bit silly. Overlord Ke'yanakh was a powerful Overlord with a long and illustrious lineage, which mattered because he'd been on the front lines in the War in Heaven and had fought aeldari the way they'd used to be, before they'd gone through the Fall. But Loki knew that might mean Ke'yanakh had a very good idea what Warp powers were supposed to be able to do and this wasn't it. Loki was pretty sure if he showed this to a human Inquisitor, they'd poop their pants. Ke'yanakh was tougher so Loki would expect a more measured sort of fear, but that wasn't great.
Loki agonized over it. Should he not show this to Ke'yanakh at all? But it would be fantastically useful! One application in particular was just incredible and could make Loki so much more versatile, capable of taking on missions that normally only humans could do. With this ability, he could do anything!
Finally Loki decided he had to share it. It would be disloyal NOT to share everything he could do, right? His superiors needed to know, right? Loki just hoped they wouldn't send him to the aeldari immediately and he really thought they might. He was really enjoying his current lessons though.
"You wanted to see me?" Overlord Ke'yanakh asked the next day. Loki had politely requested a meeting. Loki saluted respectfully.
"Yes sir! I've been experimenting with my powers a little, sir, and this ability is so incredibly useful for our work I thought I had to show you," Loki said before concentrating a little. It was harder because the real world was stickier but it was essentially the same process as the Warp, when Loki chose his appearance. His Necron body vanished, replaced with his human one although Loki instantly realized there was a small problem with it. Humans weren't eight feet tall… after a moment's work, he adjusted the size down to seven feet. That was still very tall for a human, maybe he should adjust that down further, but it wasn't freakishly impossible like eight feet. Ke'yanakh watched, interested.
"I see, an illusion." An… illusion? "We do have such things, although they are not reliable enough to use for missions. You believe this will be suitable?" Loki was a little speechless. He thought it was an illusion?
"Uh, yes sir! This is extremely reliable!" Loki said, although that was because this wasn't an illusion at all, it was a complete alteration in reality. Ke'yanakh tilted his head.
"Despite the height difference of your body beneath the illusion?" …That didn't matter… "Well, if you are careful that shouldn't be a problem." Loki was dying inside as he tried to think of how to explain. Also, could he even make illusions? Loki thought maybe he COULDN'T, telepathy had never been his thing. Was it crazy that just changing reality around him was way easier than tricking people?
Then, to Loki's relief, Calder showed up and fixed everything.
"Forgive me sir, Loki asked me to meet us, I assumed he would be here… who is this?" Calder examined him dubiously and Loki knew he was seeing a civilian man with soft blonde hair, wearing pretty typical clothes for Hemingway and no horns. Loki knew Calder was definitely going to poop on his new appearance, he KNEW what Calder would say, so he prudently stayed silent. But then Calder recognized it. "Wait, Loki? Is that you?"
"Uh, yeah! Do you like it?" Loki said, knowing he wouldn't. Sure enough, Calder made glyphs of derision.
"You're cosplaying as the real Loki again? Your mum wasn't the only one with mental issues." Oh, come on! "Where are your horns?" WELL!
"I wasn't gonna do that but since you asked!" Loki said brightly before giving himself golden horns. They felt so nice and fit him perfectly, he loved them! Then he followed it with the grey greatcloak, trimmed with fur, and the beautiful but ancient clothing beneath it. It was super detailed, fine woolen clothes with leather trim and a bit of leather armor too.
"Interesting, so you can change the illusion at will," Ke'yanakh said, disregarding all the stuff about Loki.
"Illusion?" Calder did something that was completely typical of him… he waved his hand over Loki's head and touched nothing. Exactly where his head WOULD have been, if he'd still been a Necron. "This isn't an illusion, sir, he's turned himself human. Hey Loki, can you do that to anyone? Can you do that to me?" Uh yeah! Loki concentrated a moment and imagined Calder, exactly as he'd been before they stepped through the furnace. He was a very dark skinned, very old man, with deep wrinkles. Calder was bald, but with a nice bushy beard. "LOKI! How dare you give me my joint pains back?!" OH NO!
"Oh, wow, sorry!" That was crazy, he'd done that?! Loki hurriedly altered it so Calder looked like he had as a young man, strong and with a full head of hair. Calder sighed a little before touching himself, exploring his body.
