Stars and Steel Dragons 1 (TCW/Primarch Jumpchain) (Patreon)

Commander Hylos Macles, one of the oldest living members of the Steel Dragons Legion, hesitated. It wasn’t something he did often, he’d faced death so many times that he’d lost count millennia ago, but even he couldn’t help but feel… not anxious, but he knew no word that would be more appropriate. Forcing himself forward, he approached the leader of the legion, placing the butt of his chainaxe on the floor of the strange facility they’d found themselves on as he knelt.

“Father,” he greeted. “The Librarians and Techmarines have confirmed the initial suspicions: this station draws from the Warp.”

Vingthor Odinson, Primarch of the Steel Dragons, did not respond, continuing to stare out the window in the closest they had found to a central hall. Taking the silence as a sign to continue, Hylos said, “The Sorcerers have also reported that the Immaterium is… unusually quiet. They see no signs of the Eye or the False God’s Beacon. They conclude that we are far from any known place, and the odds of returning are highly unlikely. Even when we eventually build enough voidships, we have no means of navigating to familiar space.

“For more material concerns, while the entirety of the Legion that survived the initial battle over Terra are accounted for, the Voidflame, Warpdrake, and Yawning Flame are unlikely to fly again. Most likely, they will need to be cannibalized in order to build a new vessel. Fortunately, our provisions are sufficient to sustain the Legion for over a year, and scans of the current system have identified a planet with life that can most likely be hunted.”

“Who else arrived?” the Primarch asked, the first words that any in the Legion had heard him speak since fleeing Terra. His voice was rough, gravely, and the memory of how he’d been found made Hylos’s own neck ache.

Still, the question confused Hylos, “Father, there has been no signs that anyone not of the Legion is aboard this station.”

“Well then, that narrows it down,” the Primarch muttered. He stood, towering over any and all within the Legion and most of the other Primarchs as well, collecting his ax and shield. Hylos stood, following his Primarch as the giant stalked through the halls. “Continue searching the station, have the Techmarines pry every scrap of information they can from its systems. I want to know anything and everything that this station is capable of.”

“Of course, Father. It will be done,” Hylos said with a nod, pausing before he broke away. “Father… if I may be so bold, what is your plan, now that the Siege of Terra ended in failure?”

His Primarch took a deep breath before answering, “I do not know. Something tells me that there is far more going on than is immediately apparent. We need more information, but until we either find the Eye of Terror or the Astronomicon, we will need to consider the possibility of being marooned.”

It was a sobering possibility, but Hylos put it from his mind as he set out to do as his Primarch had ordered.

[hr][/hr]

Jesus fucking Christ on a rocket powered pogostick, I have no fucking idea how the fuck I’m not screaming from the top of my lungs right now. I’m at home, bundled up in my blankets with a mason jar of hot chocolate (mugs don’t hold enough), filling out this stupid jumpchain my buddy sent me, and the next thing I know I’m in the middle of a battlefield while some guy with a buzz cut is shoving an ax into my neck.

Said guy is decapitated before I’m dead, but I pass out to the feeling of a multitude of hands grabbing me by the arms and shoulders and dragging my confused ass off as my neck burns. And I mean that literally, running my fingers over the healed cut tells me that’s a burn scar.

Really, I should be glad for the fact that I’d passed out, it gave me time to have a deluge of memories downloading into my brain and for them to be processed. Turns out that jumpchain build I’d made, yeah, that’s whose body I was now inhabiting. I am so fucking glad I’d decided to cheat and use that Head Start CYOA as well.

Regardless, I’m now a Chaos Primarch, with a Legion of Chaos Space Marines, no idea where I am, and something scratching at my brain telling me that I and my Legion aren’t the only ones here. Oh, and a metric fuckton of ideas for making space ships.

From what I can tell going through the memories, I… Vingthor, the Primarch whose body I now owned, had been talked by Lorgar into joining the Traitor Legions during what would later be called the Horus Heresy. This being despite the fact that Horus and Vingthor despised one another.

I forced the memories back, focusing on the here and now. I swear, something about this station was familiar to me, but for the life of me I couldn’t figure out why. I could tell, through Vingthor’s memories, that this place wasn’t built by humans of the Imperium, the architecture screaming ‘xenotech’ to his mind, which meant that the familiarity was probably because I’d seen it in my original, quiet, peaceful life.

Which given that it had been a quiet, peaceful life, meant I’d seen it in either a movie or video game. Oh goodie. Entering a new room, I froze. Not because I’d sprung a booby trap or anything, but because of the giant blade now resting against my neck.

“You so much as lob that ax, and I will take your head,” the one holding what I now recognized as a scythe blade growled. “I have questions, and you’re going to answer them.”

I turned my head, taking in the visage of the woman in high end power armor, the lower half of her face covered with a gas mask. I recognized the armor, and the scythe holding it, but last time I had checked, Mortarion of the Death Guard was a guy.

