The Seer of Corrinto
The lander thundered through the skies of the Groden Moon, sweeping over the swampland below with the sound of screaming ram-jets. Its escorts, two similar painted grey-blue Lightenings peeled off and arced back into the sky. The Aquila class lander kept on going, powering barely three metres above the forest canopy. Strange reptilian birds and furry winged mammals fluttered angrily into the sky, squawking at the new predator invading their territory.
“This is nothing short of heresy!” Interrogator Rufus Thracken growled from inside the cockpit, peering with disgust at the green-grey swamps below. The swamp-forest covered the moon as far as the eye could see, a vast snot-green ocean of overgrow fungus spewed under a sickly ochre sky. “We should simply kill this witch and have done with it! Not consort with the fiend!”
“Hold your tongue Rufus, or I will have Orgustos cut it out. That’s strike one. Your words are beginning to sound a lot like insubordination.” Exander purred with a half-smile, giving his subordinate a sidelong stare with cold eyes as he tightened his gloves. His yellow irises almost made the Interrogator shudder. Almost.
How Many Orks…?
What makes a man truly a man?
In the innermost sanctuary of the NorthKern fortress, a lone sound still could be heard. A ragged sound, the heavy breathing of a man. In the darkness, near the shattered glowglobe on the desk, a body still tried to cling to life. Starving, old, tired, it was slowly losing its battle, but it could resist a few more minutes. The mouth was trying to form words, a last prayer maybe, but only a croaking sound emerged. The left hand tightened on an autopistol.
Is a man already a man when he is, and always will be, alone?
Shakingly, the arm rose, to rest the barrel of the gun on the temple of the officer. With feeble strength, the right hand gripped the aquila sitting on the desk. A flare, and the gun thumped, smoking, on the carpet. Silence.
Is a man already a man, if his world lie within a little tribe, a few hundred fellows, without a true society?
Marneus Calgar’s Barmy Army: 2009 Christmas Special
“What do you think about that weird Christmas song, ‘A Spaceman Came Travelling’?”
“I think it should be illegal to write Christmas songs while on drugs, sir.”
- Marneus Calgar and Dick Bannerman
*
It is the 41st Millennium. For more than a hundred centuries the Emperor has sat immobile on the Golden Throne of Earth, waiting for Gran Turismo 5 to come out. He is the master of mankind by the will of the Prophets, and master of a million worlds by the might of Andy Chambers (sob, come back Andy) and Jervis Johnson. I mean, JERVIS, for feth’s sake? That’s not even a real name, it sounds like something from Dungeons and Dragons, no offence.
The Emperor is a rotting carcass writhing invisibly with power from technology invented during NoPoet’s forthcoming 20K series. He is the Carrion Lord of the Imperium (the Emperor, not NoPoet) for whom a thousand souls are sacrificed every day, so that he may never truly die. We’re sure he is really happy about that.
Evermont
It was already past midnight when Interrogator Malik Joon arrived at the House called Evermont. The bright beams of the limousine’s headlights swept across the tall hive mansion.
The Evermont lurked behind leafless trees, implanted long ago to add colour to the oppressive High Gothic architecture of the large, rambling buildings. Joon thought it looked typical of the sort of hab-houses you might find nestled into the mid-hives, full of the character the middle classes exude into their homes. He didn’t need to be a psyker to sense the mix of snobbery imbedded in the very rockcrete, as if the buildings wedged between the upper and the lower hives found themselves disdainful of one class and resentful of the other.
A faint light gleamed from the walk-level lamps as the private car swung into the drive past two deactivated servitor-sentries guarding the Evermont’s approach, their flesh slowly decaying with disuse.
Hey folks…
Howdy all,
I apologize for the sudden stop on stories. It’s that time of the year again, notably exams. I have my last one Monday morning, and I hope to get a story up here on the front page soon after I get home from that.
Imperial Literature is going to a once-a-week publishing schedule. Two stories a week was straining to keep up with. I hope this new schedule will result in consistently quality stories for your reading pleasure. The information pages will be updated on Monday to reflect this.
Contest. I had promised one a while back, but that fell on its face (the Halloween contest wasn’t it!). Thus, we’re turning to you all for ideas for the theme, scale, deadline etc. Send your opinions and thoughts, along with any other feedback about Imp Lit, to consadine@gmail.com with “Imp Lit” in the subject line.
Cheers all, thanks for reading,
-Consadine
Gothwine or no Gothwine
Dining at the House of Gothwinsor, Imperial nobleman Andro Slaker looked down at his rich meal of peppered grox fillet and considered the vast efforts that had gone into delivering it to his plate.
The hiveworld of Praetoria, a spewing metropolis of crime and poverty, at least below the high-hive, was not an agricultural world. Much of its surface was taken up by bloated city stacks, as vast and dense as mountain ranges. Overpopulated and polluted, teeming with billions of beleaguered workers, Proud Praetoria had no farmlands or cattle ranches. Instead it had factories, workhouses, hab-stacks and more factories, every shred of food imported from offworld.