"This is truly incredible… it feels so very real," he said, pinching his own skin a bit. Ke'yanakh had been watching the whole thing and spoke, his tone flat.
"This is an alteration in reality." He looked at Loki and he made glyphs indicating displeasure and concern. "I have never seen an aeldari do such a thing. How can you have such a potent power?" Well… uh…
"Well sir, eldar can do things like telepathy and throwing fire around and lifting things with their minds and I can't do any of that, unless I do an actual spell anyway." Spells let sorcerers get around stuff like that. It was possible to not be a psyker at all, and still become a sorcerer, if you knew what you were doing. You wouldn't be a GOOD sorcerer, but you'd probably also last longer than stronger ones. "This is the only thing I do… it's very powerful, but is it really more powerful than some crazy flame strike or crushing a tank with your mind?" Sure, Loki could just look at a building and turn it to rubble by deciding that it should be rubble but if another psyker could hit it with a fireball and do the same, did it matter that his way of doing it was scarier? They were both changing the building from not-rubble to rubble.
"Do you have any idea what you're doing?" Ke'yanakh asked and Loki replied with absolute honesty.
"No sir! Ahriman did say I have really good instincts though! I've been trying to figure out how it works in the real world… it seems to be a lot harder here." Ke'yanakh made a questioning glyph and Loki elaborated. "I can basically create something out of nothing, but it takes a lot of effort and makes me run really hot. Altering something that already exists, like turning me and Calder human, is way easier. It doesn't obey natural laws though, I've weighed myself and my weight changes. I don't know where the extra mass goes," Loki said. He was vague on everything, except to assume it was just magic. "But as far as I can tell, this transformation is perfect. The only downside is that I don't sleep like a human, I still need to take a rest cycle and then everything I've been messing with reverts back, including me. So if I wanted to use this for a mission I'd have to make sure I'm undisturbed for my sleep cycles."
"Do you have any theory about why it's easier in the Immaterium than it is in the real world?" Ke'yanakh asked and Loki nodded.
"Well, not a theory, more like a certainty. The Immaterium just isn't the real world. When I'm there, I don't really alter the reality of things so much as my perception of it, and that has power." Was he making any sense? "But that's because the Warp doesn't HAVE a reality of things. The real world does and just altering my perception of it doesn't change the world, it just makes me insane. So I have to do actual reality alteration. It's way more work." Loki ran a bit hot when he was astral walking, from what Manric said, but that was nothing compared to some of the readings he'd gotten when he was messing around with reality.
"Wait, hold on. Loki, I just had an awful thought," Calder said. "What happens if we die like this? Are we still tied to recall?" …Uh…
"Nope! Not even slightly! If you die, you are dead!" Loki said with insane cheer and Calder stared at him for a moment. "Come on Calder, what's going to happen?"
"Now that you've said that, we're going to get hit by a meteor! Change me back!" Oh alright. Calder reverted back to his necron body and Loki decided maybe that was a good idea so he switched himself back. Ke'yanakh was looking at Calder, now.
"Are you so afraid of death?" he asked, not making any glyphs but Loki fancied that was a bit derisive. Loki knew what Calder was afraid of and it wasn't exactly that but he decided to leave that to him to explain.
"Not death per se sir, but rather, dying in a very pointless and stupid way," Calder said and Loki nodded to himself. Calder had been afraid of that since – "Remember that poor man who got mustered out? What was his name, Ross? Survived two drukhari invasions, fought like a demon, went home and got kicked in the head by a horse and died!"
"Yeah, just a year after he went home. It was a terrible shame," Loki said, remembering it. What a thing to happen after going through so much. Then he looked at Calder. "You're afraid of going to Hel instead of Valhalla!" Ke'yanakh made a glyph of confusion and Loki explained. "In Norse mythology, you have to die in honorable battle to go to Valhalla, the hall of heroes! Otherwise you go to Hell!" Although in Norse mythology, hell wasn't horrible – there was a special place for the bad people – it was just very boring. Calder made a glyph of derision.
"Loki, stop blaspheming. I'll go to God either way, I just want to die in battle." Ke'yanakh made a glyph of satisfaction, now that he understood Calder's feelings.
"An understandable wish. Now…" Ke'yanakh paused, regarding Loki and he had a bad feeling about this. Then he made glyphs of resolution and firm decision. "You are going to the aeldari now. It cannot wait." Loki drooped although he'd been expecting this.