Now, I know I’m not always the sharpest knife in the block, but even I know to be tactful when someone has a murder implement that is also probably liable to cause shit a lot worse than tetanus if it nicks me. Of course, given my luck, I shouldn’t be surprised that my mouth started working without my input.

“Had you begun with that, I would be more inclined to cooperate. As it is, you will remove your blade from my neck if you wish to have any answers at all,” the part of me that was Vingthor stated flatly. Fuck me, I’m gonna die, again!

The woman stared at me, her golden amber eyes narrowed. Finally, after the most nerve wracking moments I’d actually lived through, the scythe was taken away from my neck.

“You wear the armor of my fallen brother, Mortarion,” I found myself saying.

“You wear the armor of my fallen sister, Valkyrie,” she returned.

“Is your Legion here as well, as the Steel Dragons are?” I asked.

“No. If they are, I do not know where,” she answered. “Who are you?”

“Vingthor Odinson, Primarch of the Steel Dragons, follower of the gods of the Warp. Yourself?”

“Morticia, Primarch of the Death Guard, follower of Nurgle.”

We traded questions back and forth for several minutes, with the conclusion being that, yes, Morticia was the female Mortarion, and I was the male version of the primarch she had known as Valkyrie. Rather interestingly, both of our counterparts had died long ago. From Vingthor’s memories, Mortarion had been killed in the opening battle of the Horus Heresy, his head ripped off by Lena Russ. According to Morticia, my counterpart had died in the Siege of Terra, “That Bitch” Manus decapitating her with her own ax.

By this point, we had moved to sit against a wall, and I had poured us both primarch sized cups of Norskarion Blood Mead (I always kept a few flasks on me). Morticia stared down at the crimson drink in her cup, her golden amber eyes distant.

Finally, she pulled down her gas mask, her skin corpse pale, scars across her lips, and blotches over the back of her jawline. Still, as she took a drink of the booze, I couldn’t help but think that she was surprisingly cute.

She let out a sigh, reaffixing her gas mask before she said, “It has been ten thousand years since I have had Norskarion alcohol, let alone been able to share a drink with Valkyrie, and I have to say… I had forgotten how much of a kick it had.”

I snorted, “I remember the first time I met Russ, the buffoon didn’t believe me when I told him that Blood Mead was strong enough to get even a primarch drunk. The next morning, he was so hungover that even his heartbeats sounded like a Defiance-class voidship firing its guns right next to his head.”

Morticia chuckled, the sound gravely, but still nice to hear, “I think I know the time you are talking about. Lena was angry about it for centuries, her ears still rang a month later, and she refused to speak to Valkyrie for a decade afterward.”

That was when we were interrupted by the sounds of footsteps, Morticia scrambling to her feet and glowering behind her gas mask. I chuckled under my breath, but stood up as well, tossing back the last of my drink just as a number of Steel Dragons appeared around the corner.

“Father, the…” the one in front began, only to pause upon seeing Morticia.

“Report, I will make an announcement later,” I ordered, the five astartes snapping to attention.

“The Techmaries have managed to devise a translation program for the station’s systems, and according to them, the station is called the Star Forge. It was constructed by a race of xenos called the Rakatans and their Infinite Empire, and it draws from both the Warp and the system’s star to construct anything it has schematics for at a rapid pace. Their initial estimates are that it could construct voidships on par with the Voidflame in as little as three terran weeks.”

That’s why the corridors were so familiar, even though it had been years, I’d played the shit out of Knights of the Old Republic. Still, I didn’t let it distract me as I continued to listen.

“Further examination of the schematics already present show that the xeno builders used a form of space travel that relied upon the Warp for navigation, but did not travel through it. Furthermore, in addition to large voidships, this station is capable of producing down to the scale of equipment for use by infantry. Techmarine Cargan was practically drooling as he ranted about the possibilities.”

I gave a considering hum, rubbing my chin as I thought. I was on the Star Forge, the only real question now was if I was in a version of the Star Wars galaxy or the Warhammer galaxy. I really hoped for the former, it was a lot less batshit insane. As was so often the case, I needed more information.

“Have the faster than light systems thoroughly analyzed, particularly how they use the Warp for navigation. Then send out scouting parties in the surviving shuttles. Have them assess the state of the Imperium, and how long we were traveling through the Warp before we crashed. We are effectively blind out here, and if the Imperium knows where we are, it will only be a matter of time before we’re attacked,” I said.

“By your will,” the Space Marines said in unison, snapping off salutes as they departed to do as I ordered.

Letting out a breath, I turned back to Morticia, “There’s work to be done. Care to join me?”

She looked down at my offered hand, her forehead scrunching up cutely under her hood, before shifting her scythe to her other hand and putting her left hand in my right. So we set out, holding hands. How lewd.