Marneus Calgar’s Barmy Army: Part 1
= Ultramarine Chapter History =
The Astonishing War Record of the Ultramarines
30th Millennium - The Ultramarines number at least 500,000 men. God, 500,000 of the sods. Thank the Lord for Horus.
31st Millennium - Horus leads the largest warhost of Chaos ever known in the invasion of Earth. Roboute Gulliman and his entire Legion of Ultramarines are at the other side of the galaxy. Gulliman will later write the book on tactical thinking.
31st Millennium - After the Heresy army is destroyed, Gulliman writes a book of military tactics. There is a huge rush of demand for this book. Many copies were returned when it was discovered Gulliman omitted the “How to avoid pitched battles by travelling to the other end of the Milky Way on a goose chase and staying there til the war is over” chapter. It is considered a wacky coincidence that the Imperium which relies on Gulliman’s book also worships a corpse.
31st Millennium - The Ultramarines are split into numerous Chapters. Try as we might, it’s hard to find something funny to say about this. Roboute Gulliman pegs it in combat. The Ultramarines preserve his body in a sus-an field. Everyone thinks this is a bit weird, as it is like taking a deceased grandparent to the taxidermist.
32nd Millennium - By now the Ultras are charging admission. Gulliman’s position within the field is altered so that he appears to be rearing up like a ferocious bear. This is very popular with children.
41st Millennium - Marneus Calgar is born.
–
Tyran’s Last Day
And the tide of death sweeps onwards.
Darkness in the Warp, a shadow rising that drove the psykers insane with dreams of clicking claws and scraping chitin, a shadow that slashed through the cobweb-thin strands of fellowship between the worlds of humanity. In the true darkness of the void, the ships are coming, great gliding crustaceans of yellowed ivory trawling through the black desert between the stars, always seeking and moving.
Always hungry.
But before the Hive rose like a trillion-strong swarm of hideous wasps, before a name was forged from the remains of a dead and broken world, before even the twisting tendrils of a mind too vast and slow to comprehend first touched the realm of men and began to drain it dry…
A world fell to the horde, a world of raging oceans and deadly predators that knew not that they were only prey, a world that christened the death that would soon threaten every world of humanity. Tyran was consumed by the darkness of the Swarm and although the world was forgotten in the grim feast that still continues to this day, for a thousand men and women, it was home.
This is Tyran’s last day.
Ghostwalkers
“Mission log, XMS Ontario, triple-zero-double-oh-six, M20. We are approaching the hyper-gate and are preparing for translation. While our Mechanica contingent are excited about the upcoming journey, I can’t help but wonder whether the Ontario will make the translation intact. This is the first time a manned Navy ship will travel through the hyper-gate and there is no way to know for sure what will happen while we are under way.”
Captain Thorpe sat back in her chair, looking around the familiar space of her command cabin. These new cruisers were so cramped. She’d been pushing for her own ship and now she had finally received one – now the shipbuilding project was able to supply vessels for all Navy captains – she wished she’d been assigned one of the older types, perhaps the legendary Canyon class.
Dwellers In the Past
Author’s note: Please take this work with a grain of salt. GW has written very little about the Necrons or their past. I’m taking what I know from the official canon and extrapolating wildly. Also bear in mind that the characters mentioned herein will have their own personal motives and goals. Not everything you read may be the truth or 100% accurate from their point of view. I ask only that you read the story and enjoy it for what it is.
With that, please enjoy ‘Dwellers in the Past.’
***
They called the world the Cauldron, and the marine could think of no better name for a planet so permeated by chaos. When the crimson sky did not scream with endless thundering peals of lightning and the roiling clouds did not bleed thick bloody torrents of red rain, the world sat motionless, utterly devoid of all life, sound, or thought.
Naturally, those times were the worst. No breeze stirred, no animal called, no person spoke. The ability to hear falling leaves is occasionally a curse, thought the marine even as he suppressed a wince at the relative volume of his inner voice. But of course that was foolishness. Whatever things might hear his thoughts he would certainly hear breathing in the inky darkness.
NS-1011:
Reporting Progress: Mission 0001 1100 0010 0111;
Directive 6596:
Subject Identified
Transmitting Coordinates…
NL-010:
Acknowledged
Coordinates received
Transmitting updated subject evaluation criteria…
NS-1011:
Receiving…
Checksum: OK
Encrypt Key: *** *********** ************ *******
Decrypting…
Decompressing…
Parsing…
Evaluation Criteria UPDATED
NL-010:
Resume Mission 0001 1100 0010 0111
NS-1011:
Acknowledged
Synchronizing bioelectric waveform…
Transmitting…