"Awww, I've really been enjoying learning how to do investigations and you're going to separate us, aren't you sir?" Calder just had no purpose at Craftworld Iyanden, except maybe to be Loki's nanny and the truth was, he didn't need that. Loki and Calder had stopped being joined at the hip after they were mustered out and Calder started his family. They loved being together, they were best friends, but they could get on without each other for a while. Calder slapped him on the shoulder.
"Cheer up Loki, this would have to be done eventually anyway." That was true. Before or after the Pariah Nexus, Calder wouldn't go with him. "Get yourself sorted out and maybe you can even use these powers in the Pariah Nexus."
"That isn't likely at all Calder! The Pariah Nexus completely stomps on psyker – sir?" Ke'yanakh had just made a sharp glyph of disagreement.
"Your powers seem to relate to travelling into the Warp and altering reality. Is it not reasonable that you might be able to act as a psychic version of the positively charged blackstone, breaking through the miasma of the Pariah Nexus?" Loki stared because he hadn't thought of that at all. But the Sisters of Battle and others could survive in the Nexus by believing in the Emperor hard enough. Loki's ability to connect to the Warp wasn't like that at all, but could he do something like that? "The eldar can determine if that is feasible." Uh, yeah, yeah!
"Wow. Okay sir, I'll go right away if we have a ship." Loki understood how important this was. They'd made as many positively charged blackstone ships as they could, but they could still run out when they started getting destroyed in battle, ANYTHING that could cut through the miasma was precious.
Loki would put his all into learning how to control his abilities.
Elsewhere, in an abandoned and desecrated system, a completely different force was gathering.
The Craftworlders and drukhari were coordinating together. They despised each other, yet still trusted each other more than they trusted the Imperium or the Sautekh Empire. Also, they fundamentally practiced the same kind of war, there was very little difference between their spaceships and other craft. So they would work together.
The Craftworlders needed the drukhari for logistical support. A gate to Commorragh was nearby, and supplies could be brought from the dark city, munitions and supplemental food. Meanwhile, the drukhari needed the Craftworlders urgently as they could use their great psychic gifts to cut through the miasma of the Pariah Nexus. While the drukhari could and would reclaim their psionic might, with Slaanesh dead, it would take decades to work the long-atrophied muscles and build back their native abilities. Also, they needed to relearn everything, which would take longer. They just had no time for that and it made more sense to depend on their kin.
The aeldari forces were not coordinating directly with the Imperium or the Sautekh. Instead, they were depending on their Farseers to plot them a course. Instead of following the attack pattern of a great Crusade, or the Necron equivalent, they would use their speed and smaller numbers to launch all kinds of hit and run attacks on the forces of the Szarekhan Dynasty. And they had a great advantage over the Imperium… aeldari ships were mostly self-sustaining. Equipped with a perfect water cycle, extremely efficient hydroponics and some cloned meats, they could operate indefinitely with only a bit of support in the way of munitions.
The humans of the Imperium would have accused the eldar of letting them and the necrons take the hard knocks and in that, they would be completely correct. The Craftworlders needed to build up their numbers and while they were now using some cloning, they wanted to make sure the clones were well adjusted and trained. The drukhari had less of a problem in that area, with their endless cloning banks but they still wanted to minimize casualties. So they would let the 'lesser' races die, to spare themselves.
Eldrad himself was with these forces and was very grateful that the situation with Ulthwe was favorable enough that he could leave. He knew of Imotekh's plans, taken from the message Lorgar had delivered. Using Orikan's advice, Imotekh had grudgingly choked them down, and then given his Overlords the bad news. That had been a bit of an ugly time, from what he'd heard, but ultimately everyone trusted the Stormlord. It helped that they all knew he'd suffered as cruelly as any of them, and would only spare the Silent King if he truly had to.
(that did not mean everyone truly accepted it, but they knew that going against Imotekh was death)
(that might be a problem later)
So for that prophecy to be brought to fruition, the greatest psykers of the eldar race needed to be present when the Pariah Nexus was taken and Eldrad would be there. For a moment, he wondered what the Harlequins were doing but he simply had no idea. Yvraine and the Ynnari were also missing. When would they turn up? He had no idea and the Farseers had no idea, likely because the Harlequins didn't WANT them to know. Briefly, Eldrad felt a bit of despair.
He loved his own people, but did they really have to be like this?